Breath of the Wild Ingredients Find Their Way into New Historical Novel
Posted on August 03 2020 by Heather Beard
OKAY. This is a thread, but it’s worth it I promise.
— Dana Schwartz (@DanaSchwartzzz) August 3, 2020
On Reddit today, user u/NoNoNo_OhOhOh posted a page from acclaimed Irish novelist John Boyne’s latest book, ‘The Traveller At the Gates of Wisdom.
Note the ingredients. pic.twitter.com/4RTgZxtUT7
Everyone makes mistakes, and sometimes those mistakes can have humorous results. Irish author John Boyne, perhaps best known for the 2006 historical novel The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, recently released his latest novel, A Traveller At The Gates of Wisdom, to positive reviews. But while readers have praised the book for its ambition and originality, it has also caught the attention of video game fans for its use of a familiar recipe for “red dye.”
Pictures surfaced on Reddit over the weekend that show a paragraph from A Traveller At The Gates of Wisdom listing ingredients from Breath of the Wild. In a portion of the novel set during the era of fifth-century ruler Attila the Hun, Boyne writes about dyes used in dressmaking, using familiar words like “octorock eyeball,” “tail of the red lizalfos,” “keese wing,” “silent princess,” and “Hylian shrooms.” Those sound familiar, don’t they?
Twitter user Dana Schwartz pointed out that it looks like the author Googled “ingredients red dye clothes” and stumbled upon Polygon’s guide to dying clothes in Breath of the Wild. If one were to try this Google search out for themselves, the process would yield similar results. John Boyne’s response to Schwartz was all in good fun, saying that he’ll be “telling this anecdote on stage for many years to come.” He also states that he will not be editing this mistake in future editions of the novel.
It’s nice to see everyone taking the honest mistake in good fun. Mistakes happen, and it’s nice to see all parties having a laugh. What do you think of this literary mishap? Sound off in the comments below.
Hi I’m Heather! I’m Senior Editor and Art Director at Zelda Dungeon and I’ve been a member of the ZD team since 2019. I am a graphic designer, artist, and nerdy mom to an awesome little boy. When my nose isn’t in a book, working on my novel or watching anime you can find me curled up with my cats Mandy-Lynn and Daisy Mae.
