Symbolism, Imagery, Allegory
M-m-m good.
In The Tale of Despereaux, there's one type of food that we hear a lot about: soup. Soup is Queen Rosemary's very favorite food, and it's what she happens to be eating in the moment that she dies. King Phillip decides to outlaw soup—and all its serving utensils—to exact revenge on his wife's death and to deal with his grief. Everybody in the kingdom loves soup; it's a mainstay of their diet. But it's taken away.
Why soup? Why not mutton, or four-and-twenty-blackbird pie, or some other thing that kings ate back in those days? We know just what you're thinking. Soup is comfort food. Warm-your-belly, steaming-on-a-cold night, everyday nothing-fancy comfort food. Nothing's more ordinary and familiar.
And that's the point. Soup is a symbol of how things have always been. Everybody eats it all the time. It's warmth, comfort, family. It's order. Once the queen's death upsets that order, the soup disappears. People miss it; the cook even makes it in secret—it's that important to their way of life. During the soupless part of the book, only bad things happen. And once the princess is rescued, the rats are defeated, and order is restored, guess what reappears on the king's table? A giant kettle of soup.
We'll take chicken noodle, please.