Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Author Lewis Carroll

Illustrator John Tenniel

Country England

Language English

Genre(s) Children's fiction

Publisher Macmillan

Publication date 26 November 1865

Followed by Through the

Looking-Glass

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) is a novel written by English author

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll.[1] It tells the story
of a girl named Alice who falls down a rabbit-hole into a fantasy world populated
by peculiar and anthropomorphic creatures.

The tale is filled with allusions to Dodgson's friends. The tale plays with logic in
ways that have given the story lasting popularity with adults as well as children. It
is considered to be one of the most characteristic examples of the genre of literary
nonsense, and its narrative course and structure has been enormously influential,
mainly in the fantasy genre.

The book is commonly referred to by the abbreviated title Alice in Wonderland, an

alternative title popularized by the numerous stage, film and television adaptations
of the story produced over the years. Some printings of this title contain both
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, and
What Alice Found There.

History

Alice was written in 1865, exactly three years after the Reverend Charles Lutwidge
Dodgson and the Reverend Robinson Duckworth rowed in a boat up the River
Thames with three little girls:[2]

Lorina Charlotte Liddell (aged 13, born 1849) ("Prima" in the book's
prefatory verse)
Alice Pleasance Liddell (aged 10, born 1852) ("Secunda" in the prefatory
verse)
Edith Mary Liddell (aged 8, born 1853) ("Tertia" in the prefatory verse)

The three girls were the daughters of Henry George Liddell, the Vice-Chancellor
of Oxford University and Dean of Christ Church as well as headmaster of
Westminster School. Most of the book's adventures were based on and influenced
by people, situations and buildings in Oxford, England and at Christ Church, e.g.,
the "Rabbit Hole" which symbolized the actual stairs in the back of the main hall in
Christ Church.

Facsimile page from Alice's Adventures Under Ground

The journey had started at Folly Bridge near Oxford and ended five miles away in
the village of Godstow. To while away time the Reverend Dodgson told the girls a
story that, not so coincidentally, featured a bored little girl named Alice who goes
looking for an adventure.

The girls loved it, and Alice Liddell asked Dodgson to write it down for her. After
a lengthy delay over two years he eventually did so and on 26 November
1864 gave Alice the handwritten manuscript of Alice's Adventures Under Ground,
with illustrations by Dodgson himself. Some, including Martin Gardner, speculate
there was an earlier version that was destroyed later by Dodgson himself when he
printed a more elaborate copy by hand (Gardner, 1965), but there is no known
prima facie evidence to support this.
But before Alice received her copy, Dodgson was already preparing it for
publication and expanding the 18,000-word original to 35,000 words, most notably
adding the episodes about the Cheshire Cat and the Mad Tea-Party. In 1865,
Dodgson's tale was published as Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by "Lewis
Carroll" with illustrations by John Tenniel. The first print run of 2,000 was held
back because Tenniel had objections over the print quality.[3] A new edition,
released in December of the same year, but carrying an 1866 date, was quickly
printed. As it turned out, the original edition was sold with Dodgson's permission
to the New York publishing house of Appleton. The binding for the Appleton
Alice was virtually identical with the 1866 Macmillan Alice, except for the
publisher's name at the foot of the spine. The title page of the Appleton Alice was
an insert cancelling the original Macmillan title page of 1865, and bearing the New
York publisher's imprint and the date 1866.

The entire print run sold out quickly. Alice was a publishing sensation, beloved by
children and adults alike. Among its first avid readers were Queen Victoria and the
young Oscar Wilde. The book has never been out of print. Alice's Adventures in
Wonderland has been translated into 125 languages, including Esperanto and
Faroese. There have now been over a hundred editions of the book, as well as
countless adaptations in other media, especially theatre and film.

Synopsis

Alice is bored of sitting on the riverbank with her sister, who is reading a book.
Suddenly she sees a white rabbit, wearing a coat and carrying a watch, run past,
lamenting running late. She follows it down a rabbit hole and falls very slowly
down a tunnel lined with curious objects. She lands in a long hallway lined with
locked doors. She finds a little key sitting on a glass table. Behind a curtain on the
wall she finds a tiny door that opens with the key and leads into a beautiful garden.
The door however is too small for Alice to fit through. Looking back at the table
she sees a bottle labeled "DRINK ME" that was not there before. She drinks and it
causes her to shrink to a size small enough to fit through the door. Unfortunately
Alice has left the key high above on the table. She finds a box under the table in
which there is a cake with the words "EAT ME" on it. She eats it, thinking that if it
makes her smaller she can creep under the door and if it makes her larger she can
get the key.

The cake makes Alice grow so tall that her head hits the ceiling. Getting frustrated
and not to mention confused, she cries. Her tears flood the hallway. The White
Rabbit runs by and is so frightened by Alice that he drops the gloves and fan he is
holding. She fans herself with the fan and starts to wonder if she is still the same
person that she was before. The fan causes her to shrink again. Alice swims
through her own tears and meets a mouse, who is swimming as well. She tries to
make small talk with him but all she can think of talking about is her cat, which
offends the mouse. The pool becomes crowded with other animals and birds that
have been swept away. They all swim to shore.

The first question is how to get dry again. The mouse gives them a very dry lecture
on William the Conqueror. A dodo decides that the best thing to dry them off
would be a Caucus-Race. The Dodo marks out a race course in a sort of circle and
the racers begin running whenever they feel like it, and everyone wins. Alice
reaches into her pocket and finds a box of comfits which she distributes among the
winners. The animals then beg the mouse to tell them something more and he
recites a tale about a mouse and a dog. Alice mistakes his tale for his tail. This
insults him and he leaves. She starts talking about her cat again, which frightens
the rest of the animals away.

The White Rabbit appears again and orders Alice to go back to his house and fetch
him his gloves and fan. Inside, she finds another bottle and drinks from it. Alice
grows so large that she has to stick one arm out the window and her foot up the
chimney. The horrified Rabbit orders his gardener, a lizard named Bill, to climb on
the roof and go down the chimney. As Bill slides down the chimney Alice kicks
him out with her foot, shooting him up into the sky. Outside, Alice hears the voices
of animals that have gathered to gawk at her giant arm. The crowd hurls pebbles at
her, which turn into little cakes that shrink Alice down again. She runs into the
woods, where she decides that she must get back to her right size and she must find
the lovely garden. Suddenly Alice is confronted by a giant puppy. She picks up a
stick and teases him with it until he is tired and she can run away. She comes upon
a mushroom and sitting on it is a caterpillar smoking a hookah.

The Caterpillar questions Alice and she admits to her current identity crisis. He
asks her to recite "You Are Old, Father William." She does so, but it comes out
with many errors. She insults him by saying that three inches is a wretched height
to be (he himself is three inches tall). The Caterpillar crawls away into the grass,
telling Alice that one side of the mushroom will make her taller and the other side
will make her shorter. She breaks off two pieces from the mushroom. One side
makes her shrink smaller than ever, while another causes her neck to grow high
into the trees, where a pigeon mistakes her for a serpent. With some effort, Alice
brings herself back to her usual height. She stumbles upon a small estate and uses
the mushroom to reach a more appropriate height.

A Fish-Footman has an invitation for the Duchess of the house, which he delivers
to a Frog-Footman. Alice observes this transaction and, after a perplexing
conversation with the frog, welcomes herself into the house. The Duchess' Cook is
throwing dishes and making a soup which has too much pepper, which causes
Alice, the Duchess and her baby (but not the cook or her grinning Cheshire Cat) to
sneeze violently. The Duchess tosses her baby up and down while reciting the
poem "Speak roughly to your little boy." The Duchess gives Alice the baby while
she leaves to go play croquet with the Queen. To Alice's surprise, the baby later
turns into a pig, so she sets it free in the woods. The Cheshire Cat appears in a tree,
directing her to the March Hare's house. He disappears but his grin remains behind
to float on its own in the air prompting Alice to remark that she has often seen a cat
without a grin but never a grin without a cat.

Alice becomes a guest at a mad tea party, along with the Hatter (now more
commonly known as the Mad Hatter), the March Hare, and the Dormouse. In the
course of the party, Alice reveals that the date is May 4 (which happens to be the
birthday of her presumed real-life counterpart, Alice Pleasance Liddell). The other
characters give Alice many riddles and stories, until she becomes so insulted that
she leaves, claiming that it was the stupidest tea party that she had ever been to.
Alice comes upon a door in a tree, and enters it, and finds herself back in the long
hallway from the first chapter. She opens the door, eats part of her mushroom, and
shrinks so she can get into the beautiful garden.

Now in the beautiful garden, she comes upon three living playing cards painting
the white roses on a rose tree red because the Queen of Hearts hates white roses. A
procession of more cards, kings and queens and even the White Rabbit enters the
garden. Alice meets the violent Queen and pacifying King of Hearts. The Queen
orders "Off with their heads!" when she sees the work of the gardeners. A game of
croquet begins, with flamingos as the mallets and hedgehogs as the balls. The
Queen condemns more people to death, and Alice once again meets the Cheshire
Cat. The Queen of Hearts then debates chopping off the Cat's head, even though
that is all there is of him. Alice suggests talking to the Duchess, so the Queen
orders the Duchess out of prison.

The Duchess is brought to the croquet ground. She is now less angry and is always
trying to find morals in things. The Queen of Hearts dismisses her on the threat of
execution and introduces Alice to the Gryphon, who takes her to the Mock Turtle.
The Mock Turtle is very sad, even though he has no sorrow. He tries to tell his
story about how he used to be a real turtle in school, which The Gryphon interrupts
so they can play a game.

The Mock Turtle and the Gryphon dance to the Lobster Quadrille, while Alice
recites (rather incorrectly) "Tis the Voice of the Lobster." The Mock Turtle sings
them "Beautiful Soup" during which the Gryphon drags Alice away for an
impending trial.

At the trial, the Knave of Hearts is accused of stealing the tarts. The jury box is
made up of twelve animals, including Bill the Lizard. The judge is the King of
Hearts. The first witness is the Mad Hatter, who doesn't help the case at all,
followed by the Duchess' Cook. During the proceedings, Alice finds that she is
steadily growing larger when she is suddenly called as a witness herself.

Alice accidentally knocks over the jury box as she stands in alarm. She argues with
the King and Queen of Hearts over the ridiculous proceedings, eventually refusing
to hold her tongue. The Queen shouts her familiar "Off with her head!" but Alice is
unafraid, calling them out as just a pack of cards. Alice's sister wakes her up for
tea, brushing what turns out to be some leaves and not a shower of playing cards
from Alice's face. Alice leaves her sister on the bank to imagine all the curious
happenings for herself.

Misconception of characters

Although Tweedledum, Tweedledee, Humpty Dumpty and the Jabberwock are

often thought to be characters in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, they actually
only appear in the sequel, Through the Looking-Glass. They are, however, often
included in film versions, which are usually simply called "Alice in Wonderland,"
causing the confusion. The Queen of Hearts is commonly mistaken for the Red
Queen who appears in the story's sequel, Through the Looking-Glass, but in reality
shares none of her characteristics other than being a queen. Many adaptations have
mixed the characters, causing much confusion.

Character allusions

The members of the boating party that first heard Carroll's tale all show up in
Chapter 3 ("A Caucus-Race and a Long Tale") in one form or another. There is, of
course, Alice herself, while Carroll, or Charles Dodgson, is caricatured as the
Dodo. Carroll is known as the Dodo because Dodgson stuttered when he spoke,
thus if he spoke his last name it would be Do-Do-Dodgson. The Duck refers to
Rev. Robinson Duckworth, the Lory to Lorina Liddell, and the Eaglet to Edith
Liddell.

Bill the Lizard may be a play on the name of Benjamin Disraeli. One of Tenniel's
illustrations in Through the Looking-Glass depicts the character referred to as the
"Man in White Paper" (whom Alice meets as a fellow passenger riding on the train
with her), as a caricature of Disraeli, wearing a paper hat. The illustrations of the
Lion and the Unicorn also bear a striking resemblance to Tenniel's Punch
illustrations of Gladstone and Disraeli.

The Hatter is most likely a reference to Theophilus Carter, a furniture dealer

known in Oxford for his unorthodox inventions. Tenniel apparently drew the
Hatter to resemble Carter, on a suggestion of Carroll's.

The Dormouse tells a story about three little sisters named Elsie, Lacie, and Tillie.
These are the Liddell sisters: Elsie is L.C. (Lorina Charlotte), Tillie is Edith (her
family nickname is Matilda), and Lacie is an anagram of Alice.

The Mock Turtle speaks of a Drawling-master, "an old conger eel," that used to
come once a week to teach "Drawling, Stretching, and Fainting in Coils." This is a
reference to the art critic John Ruskin, who came once a week to the Liddell house
to teach the children drawing, sketching, and painting in oils. (The children did, in
fact, learn well; Alice Liddell, for one, produced a number of skilled watercolours.)

The Mock Turtle also sings "Beautiful Soup." This is a parody of a song called
"Star of the Evening, Beautiful Star," which was performed as a trio by Lorina,
Alice and Edith Liddell for Lewis Carroll in the Liddell home during the same
summer in which he first told the story of Alice's Adventures Under Ground
(source: the diary of Lewis Carroll, 1 August 1862 entry).

Tenniel's illustrations

John Tenniel's illustrations of Alice do not portray the real Alice Liddell, who had
dark hair and a short fringe. There is a persistent legend that Carroll sent Tenniel a
photograph of Mary Hilton Babcock, another child-friend, but no evidence for this
has yet come to light, and whether Tenniel actually used Babcock as his model is
open to dispute.

Famous lines and expressions

The term "Wonderland," from the title, has entered the language and refers to a
marvelous imaginary place, or else a real-world place that one perceives to have
dream like qualities. It challenges and takes on real-life matters. It, like much of
the Alice work, is widely referred to in popular culture.

"Down the Rabbit-Hole," the Chapter 1 title, has become a popular term for going
on an adventure into the unknown. In computer gaming, a "rabbit hole" may refer
to the initiating element that drives the player to enter the game. In drug culture,
"going down the rabbit hole" is a metaphor for taking hallucinogenic drugs.

In Chapter 6, the Cheshire Cat's disappearance prompts Alice to say one of her
most memorable lines: "...a grin without a cat! It's the most curious thing I ever
saw in all my life!"

In Chapter 7, the Hatter gives his famous riddle without an answer: "Why is a
raven like a writing desk?" Although Carroll intended the riddle to have no
solution, in a new preface to the 1896 edition of Alice, he proposes several
answers: "Because it can produce a few notes, though they are very flat; and it is
nevar put with the wrong end in front!" (Note the spelling of "never" as "nevar"
turning it into "raven" when inverted. This spelling, however, was "corrected" in
later editions to "never" and Carroll's pun was lost.) Puzzle expert Sam Loyd
offered the following solutions:

Because the notes for which they are noted are not noted for being musical
notes
Poe wrote on both
They both have inky quills ("inkwells")
Bills and tales ("tails") are among their characteristics
Because they both stand on their legs, conceal their steels ("steals"), and
ought to be made to shut up

Many other answers are listed in The Annotated Alice. In Frank Beddor's novel
Seeing Redd, the main antagonist, Queen Redd (a megalomaniac parody of the
Queen of Hearts) meets Lewis Carroll and declares that the answer to the riddle is
"Because I say so." Carroll is too terrified to contradict her.

Arguably the most famous quote is used when the Queen of Hearts screams "Off
with her head!" at Alice (and everyone else she feels slightly annoyed with).
Possibly Carroll here was echoing a scene in Shakespeare's Richard III (III, iv, 76)
where Richard demands the execution of Lord Hastings, crying "Off with his
head!"
When Alice is growing taller after eating the cake labeled "Eat me" she says,
"curiouser and curiouser," a famous line that is still used today to describe an event
with extraordinary wonder.

The Cheshire Cat confirms to Alice "We're all mad here," a line that has been
repeated for years as a result.

Symbolism in the text

References to mathematics

Since Carroll was a mathematician at Christ Church, it has been suggested[5] that
there are many references and mathematical concepts in both this story and also in
Through the Looking-Glass; examples include:

In chapter 1, "Down the Rabbit-Hole," in the midst of shrinking, Alice

waxes philosophic concerning what final size she will end up as, perhaps
"going out altogether, like a candle."; this pondering reflects the concept of
a limit.
In chapter 2, "The Pool of Tears," Alice tries to perform multiplication but
produces some odd results: "Let me see: four times five is twelve, and four
times six is thirteen, and four times seven isoh dear! I shall never get to
twenty at that rate!" This explores the representation of numbers using
different bases and positional numeral systems (4 x 5 = 12 in base 18
notation; 4 x 6 = 13 in base 21 notation. 4 x 7 could be 14 in base 24
notation, following the sequence).
In chapter 5, "Advice from a Caterpillar," the Pigeon asserts that little girls
are some kind of serpent, for both little girls and serpents eat eggs. This
general concept of abstraction occurs widely in many fields of science; an
example in mathematics of employing this reasoning would be in the
substitution of variables.
In chapter 7, "A Mad Tea-Party," the March Hare, the Mad Hatter, and the
Dormouse give several examples in which the semantic value of a sentence
A is not the same value of the converse of A (for example, "Why, you might
just as well say that 'I see what I eat' is the same thing as 'I eat what I
see'!"); in logic and mathematics, this is discussing an inverse relationship.
Also in chapter 7, Alice ponders what it means when the changing of seats
around the circular table places them back at the beginning. This is an
observation of addition on a ring of the integers modulo N.
 The Cheshire cat fades until it disappears entirely, leaving only its wide grin,
suspended in the air, leading Alice to marvel and note that she has seen a cat
without a grin, but never a grin without a cat. This is usually seen as either a
reference to the deep abstraction of concepts (non-Euclidean geometry,
abstract algebra, the beginnings of mathematical logic...) that was taking
over mathematics at the time. Even more pertinently, it can be taken to
represent the very concept of mathematics and number itself. For example,
instead of considering two or three apples, one may easily consider the
concept of 'apple,' upon which the concepts of 'two' and 'three' may seem to
depend. However, a far more sophisticated jump is to consider the concepts
of 'two' and 'three' by themselves, just like a grin, originally seemingly
dependent on the cat, separated conceptually from its physical object.

References to the French language

It has been suggested by several people including Martin Gardner and Selwyn
Goodacre[5] that Dodgson had an interest in the French language, choosing to make
references and puns about it in the story. It is most likely that these are references
to French lessons which would have been a common feature of a Victorian middle-
class girl's upbringing. A sampling of these include:

In chapter 2, Alice posits that the mouse may be French and chooses to
speak the first sentence of her French lesson-book to it: "O est ma chatte?"
("Where is my cat?").
Chapter 7, "A Mad Tea Party," features the character of the Dormouse, who
is constantly asleep; the present, third-person conjugation of the French verb
dormir, to sleep, is 'dort,' pronounced 'dor'hence, a dormouse is a sleeping
mouse.

References to classical languages

In chapter 2, Alice initially addresses the mouse as "O Mouse," based on her
vague memory of the noun declensions in her brother's textbook: "A mouse
(nominative) of a mouse (genitive) to a mouse (dative) a mouse
(accusative) O mouse! (vocative)." This corresponds to the traditional
order that was established by Byzantine grammarians (and is still in standard
use, except in the United Kingdom and some countries in Western Europe)
for the five cases of Classical Greek; because of the absence of the ablative
case, which Greek does not have but is found in Latin, the reference is
apparently not to the latter as some have supposed.
Historical references

In chapter 8, three cards are painting the roses on a rose tree red, for they
accidentally planted a white-rose tree which the Queen of Hearts hates. Red
roses symbolized the English House of Lancaster, while white roses were
the symbol for their rival House of York. Therefore, this scene may contain
a hidden allusion to the Wars of the Roses.[6]
Criticism
The book was generally received in a positive light, but has also caught a
large amount of derision for its strange and unpredictable tone. It is also
sometimes thought as a reference to psychoactive drugs. One of the best-
known critics is fantasy writer Terry Pratchett, who has openly stated that he
dislikes the book.[7]
In 1931, the book was banned in Hunan, China because "animals should not
use human language" and it "put animals and human beings on the same
level."[8]
Works influenced
Main article: Works based on Alice in Wonderland
Alice and the rest of Wonderland continue to inspire or influence many other
works of art to this day, sometimes indirectly via the Disney movie, for
example. The character of the plucky, yet proper, Alice has proven
immensely popular and inspired similar heroines in literature and pop
culture, many also named Alice in homage

Alice is a fictional character who is a Victorian English girl in the books Alice's
Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, which were
written by Charles Dodgson under the pen name Lewis Carroll.

Development

The character has been said to be based on Alice Liddell, a child friend of
Dodgson's. Dodgson said several times that his 'little heroine' was not based on any
real child, but was entirely fictional.[1] Alice is portrayed as a quaintly logical girl,
sometimes even pedantic, especially with Humpty Dumpty in the second book.
According to Through the Looking-Glass, she is seven-and-a-half years old but
seems to conduct herself like a somewhat older child. Alice's Adventures in
Wonderland takes place on May 4th, Alice Liddell's birthday. Through the
Looking-Glass takes place on November 4th, her half-birthday (and Alice states
that she is "seven and a half exactly.")

Character outline

Alice is popularly depicted wearing a pale blue knee-length dress with a white
pinafore overtop, although the dress originally was yellow in The Nursery "Alice",
the first coloured version of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. In the illustrations
for Through the Looking-Glass her hair is held back with a wide ribbon, and in
honour of Alice, such hair bows are sometimes called Alice bands, particularly in
the UK.

As Alice was first drawn in black and white her colors would vary from artist to
artist; it was Disney who made blue the most popular color for her dress and
blonde for her hair. However, Alice has been coloured by Tenniel in a blue dress,
with white stripes at the bottom, her pinafore is outlined in red and this look has,
perhaps, become the classic and most widely recognized Alice in Wonderland
dress in later works.

Tenniel drew Alice in two variants: for Through the Looking-Glass her pinafore is
more ruffled and she is shown in striped stockings, an image which has remained
in much of the later art.

The White Rabbit is a fictional character in Lewis Carroll's book Alice's Adventures
in Wonderland. He appears at the very beginning of the book, in chapter one,
wearing a waistcoat, and muttering "Oh dear! Oh dear! I shall be too late!" Alice
follows him down the rabbit hole into Wonderland. Alice encounters him again
when he mistakes her for his housemaid Mary Ann and she becomes trapped in
his house after growing too large. The Rabbit shows up again in the last few
chapters, as a herald-like servant of the King and Queen of Hearts.

The Caterpillar (also known as the Hookah-Smoking Caterpillar) is a fictional

character appearing in Lewis Carroll's book, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

Introduced in Chapter IV ("Rabbit Sends in a Little Bill") and the main centre of
interest of Chapter V ("Advice from a Caterpillar"), the Caterpillar is a hookah-
smoking caterpillar exactly three inches high which, according to him, "is a very
good height indeed" (though Alice believes it to be a wretched height).
Alice does not like the Caterpillar when they first meet, because he does not
immediately talk to her and when he does, it is usually in short, rather rude
sentences, or difficult questions. He asks Alice to repeat the poem You Are Old,
Father William, which comes out rather strange like many of the nursery rhymes
Alice attempts in Wonderland. The Caterpillar tells Alice how to grow and shrink
using the mushroom upon which he is sitting.

The original illustration by John Tenniel at right, is something of a visual paradox;

the caterpillar's human face appears to be formed from the head and legs of a more
realistic caterpillar.[1] In another allusion, the flowers on the right of the illustration
appear to be a form of tobacco, while the caterpillar is smoking heavily.

The caterpillar makes an appearance in a few other places outside Alice's

Adventures in Wonderland, such as American McGee's Alice and the novel The
Looking-Glass Wars; in both of these spin-offs he plays the role of an oracle. The
caterpillar also makes an appearance in "Curiouser and Curiouser," an episode of
the television show Forever Knight, in the form of a child's toy. In popular music,
the Caterpillar is mentioned in Jefferson Airplane's "White Rabbit" (1967), a song
containing many references to the book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

His memorable phrase is a breathy "Whooo ... are ... you?". In the Disney animated
movie, this line is visualised as exhalations of smoke in the shapes "O", "R" and
"U". Alice remarks in the original story that the Caterpillar will one day turn into a
butterfly, and in both the 1999 television film and Disney's 1951 version he does
just that (albeit while angry from Alice's comment about being only three inches
high).

The Mock Turtle is a fictional character devised by Lewis Carroll from his
popular book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Its name is taken from a dish that
was popular in the Victorian period, mock turtle soup.

Then the Queen left off, quite out of breath, and said to Alice, "Have you
seen the Mock Turtle yet?"
"No," said Alice. "I don't even know what a Mock Turtle is."
"It's the thing Mock Turtle Soup is made from," said the Queen.

(Alice in Wonderland, chapter 9)

Carroll enjoyed such puns on Victorian fashions and etiquette, and showed this
frequently. The description and drawing by John Tenniel gives comedic value to
the Mock Turtle, as he is clearly an assemblage of creatures, therefore not a real
turtle as his name rightly suggests.

The Mock Turtle is a very melancholy character, it is thought because he used to

be a real turtle. He tells Alice his history of going to school in the sea, but cannot
understand the school system that Alice describes to him- least of all the poetry she
recites. Ironically, she cannot understand it either. This is a pun on the two
meanings of "school", refering in the turtle's usage to a school of fish or marine
animals, and by Alice to an insitute of learning (see (school).

Origins

To say that the Mock Turtle's name is a pun on the name of the soup is incomplete.
The Tenniel illustration of the Mock Turtle specifically depicts it as a collection of
creatures that make up the ingredients of mock turtle soup; they are not random.
The pun is not only of the name, but of the nature of the soup itself.

Traditionally, mock turtle soup takes the parts of a calf that were not frequently
used and often discarded, including the head, hooves, and tail; and uses the non-
muscular meat to imitate turtle meat. Tenniel's illustration shows the Mock Turtle
with the body of a turtle, and the head, hooves, and tail of a calf. The complicated
pun, then, is both word-play and picture-play.

The King of Hearts is a character from the book Alice's Adventures in

Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. He seems to, when compared to the Queen of
Hearts, be the moderate part of the Wonderland government. As an example, when
the Queen, who enjoys ordering beheadings, attempts to have Alice executed
(charged with being unable to answer who is lying down in front of her) the King
of Hearts reminds her that she is only a child.

The King also quietly pardons many of the subjects the Queen has ordered to be
beheaded when the Queen is not looking. This guarantees few people are actually
beheaded. Nevertheless, when the Queen plays a game of croquet in the story, the
only players who remain at the end are himself, the Queen, and Alice.

At the Knave of Hearts' trial, however, where he acts as judge, he is revealed to be

quite juvenile, with such lines as, "don't be nervous or I'll have you executed on the
spot" to the Mad Hatter, or asking the Duchess's cook irrelevant questions such as,
"what are tarts made of?" Between the two of them, the King and Queen appear to
present a fairly accurate portrayal of why Wonderland is as childish, reckless and
confusing as it is.
The Dodo is a fictional character appearing in Chapters 2 and 3 of the book Alice's
Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson). The
Dodo is a caricature of the author. A popular but unsubstantiated belief is that
Dodgson chose the particular animal to represent himself because of his stammer,
and thus would accidentally introduce himself as "Do-do-dodgson."

In this passage Lewis Carroll incorporated references to everyone present on the

original boating expedition of 4th July, 1862 during which Alice's Adventures
were first told, with Alice as herself, and the others represented by birds: the Lory
was Lorina Liddell, the Eaglet was Edith Liddell, the Dodo was Dodgson, and the
Duck was Rev. Robinson Duckworth. In order to get dry after a swim, the Dodo
proposes that everyone run a Caucus race where the participants run in patterns
of any shape, starting and leaving off whenever they like, so that everyone wins. At
the end of the race, Alice distributes comfits from her pocket to all as prizes.
However this leaves no prize for herself. The Dodo inquires what else she has in
her pocket. As she has only a thimble, the Dodo requests it from her and then
awards it to Alice as her prize. The Caucus Race as depicted by Carroll is a satire
on the political caucus system, mocking its lack of clarity and decisiveness.

In the Disney film, the Dodo plays a much greater role in the story, and plays the
role of Pat's in Alice's infamous growth-in-the-house scene.

The Lory is a character appearing in Chapter 2 and 3 of Alice's Adventures in

Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, a reference to Lorina Charlotte Liddell, Alice's
older sister. Lorina also appears, unnamed, as herself at the beginning of the book.

In this passage Lewis Carroll incorporated references to everyone present on the

original boating expedition of July 4, 1862 during which Alice's Adventures were
first told, with Alice as herself, and the others represented by birds: the Lory was
Lorina Liddell, the Eaglet was Edith Liddell, the Dodo was Charles Lutwidge
Dodgson, and the Duck was Rev. Robinson Duckworth.

According to The Annotated Alice, Carroll had originally had the characters dry off
by having the Dodo lead them to a nearby house for towels. As they walked, only
Alice, the Lory, and the Eaglet could keep up. This was a reference to a boating
outing Carroll had with the three girls and their family. It began to rain and the
group left for a nearby house. Carroll and the sisters got there first, as they walked
the fastest. Carroll ultimately replaced this scene in the book with the Caucus race,
as he felt that it would only have been funny to the people familiar with the
incident.
The Eaglet is a character appearing in Chapter 2 and 3 of Alice's Adventures in
Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, a reference to Edith Liddell, Alice's sister.

In this passage Lewis Carroll incorporated references to everyone present on the

original boating expedition of July 4, 1862 during which Alice's Adventures were
first told, with Alice as herself, and the others represented by birds: the Lory was
Lorina Liddell, the Eaglet was Edith Liddell, the Dodo was Charles Lutwidge
Dodgson, and the Duck was Rev. Robinson Duckworth.

According to The Annotated Alice, Carroll had originally had the characters dry off
by having the Dodo lead them to a nearby house for towels. As they walked, only
Alice, the Lory, and the Eaglet could keep up. This was a reference to a boating
outing Carroll had with the three girls and their family. It began to rain and the
group left for a nearby house. Carroll and the sisters got there first, as they walked
the fastest. Carroll ultimately replaced this scene in the book with the Caucus race,
as he felt that it would only have been funny to the people familiar with the
incident.

The Duck is a fictional character appearing in Chapters 2 and 3 of the book Alice's
Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson). The
Duck features with a group of birds including a Dodo, a Lory and an Eaglet.

The Duck was a representation of Rev. Robinson Duckworth, who accompanied

Dodgson (the Dodo) on the original boat trip on the River Thames that inspired the
book, with Alice Liddell (the inspiration for the main character Alice in the book)
and her sisters Lorina (the Lory) and Edith (the Eaglet).

Bill the Lizard is a fictional character appearing in Lewis Carroll's Alice's

Adventures in Wonderland.

Introduced in chapter four, Bill is perceived by Alice to be someone who does all
of the hard work for The White Rabbit and the denizens of the community. When
Alice becomes stuck in one of The White Rabbit's house's rooms from eating a
cookie that made her grow uncontrollably, the rabbit's attempts to get in through
the door and window fail. Bill the Lizard is sent to go through the chimney to
investigate, since he and another creature have a ladder in their possession.
Unwilling to let Bill get through the chimney, Alice uses her now huge foot, which
is in the chimney, to kick Bill into the air. He manages to survive the fall thanks to
the fellow creatures. Reappearing in chapters eleven and twelve, Bill is a juror in
the trial of The Knave of Hearts' supposed theft of The Queen of Heart's tarts.
When his pencil squeaks too much on his slate, it annoys Alice to the point that she
takes the pencil from him. Not knowing where it went, Bill the Lizard starts using
his finger to write, even though it left no mark on the slate. In chapter twelve, he
becomes disheveled when the "mile-high" Alice disturbs the jury by messing up
the jury box. When Alice puts Bill the Lizard back in his place, he stares blankly
up in the sky. Then later, the Queen provides ink for Bill when she spills ink on his
face.

The Duchess is a character in Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland,

published in 1865. Carroll does not describe her physically in much detail,
although her hideous appearance is strongly established in the popular
imagination thanks to John Tenniel's illustrations and from context it is clear that
Alice finds her quite unattractive. The Duchess (and the characters which
accompany her) is a character that was only added successively, in the 1865
version, and not in the earlier ones.

The Hatter is a fictional character initially encountered at a tea party in Lewis

Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and later again as "Hatta" in the story's
sequel, Through the Looking-Glass. He is popularly referred to as "The Mad
Hatter," but is never called by this name in Carroll's book - although the Cheshire
Cat does warn Alice that he is mad, and the Hatter's eccentric behavior supports
this. (Likewise, the chapter in which he first appears, "A Mad Tea-Party," is often
called "The Mad Hatter's Tea Party"). He has been portrayed on film by Edward
Everett Horton, Sir Robert Helpmann, Martin Short, Peter Cook, Anthony Newley,
Ed Wynn and, in a music video, by Tom Petty.

The Hatter explains to Alice that he and the March Hare are always having tea
because, when he tried to sing for the Queen of Hearts at a celebration of hers, she
sentenced him to death for "murdering the time," but escaped decapitation. He
comes to the conclusion that time itself was indeed "murdered," he and the March
Hare continue to have tea as though the clock had truly stopped. His tea party,
when Alice arrives, is characterised by switching places on the table at any given
time, making (along with the March Hare) somewhat short, personal remarks,
asking unanswerable riddles and reciting nonsensical poetry, all of which
eventually drive Alice away. He appears again as a witness at the Knave of Hearts'
trial, where the Queen appears to recognise him as the singer she sentenced to
death, and the King also cautions him not to be nervous "or I'll have you executed
on the spot."
When the character makes his appearance as "Hatta" in Through the Looking-
Glass, he is in trouble with the law once again. This time, however, he is not
necessarily guilty: the White Queen explains that quite often subjects are punished
before they commit a crime, rather than after, and sometimes they do not even
commit it at all. He is also mentioned as being one of the White King's messengers,
and the March Hare appears as well as "Haigha," since the King explains that he
needs two messengers: "one to come, and one to go." Sir John Tenniel's illustration
also depicts him as sipping from a teacup as he did before in the prequel, adding
weight to Carroll's hint that the two characters are indeed the same.