160-490: Alice Pleasance Hargreaves ( née Liddell , / ˈ l ɪ d əl / ; 4 May 1852 – 16 November 1934) was an English woman who, in her childhood, was an acquaintance and photography subject of Lewis Carroll . One of the stories he told her during a boating trip became the classic 1865 children's novel Alice's Adventures in Wonderland . She shared her name with " Alice ", the story's protagonist, but scholars disagree about
320-601: A roman à clef populated with real figures from Carroll's life. Alice is based on Alice Liddell; the Dodo is Carroll; Wonderland is Oxford; even the Mad Hatter's Tea Party, according to Cohen, is a send-up of Alice's own birthday party. The critic Jan Susina rejects Cohen's account, arguing that Alice the character bears a tenuous relationship with Alice Liddell. Beyond its refashioning of Carroll's everyday life, Cohen argues, Alice critiques Victorian ideals of childhood. It
480-460: A Grand Tour of Europe with Lorina and Edith. One story has it that she became a romantic interest of Prince Leopold , the youngest son of Queen Victoria , during the four years he spent at Christ Church, but the evidence for this is sparse. It is true that years later, Leopold named his first child Alice and acted as godfather to Alice's second son Leopold. However, it is possible Alice was named in honour of Leopold's deceased elder sister instead,
640-577: A cultural icon . In 2006, Alice in Wonderland was named among the icons of England in a public vote. Books for children in the Alice mould emerged as early as 1869 and continued to appear throughout the late 19th century. Released in 1903, the British silent film Alice in Wonderland was the first screen adaptation of the book. In 2015, Robert Douglas-Fairhurst wrote in the Guardian , Since
800-596: A stammer – a condition shared by most of his siblings – that often inhibited his social life throughout his years. At the age of twelve he was sent to Richmond Grammar School (now part of Richmond School ) in Richmond, North Yorkshire . In 1846, Dodgson entered Rugby School , where he was evidently unhappy, as he wrote some years after leaving: "I cannot say ... that any earthly considerations would induce me to go through my three years again ... I can honestly say that if I could have been ... secure from annoyance at night,
960-417: A bank and engage in a "Caucus Race" to dry themselves. Following the end of the race, Alice inadvertently frightens the animals away by discussing her cat. The White Rabbit appears looking for the gloves and fan. Mistaking Alice for his maidservant, he orders her to go to his house and retrieve them. Alice finds another bottle and drinks from it, which causes her to grow to such an extent that she gets stuck in
1120-702: A basis for new works. Eva Le Gallienne 's stage adaptation of the Alice books premiered on 12 December 1932 and ended its run in May 1933. The production was revived in New York in 1947 and 1982. A community theatre production of Alice was Olivia de Havilland 's first foray onto the stage. Joseph Papp staged Alice in Concert at the Public Theater in New York City in 1980. Elizabeth Swados wrote
1280-435: A children's fantasy, in 1863, and suggested its design as a basis for Alice 's . Carroll saw a specimen copy in May 1865. 2,000 copies were printed by July, but Tenniel objected to their quality, and Carroll instructed Macmillan to halt publication so they could be reprinted. In August, he engaged Richard Clay as an alternative printer for a new run of 2,000. The reprint cost £600, paid entirely by Carroll. He received
1440-661: A close friend of the Liddell family in subsequent years. Alice was three years younger than Lorina and two years older than Edith, and the three sisters were constant childhood companions. She and her family regularly spent holidays at their holiday home Penmorfa, which later became the Gogarth Abbey Hotel, on the West Shore of Llandudno in North Wales . When Alice Liddell was a young woman, she set out on
1600-542: A considerable fortune, and was a local magistrate ; he also played cricket for Hampshire . Alice became a noted society hostess and was the first president of Emery Down Women's Institute . During World War I , she joined the Red Cross as a volunteer, for which she was awarded a medal currently on display in the Museum of Oxford . She took to referring to herself as "Lady Hargreaves", but no basis existed for such
1760-530: A cricketer, on 15 September 1880, at the age of 28 in Westminster Abbey . They had three sons: Alan Knyveton Hargreaves and Leopold Reginald "Rex" Hargreaves (both were killed in action in World War I ); and Caryl Liddell Hargreaves, who survived to have a daughter of his own. Liddell denied that the name 'Caryl' was in any way associated with Charles Dodgson's pseudonym. Reginald Hargreaves inherited
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#17327756151201920-577: A croquet game, in which hedgehogs are used as balls, flamingos are used as mallets, and soldiers act as hoops. The Queen is short-tempered and constantly orders beheadings. When the Cheshire Cat appears as only a head, the Queen orders his beheading, only to be told that such an act is impossible. Because the cat belongs to the Duchess, Alice prompts the Queen to release the Duchess from prison to resolve
2080-452: A depression that lasted some years. In 1876, Dodgson produced his next great work, The Hunting of the Snark , a fantastical "nonsense" poem, with illustrations by Henry Holiday , exploring the adventures of a bizarre crew of nine tradesmen and one beaver, who set off to find the snark. It received largely mixed reviews from Carroll's contemporary reviewers, but was enormously popular with
2240-463: A dozen books under his real name. Dodgson also developed new ideas in linear algebra (e.g., the first printed proof of the Rouché–Capelli theorem ), probability, and the study of elections (e.g., Dodgson's method ) and committees ; some of this work was not published until well after his death. His occupation as Mathematical Lecturer at Christ Church gave him some financial security. His work in
2400-496: A family of high-church Anglicans , and pursued his clerical training at Oxford University's Christ Church constituent college , where he lived for most of his life as a scholar , teacher and Anglican deacon . Alice Liddell – a daughter of Henry Liddell , the Dean of Christ Church – is widely identified as the original inspiration for Alice in Wonderland , though Carroll always denied this. An avid puzzler, Carroll created
2560-492: A glass, ensured the right amount of liqueur for the price paid; a double-sided adhesive strip to fasten envelopes or mount things in books; a device for helping a bedridden invalid to read from a book placed sideways; and at least two ciphers for cryptography . He also proposed alternative systems of parliamentary representation. He proposed the so-called Dodgson's method , using the Condorcet method . In 1884, he proposed
2720-436: A high-powered London publisher, on 19 October 1863. His firm, Macmillan Publishers , agreed to publish Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by sometime in 1864. Carroll financed the initial print run, possibly because it gave him more editorial authority than other financing methods. He managed publication details such as typesetting and engaged illustrators and translators. Macmillan had published The Water-Babies , also
2880-407: A knee injury sustained in middle age. As a very young child, he suffered a fever that left him deaf in one ear. At the age of 17, he suffered a severe attack of whooping cough , which was probably responsible for his chronically weak chest in later life. In early childhood, he acquired a stammer , which he referred to as his "hesitation"; it remained throughout his life. The stammer has always been
3040-502: A member of his father's old college, Christ Church . After waiting for rooms in college to become available, he went into residence in January 1851. He had been at Oxford only two days when he received a summons home. His mother had died of "inflammation of the brain" – perhaps meningitis or a stroke – at the age of 47. His early academic career veered between high promise and irresistible distraction. He did not always work hard, but
3200-536: A much better match for her." Clark argues that in Victorian England such arrangements were not as improbable as they might seem; John Ruskin , for example, fell in love with a 12-year-old girl while Dodgson's younger brother sought to marry a 14-year-old, but postponed the wedding for six years. In 1996, Karoline Leach found what became known as the "Cut pages in diary" document—a note allegedly written by Charles Dodgson's niece, Violet Dodgson, summarising
3360-555: A piglet, which Alice releases into the woods. The Cheshire Cat appears to Alice and directs her toward the Hatter and March Hare before disappearing, leaving his grin behind. Alice finds the Hatter, March Hare, and a sleepy Dormouse in the midst of a tea party . The Hatter explains that it is always 6 p.m. ( tea time ), claiming that time is standing still as punishment for the Hatter trying to "kill it". A conversation ensues around
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#17327756151203520-417: A pocket or purse, as the most common individual stamps could easily be carried on their own. The pack included a copy of a pamphlet version of this lecture. Another invention was a writing tablet called the nyctograph that allowed note-taking in the dark, thus eliminating the need to get out of bed and strike a light when one woke with an idea. The device consisted of a gridded card with sixteen squares and
3680-554: A poem . Before crawling away, the Caterpillar says that a bite of one side of the mushroom will make her larger, while a bite from the other side will make her smaller. During a period of trial and error, Alice's neck extends between the treetops, frightening a pigeon who mistakes her for a serpent. After shrinking to an appropriate height, Alice arrives at the home of a Duchess , who owns a perpetually grinning Cheshire Cat . The Duchess's baby, whom she hands to Alice, transforms into
3840-456: A practice new to the nineteenth century. He exerted his agency of this craft by literally rewriting the text created by the image to produce a new dialogue about childhood. However, popular taste changed with the advent of Modernism , affecting the types of photographs that he produced. To promote letter writing, Dodgson invented "The Wonderland Postage-Stamp Case" in 1889. This was a cloth-backed folder with twelve slots, two marked for inserting
4000-442: A proportional representation system based on multi-member districts, each voter casting only a single vote, quotas as minimum requirements to take seats, and votes transferable by candidates through what is now called Liquid democracy . Within the academic discipline of mathematics, Dodgson worked primarily in the fields of geometry , linear and matrix algebra , mathematical logic , and recreational mathematics , producing nearly
4160-507: A publisher. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland , with illustrations by John Tenniel , was published in 1865, under the name Lewis Carroll. A second book about the character Alice, Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There , followed in 1871. In 1886, a facsimile of Alice's Adventures Under Ground , the original manuscript that Dodgson had given Liddell, was published. The relationship between Liddell and Dodgson has been
4320-399: A rabbit hole, which sends her into a lengthy plummet but to a safe landing. Inside a room with a table, she finds a key to a tiny door, beyond which is a garden. While pondering how to fit through the door, she discovers a bottle labelled "Drink me". Alice drinks some of the bottle's contents, and to her astonishment, she shrinks small enough to enter the door. However, she had left the key upon
4480-503: A rule for finding the day of the week for any date; a means for justifying right margins on a typewriter; a steering device for a velociman (a type of tricycle); fairer elimination rules for tennis tournaments; a new sort of postal money order; rules for reckoning postage; rules for a win in betting; rules for dividing a number by various divisors; a cardboard scale for the Senior Common Room at Christ Church which, held next to
4640-459: A sequel in 1871 entitled Through the Looking-Glass and a shortened version for young children, The Nursery "Alice" , in 1890. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland was conceived on 4 July 1862, when Lewis Carroll and Reverend Robinson Duckworth rowed up the river Isis with the three young daughters of Carroll's friend Henry Liddell : Lorina Charlotte (aged 13; "Prima" in the book's prefatory verse); Alice Pleasance (aged 10; "Secunda" in
4800-431: A significant part of the image of Dodgson. While one apocryphal story says that he stammered only in adult company and was free and fluent with children, there is no evidence to support this idea. Many children of his acquaintance remembered the stammer, while many adults failed to notice it. Dodgson himself seems to have been far more acutely aware of it than most people whom he met; it is said that he caricatured himself as
4960-727: A small audience, Tom Waits released the songs as the album Alice in 2002. The English composer Joseph Horovitz composed an Alice in Wonderland ballet commissioned by the London Festival Ballet in 1953. It was performed frequently in England and the US. A ballet by Christopher Wheeldon and Nicholas Wright commissioned for the Royal Ballet entitled Alice's Adventures in Wonderland premiered in February 2011 at
Alice Liddell - Misplaced Pages Continue
5120-464: A special letter register which he devised. He documented his advice about how to write more satisfying letters in a missive entitled " Eight or Nine Wise Words about Letter-Writing ", published in 1890. Dodgson's existence remained little changed over the last twenty years of his life, despite his growing wealth and fame. He continued to teach at Christ Church until 1881 and remained in residence there until his death. Public appearances included attending
5280-469: A specimen page of the print edition around that date. On 26 November 1864, Carroll gave Alice the manuscript of Alice's Adventures Under Ground , with illustrations by Carroll, dedicating it as "A Christmas Gift to a Dear Child in Memory of a Summer's Day". The published version of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is about twice the length of Alice's Adventures Under Ground and includes episodes, such as
5440-469: 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", who came once a week to teach "Drawling, Stretching, and Fainting in Coils". This
5600-486: A system of symbols representing an alphabet of Dodgson's design, using letter shapes similar to the Graffiti writing system on a Palm device. He also devised a number of games, including an early version of what today is known as Scrabble . Devised sometime in 1878, he invented the "doublet" (see word ladder ), a form of brain-teaser that is still popular today, changing one word into another by altering one letter at
5760-427: A time when people commonly devised their own amusements and when singing and recitation were required social skills, and the young Dodgson was well equipped to be an engaging entertainer. He could reportedly sing at a passable level and was not afraid to do so before an audience. He was also adept at mimicry and storytelling, and reputedly quite good at charades . In the interim between his early published writings and
5920-615: A time, each successive change always resulting in a genuine word. For instance, CAT is transformed into DOG by the following steps: CAT, COT, DOT, DOG. It first appeared in the 29 March 1879 issue of Vanity Fair , with Carroll writing a weekly column for the magazine for two years; the final column dated 9 April 1881. The games and puzzles of Lewis Carroll were the subject of Martin Gardner's March 1960 Mathematical Games column in Scientific American . Other items include
6080-411: A time, the guards soon gang up and start to swarm all over her. Alice's sister wakes her up from a dream, brushing what turns out to be leaves from Alice's face. Alice leaves her sister on the bank to imagine all the curious happenings for herself. The main characters in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland are the following: In The Annotated Alice , Martin Gardner provides background information for
6240-423: A title. After her husband’s death in 1926, the cost of maintaining their home, Cuffnells, was such that she deemed it necessary to sell her copy of Alice's Adventures under Ground (Lewis Carroll's earlier title for Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ). The manuscript fetched £15,400 (equivalent to £1,100,000 in 2023), nearly four times the reserve price given to it by Sotheby's auction house. It later became
6400-424: A useful entrée into higher social circles. During the most productive part of his career, he made portraits of notable sitters such as John Everett Millais , Ellen Terry , Maggie Spearman , Dante Gabriel Rossetti , Julia Margaret Cameron , Michael Faraday , Lord Salisbury , and Alfred Tennyson . By the time that Dodgson abruptly ceased photography (1880, after 24 years), he had established his own studio on
6560-458: A visit in December 1863. However, the former closeness does not seem to have been re-established, and the friendship gradually faded away, possibly because Dodgson was in opposition to Dean Liddell over college politics. The extent to which Dodgson's Alice may be or could be identified with Liddell is controversial. The two Alices are clearly not identical, and though it was long assumed that
Alice Liddell - Misplaced Pages Continue
6720-471: A work about the role of evolutionary theory in Victorian children's literature, argues that Carroll's focus on language prioritises humanism over scientism by emphasising language's role in human self-conception. Pat's "Digging for apples" is a cross-language pun , as pomme de terre (literally; "apple of the earth") means potato and pomme means apple. In the second chapter, Alice initially addresses
6880-529: Is a "censored version" of what really happened, intended to prevent Lorina from being offended or humiliated at having her feelings for Dodgson made public. It is uncertain who wrote the note. Leach has said that the handwriting on the front of the document most closely resembles that of either Menella or Violet Dodgson, Dodgson's nieces. However, Morton N. Cohen in an article published in the Times Literary Supplement in 2003 said that in
7040-560: Is a reference to the art critic John Ruskin , who came once a week to the Liddell house to teach the children to draw, sketch, and paint in oils. The Mock Turtle sings "Turtle Soup", which is a parody of a song called "Star of the Evening, Beautiful Star", which the Liddells sang for Carroll. Carroll wrote multiple poems and songs for Alice's Adventures in Wonderland , including: Carroll's biographer Morton N. Cohen reads Alice as
7200-491: Is a rule-bound world, but its rules are not those of our world. The literary scholar Daniel Bivona writes that Alice is characterised by "gamelike social structures." She trusts in instructions from the beginning, drinking from the bottle labelled "drink me" after recalling, during her descent, that children who do not follow the rules often meet terrible fates. Unlike the creatures of Wonderland, who approach their world's wonders uncritically, Alice continues to look for rules as
7360-583: Is a timeline of major publication events related to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland : Alice was published to critical praise. One magazine declared it "exquisitely wild, fantastic, [and] impossible". In the late 19th century, Walter Besant wrote that Alice in Wonderland "was a book of that extremely rare kind which will belong to all the generations to come until the language becomes obsolete". No story in English literature has intrigued me more than Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland . It fascinated me
7520-486: Is absent from Alice's recitation. Nilson suggests that Alice's missing ablative is a pun on her father Henry Liddell's work on the standard A Greek-English Lexicon , since ancient Greek does not have an ablative case. Further, mousa (μούσα, meaning muse ) was a standard model noun in Greek textbooks of the time in paradigms of the first declension, short-alpha noun. Mathematics and logic are central to Alice . As Carroll
7680-409: Is also missing the personal catalogue number that Dodgson meticulously catalogued his photos under. "[Dodgson's] usual practice was to add a number on the back of any prints which he had developed". Wakeling also points out that Dodgson never made "full frontal studies...particularly a girl as mature as this.. There's no way the Liddells would have allowed a picture of this kind to have been taken." It
7840-484: Is an 1865 English children's novel by Lewis Carroll , a mathematics don at the University of Oxford . It details the story of a girl named Alice who falls through a rabbit hole into a fantasy world of anthropomorphic creatures. It is seen as an example of the literary nonsense genre. The artist John Tenniel provided 42 wood-engraved illustrations for the book. It received positive reviews upon release and
8000-401: Is an account of "the child's plight in Victorian upper-class society", in which Alice's mistreatment by the creatures of Wonderland reflects Carroll's own mistreatment by older people as a child. In the eighth chapter, three cards are painting the roses on a rose tree red, because they had accidentally planted a white-rose tree that the Queen of Hearts hates. According to Wilfrid Scott-Giles ,
8160-559: Is currently unknown whether this photo is by Dodgson, nor who wrote the pencil inscription on the back of it and for what reason. The photo was not included in Wakeling's catalogue raisonné of Dodgson's complete surviving photographs and has remained unused by other subsequent documentaries on Dodgson. Alice%27s Adventures in Wonderland Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (also known as Alice in Wonderland )
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#17327756151208320-494: Is lost. The girls and Carroll took another boat trip a month later, when he elaborated the plot of the story to Alice, and in November, he began working on the manuscript in earnest. To add the finishing touches, he researched natural history in connection with the animals presented in the book and then had the book examined by other children—particularly those of George MacDonald . Though Carroll did add his own illustrations to
8480-416: Is now one of the best-known works of Victorian literature ; its narrative, structure, characters and imagery have had a widespread influence on popular culture and literature, especially in the fantasy genre. It is credited as helping end an era of didacticism in children's literature , inaugurating an era in which writing for children aimed to "delight or entertain". The tale plays with logic , giving
8640-863: The Whitby Gazette and the Oxford Critic . Most of this output was humorous, sometimes satirical, but his standards and ambitions were exacting. "I do not think I have yet written anything worthy of real publication (in which I do not include the Whitby Gazette or the Oxonian Advertiser ), but I do not despair of doing so someday," he wrote in July 1855. Sometime after 1850, he did write puppet plays for his siblings' entertainment, of which one has survived: La Guida di Bragia . In March 1856, he published his first piece of work under
8800-546: The Dodo in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland , referring to his difficulty in pronouncing his last name, but this is one of the many supposed facts often repeated for which no first-hand evidence remains. He did indeed refer to himself as a dodo, but whether or not this reference was to his stammer is simply speculation. Dodgson's stammer did trouble him, but it was never so debilitating that it prevented him from applying his other personal qualities to do well in society. He lived in
8960-527: The Guardian , 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. The book has inspired numerous film and television adaptations, which have multiplied, as the original work is now in the public domain in all jurisdictions. Musical works inspired by Alice include the Beatles 's song " Lucy in
9120-800: The Royal Opera House in London. The ballet was based on the novel Wheeldon grew up reading as a child and is generally faithful to the original story, although some critics claimed it may have been too faithful. Unsuk Chin 's opera Alice in Wonderland premiered in 2007 at the Bavarian State Opera and was hailed as World Premiere of the Year by the German opera magazine Opernwelt . Gerald Barry 's 2016 one-act opera , Alice's Adventures Under Ground , first staged in 2020 at
9280-557: The Tractarian movement , and did his best to instil such views in his children. However, Charles developed an ambivalent relationship with his father's values and with the Church of England as a whole. During his early youth, Dodgson was educated at home. His "reading lists" preserved in the family archives testify to a precocious intellect: at the age of seven, he was reading books such as The Pilgrim's Progress . He also spoke with
9440-616: The West End musical Alice in Wonderland (the first major live production of his Alice books) at the Prince of Wales Theatre on 30 December 1886. The two volumes of his last novel, Sylvie and Bruno , were published in 1889 and 1893, but the intricacy of this work was apparently not appreciated by contemporary readers; it achieved nothing like the success of the Alice books, with disappointing reviews and sales of only 13,000 copies. The only known occasion on which he travelled abroad
9600-590: The word ladder puzzle (which he then called "Doublets"), which he published in his weekly column for Vanity Fair magazine between 1879 and 1881. In 1982 a memorial stone to Carroll was unveiled at Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey . There are societies in many parts of the world dedicated to the enjoyment and promotion of his works. Dodgson's family background was predominantly northern English , conservative , and high-church Anglican . Most of his male ancestors were army officers or Anglican clergymen. His great-grandfather, Charles Dodgson , had risen through
9760-479: The "T" sound softened. Also the name "Lacie" is an anagram of "Alice", while 'Elsie' refers to Lorina, whose second name was Charlotte, giving her the initials L.C. 'Tillie' refers to Edith's family nickname of 'Matilda'. Fourth, there is an acrostic poem at the end of Through the Looking-Glass . Reading downward, taking the first letter of each line, spells out Liddell's full name. The poem has no title in Through
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#17327756151209920-419: The 1960s, Dodgson's great-nephew Philip Dodgson Jacques told him that Jacques had written the note himself based on conversations he remembered with Dodgson's nieces. Cohen's article offered no evidence to support this, however, and known samples of Jacques' handwriting do not seem to resemble the writing of the note. After this incident, Dodgson avoided the Liddell home for six months but eventually returned for
10080-651: The British people "in recognition of Britain's courage in facing Hitler". The manuscript is held by the British Library . For most of her life, Alice lived in and around Lyndhurst in the New Forest , in the county of Hampshire . After she died in 1934, her body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium , with her ashes being buried in the graveyard of the church of St Michael and All Angels in Lyndhurst, Hampshire . Alice's mirror can be found on display at
10240-507: The Cantini photo's authenticity, the BBC's failure to tell participants of the found photo, and several factual errors. Wakeling draws attention to the irregular "trimmed" nature of the photo itself, and no trace of Dodgson's writing. The inscription on the back of the photo, attributed "lewis Carroll" in pencil, "is an unknown hand... so it could have been written by anybody" . The photo negative
10400-526: The Christ Church library, where his office was close to the Deanery, where Alice Liddell lived. The young adult Charles Dodgson was about 6 feet (1.83 m) tall and slender, and he had curly brown hair and blue or grey eyes (depending on the account). He was described in later life as somewhat asymmetrical , and as carrying himself rather stiffly and awkwardly, although this might be on account of
10560-511: The Grand Duchess of Hesse . A recent biographer of Leopold suggests it is far more likely that Alice's sister Edith was the true recipient of Leopold's attention. Edith died on 26 June 1876, possibly of measles or peritonitis (accounts differ), shortly before she was to be married to Aubrey Harcourt, a cricket player. Prince Leopold served as a pall-bearer at her funeral on 30 June 1876. Alice Liddell married Reginald Hargreaves , also
10720-482: The Lewis Carroll pen name, which Dodgson had first used some nine years earlier. The illustrations this time were by Sir John Tenniel ; Dodgson evidently thought that a published book would need the skills of a professional artist. Annotated versions provide insights into many of the ideas and hidden meanings that are prevalent in these books. Critical literature has often proposed Freudian interpretations of
10880-446: The Liddell children since around March 1856, when he befriended Harry Liddell. He had met Lorina by early March as well. In June 1856, he took the children out on the river. Robert Douglas-Fairhurst, who wrote a literary biography of Carroll, suggests that Carroll favoured Alice Pleasance Liddell in particular because her name was ripe for allusion. "Pleasance" means pleasure and the name "Alice" appeared in contemporary works, including
11040-578: The Lion and the Unicorn (also in Looking-Glass ) look like Tenniel's Punch illustrations of William Ewart Gladstone and Disraeli, although Gardner says there is "no proof" that they were intended to represent these politicians. Gardner has suggested that the Hatter is a reference to Theophilus Carter , an Oxford furniture dealer, and that Tenniel apparently drew the Hatter to resemble Carter, on
11200-517: The Looking-Glass , but is usually referred to by its first line , "A Boat Beneath a Sunny Sky". A boat beneath a sunny sky, L ingering onward dreamily I n an evening of July— C hildren three that nestle near, E ager eye and willing ear, P leased a simple tale to hear— L ong has paled that sunny sky: E choes fade and memories die. A utumn frosts have slain July. S till she haunts me, phantomwise, A lice moving under skies N ever seen by waking eyes. C hildren yet,
11360-687: The Lory and Eaglet to Alice Liddell's sisters Lorina and Edith. Bill the Lizard may be a play on the name of British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli . One of Tenniel's illustrations in Through the Looking-Glass — the 1871 sequel to Alice — depicts the character referred to as the "Man in White Paper" (whom Alice meets on a train) as a caricature of Disraeli, wearing a paper hat. The illustrations of
11520-409: The Mad Hatter's Tea-Party (or Mad Tea Party), that do not appear in the manuscript. The only known manuscript copy of Under Ground is held in the British Library . Macmillan published a facsimile of the manuscript in 1886. Alice , a young girl, sits bored by a riverbank and spots a White Rabbit with a pocket watch and waistcoat lamenting that he is late. Surprised, Alice follows him down
11680-617: The New Forest Heritage Centre, Lyndhurst, a free museum sharing the history of the New Forest National Park . On 4 July 1862, in a rowing boat travelling on the Isis from Folly Bridge , Oxford , to Godstow for a picnic outing, 10-year-old Alice asked Charles Dodgson (who wrote under the pen name Lewis Carroll ) to entertain her and her sisters, Edith (aged 8) and Lorina (13), with a story. As
11840-487: The New York publishing house of D. Appleton & Company . The binding for the Appleton Alice was identical to 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
12000-460: The Queen's tarts. The trial is conducted by the King of Hearts , and the jury is composed of animals that Alice previously met. Alice gradually grows in size and confidence, allowing herself increasingly frequent remarks on the irrationality of the proceedings. The Queen eventually commands Alice's beheading, but Alice scoffs that the Queen's guard is only a pack of cards. Although Alice holds her own for
12160-501: The Reverend Robinson Duckworth rowed the boat, Dodgson regaled the girls with fantastic stories of a girl, named Alice, and her adventures after she fell into a rabbit-hole. The story was not unlike those Dodgson had spun for the sisters before, but this time Liddell asked Mr. Dodgson to write it down for her. He promised to do so but did not get around to the task for some months. He eventually presented her with
12320-553: The Sky with Diamonds ", with songwriter John Lennon attributing the song's fantastical imagery to his reading of Carroll's books. A popular figure in Japan since the country opened up to the West in the late 19th century, Alice has been a popular subject for writers of manga and a source of inspiration for Japanese fashion, in particular Lolita fashion . The first full major production
12480-580: The alleged photo until editing of the documentary was underway. Edward Wakeling's paper/review "Eight or nine wise words on documentary making" [1] appeared in March 2015 as part of the Lewis Carroll society newsletter Bandersnatch . Wakeling also echoed Woolf's assertions that he was not given time to talk about the alleged photo. Wakeling claimed, "The documentary knew I could authenticate [the photo] or not, but they chose to keep it from me as they anticipated my response." Wakeling further criticises in his paper
12640-455: The art and became a well-known gentleman-photographer, and he seems even to have toyed with the idea of making a living out of it in his very early years. A study by Roger Taylor and Edward Wakeling exhaustively lists every surviving print, and Taylor calculates that just over half of Dodgson's surviving work depicts young girls. Thirty surviving photographs depict nude or semi-nude children. About 60% of Dodgson's original photographic portfolio
12800-520: The author of his mathematical works". He also began earning quite substantial sums of money but continued with his seemingly disliked post at Christ Church. Late in 1871, he published the sequel Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There . (The title page of the first edition erroneously gives "1872" as the date of publication. ) Its somewhat darker mood possibly reflects changes in Dodgson's life. His father's death in 1868 plunged him into
12960-551: The book as "a descent into the dark world of the subconscious ", as well as seeing it as a satire upon contemporary mathematical advances. The overwhelming commercial success of the first Alice book changed Dodgson's life in many ways. The fame of his alter ego "Lewis Carroll" soon spread around the world. He was inundated with fan mail and with sometimes unwanted attention. Indeed, according to one popular story, Queen Victoria herself enjoyed Alice in Wonderland so much that she commanded that he dedicate his next book to her, and
13120-552: The book, lyrics, and music based on both Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass . Papp and Swados had previously produced a version of it at the New York Shakespeare Festival . Meryl Streep played Alice, the White Queen, and Humpty Dumpty. The cast also included Debbie Allen , Michael Jeter , and Mark Linn-Baker . Performed on a bare stage with the actors in modern dress,
13280-405: The character in the original manuscript of Alice's Adventures Under Ground show little resemblance to Liddell. Biographer Anne Clark suggests that Dodgson might have used Edith Liddell as a model for his drawings. There are at least four direct links to Liddell in the two books. First, he set them on 4 May (Liddell's birthday) and 4 November (her "half-birthday"), and in Through the Looking-Glass
13440-445: The characters in the narrative are based on her. Information is scarce (Dodgson's diaries for the years 1858–1862 are missing), but it seems clear that his friendship with the Liddell family was an important part of his life in the late 1850s, and he grew into the habit of taking the children on rowing trips (first the boy, Harry, and later the three girls) accompanied by an adult friend to nearby Nuneham Courtenay or Godstow . It
13600-402: The characters. The members of the boating party that first heard Carroll's tale show up in chapter 3 ("A Caucus-Race and a Long Tale"). Alice Liddell is there, while Carroll is caricatured as the Dodo (Lewis Carroll was a pen name for Charles Lutwidge Dodgson; because he stuttered when he spoke, he sometimes pronounced his last name as "Dodo-Dodgson"). The Duck refers to Robinson Duckworth , and
13760-681: The county of Surrey, just four days before the death of Henry Liddell. He was two weeks away from turning 66 years old. His funeral was held at the nearby St Mary's Church . His body was buried at the Mount Cemetery in Guildford. He is commemorated at All Saints' Church, Daresbury , in its stained glass windows depicting characters from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland , erected in 1935. A BBC documentary from 2015, The Secret World of Lewis Carroll , critically examined Dodgson's relationship with Alice Liddell and her sisters. It explored
13920-489: The earliest modern use of a truth tree . Robbins' and Rumsey's investigation of Dodgson condensation , a method of evaluating determinants , led them to the alternating sign matrix conjecture, now a theorem. The discovery in the 1990s of additional ciphers that Dodgson had constructed, in addition to his "Memoria Technica", showed that he had employed sophisticated mathematical ideas in their creation. Dodgson wrote and received as many as 98,721 letters, according to
14080-433: The eater—a horrific image of mortality. Nina Auerbach discusses how the novel revolves around eating and drinking which "motivates much of her [Alice's] behaviour", for the story is essentially about things "entering and leaving her mouth." The animals of Wonderland are of particular interest, for Alice's relation to them shifts constantly because, as Lovell-Smith states, Alice's changes in size continually reposition her in
14240-455: The extent to which the character was based upon her. Alice Liddell was the fourth of the ten children of Henry Liddell , ecclesiastical dean of Christ Church, Oxford , one of the editors of A Greek-English Lexicon , and his wife Lorina Hanna Liddell ( née Reeve). She had two older brothers, Harry (born 1847) and Arthur (1850–53), an older sister Lorina (born 1849), and six younger siblings, including her sister Edith (born 1854) to whom she
14400-414: The family governess and to "Ina" (both Alice's older sister and her mother were named "Lorina"). In her biography, The Mystery of Lewis Carroll, Jenny Woolf suggests that the problem was caused by Lorina becoming too attached to Dodgson and not the other way around. Woolf then uses this theory to explain why "Menella [would] remove the page itself, yet keep a note of what was on it. " The note, she submits,
14560-582: The family of friend and mentor George MacDonald read Dodgson's incomplete manuscript, and the enthusiasm of the MacDonald children encouraged Dodgson to seek publication. In 1863, he had taken the unfinished manuscript to Macmillan the publisher , who liked it immediately. After the possible alternative titles were rejected – Alice Among the Fairies and Alice's Golden Hour – the work was finally published as Alice's Adventures in Wonderland in 1865 under
14720-503: The fictional Alice declares that her age is "seven and a half exactly", the same as Liddell on that date. Second, he dedicated them "to Alice Pleasance Liddell". Third, in the first book, the Dormouse tells a story which begins, "Once upon a time there were three little sisters... and their names were Elsie, Lacie, and Tillie." The name Liddell was pronounced with the accent on the first syllable and would sound like "little" as spoken with
14880-479: The fictional Alice was based very heavily on Liddell, recent research has contradicted this assumption. Dodgson himself claimed in later years that his Alice was entirely imaginary and not based upon any real child at all. There was a rumour that Dodgson sent Tenniel a photo of one of his other child-friends, Mary Hilton Badcock, suggesting that he use her as a model, but attempts to find documentary support for this theory have proved fruitless. Dodgson's own drawings of
15040-466: The field of mathematical logic attracted renewed interest in the late 20th century. Martin Gardner's book on logic machines and diagrams and William Warren Bartley's posthumous publication of the second part of Dodgson's symbolic logic book have sparked a reevaluation of Dodgson's contributions to symbolic logic. It is recognised that in his Symbolic Logic Part II , Dodgson introduced the Method of Trees,
15200-501: The first copy of Clay's edition on 9 November 1865. Macmillan finally published the new edition, printed by Richard Clay, in November 1865. Carroll requested a red binding, deeming it appealing to young readers. A new edition, released in December 1865 for the Christmas market but carrying an 1866 date, was quickly printed. The text blocks of the original edition were removed from the binding and sold with Carroll's permission to
15360-449: The first publication of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland 150 years ago, Lewis Carroll's work has spawned a whole industry, from films and theme park rides to products such as a "cute and sassy" Alice costume ("petticoat and stockings not included"). The blank-faced little girl made famous by John Tenniel's original illustrations has become a cultural inkblot we can interpret in any way we like. Labelled "a dauntless, no-nonsense heroine" by
15520-405: The first time I read it as a schoolboy. F. J. Harvey Darton argued in a 1932 book that Alice ended an era of didacticism in children's literature , inaugurating a new era in which writing for children aimed to "delight or entertain". In 2014, Robert McCrum named Alice "one of the best loved in the English canon" and called it "perhaps the greatest, possibly most influential, and certainly
15680-457: The following years, and would greatly influence his writing career. Dodgson became close friends with Liddell's wife, Lorina, and their children, particularly the three sisters Lorina, Edith, and Alice Liddell. He was widely assumed for many years to have derived his own "Alice" from Alice Liddell ; the acrostic poem at the end of Through the Looking-Glass spells out her name in full, and there are also many superficial references to her hidden in
15840-463: The food chain, serving as a way to make her acutely aware of the 'eat or be eaten' attitude that permeates Wonderland. Alice is an example of the literary nonsense genre. According to Humphrey Carpenter , Alice 's brand of nonsense embraces the nihilistic and existential . Characters in nonsensical episodes such as the Mad Hatter's Tea Party, in which it is always the same time, go on posing paradoxes that are never resolved. Wonderland
16000-469: The four decades after its premiere, including a London production at the Globe Theatre in 1888, with Isa Bowman as Alice. As the book and its sequel are Carroll's most widely recognised works, they have also inspired numerous live performances, including plays, operas, ballets, and traditional English pantomimes . These works range from fairly faithful adaptations to those that use the story as
16160-418: The hardships of the daily life would have been comparative trifles to bear." He did not claim he suffered from bullying, but cited little boys as the main targets of older bullies at Rugby. Stuart Dodgson Collingwood, Dodgson's nephew, wrote that "even though it is hard for those who have only known him as the gentle and retiring don to believe it, it is nevertheless true that long after he left school, his name
16320-475: The house. Attempting to extract her, the White Rabbit and his neighbours eventually take to hurling pebbles that turn into small cakes. Alice eats one and shrinks herself, allowing her to flee into the forest. She meets a Caterpillar seated on a mushroom and smoking a hookah . During the Caterpillar's questioning, Alice begins to admit to her current identity crisis, compounded by her inability to remember
16480-428: The idea of eating coincides to make gruesome images. After the riddle "Why is a raven like a writing-desk?", the Hatter claims that Alice might as well say, "I see what I eat…I eat what I see" and so the riddle's solution, put forward by Boe Birns, could be that "A raven eats worms; a writing desk is worm-eaten"; this idea of food encapsulates idea of life feeding on life itself, for the worm is being eaten and then becomes
16640-422: The manuscript more than two years later. 4 July was known as the " golden afternoon ", prefaced in the novel as a poem. In fact, the weather around Oxford on 4 July was "cool and rather wet", although at least one scholar has disputed this claim. Scholars debate whether Carroll in fact came up with Alice during the "golden afternoon" or whether the story was developed over a longer period. Carroll had known
16800-429: The manuscript of Alice's Adventures Under Ground in November 1864. In the meantime, Dodgson had decided to rewrite the story as a possible commercial venture. Probably with a view to canvassing his opinion, Dodgson sent the manuscript of Under Ground to a friend, the author George MacDonald , in the spring of 1863. The MacDonald children read the story and loved it, and this response probably persuaded Dodgson to seek
16960-490: The mathematics textbook that the young Dodgson used – still survives and it contained an inscription in Latin , which translates to: "This book belongs to Charles Lutwidge Dodgson: hands off!" Some pages also included annotations such as the one found on p. 129, where he wrote "Not a fair question in decimals" next to a question. He left Rugby at the end of 1849 and matriculated at the University of Oxford in May 1850 as
17120-605: The matter. When the Duchess ruminates on finding morals in everything around her, the Queen dismisses her on the threat of execution. Alice then meets a Gryphon and a Mock Turtle , who dance to the Lobster Quadrille while Alice recites (rather incorrectly) a poem . The Mock Turtle sings them "Beautiful Soup", during which the Gryphon drags Alice away for a trial, in which the Knave of Hearts stands accused of stealing
17280-450: The media's reactions to the UK's early 2010 Yewtree investigations. When problems about the documentary's conduct and research surfaced, The Times and The Telegraph reported it. The material in the documentary has come under intense scrutiny by Carroll scholars, including those such as Jenny Woolf and Edward Wakeling, who appeared in it. Woolf claimed that she was not told of the use of
17440-427: The missing page from 27–29 June 1863, apparently written before she (or her sister Menella) removed the page. The note reads: L.C. learns from Mrs. Liddell that he is supposed to be using the children as a means of paying court to the governess—he is also supposed by some to be courting Ina This might imply that the break between Dodgson and the Liddell family was caused by concern over alleged gossip linking Dodgson to
17600-527: The most commonly used penny stamp, and one each for the other current denominations up to one shilling. The folder was then put into a slipcase decorated with a picture of Alice on the front and the Cheshire Cat on the back. It intended to organise stamps wherever one stored their writing implements; Carroll expressly notes in Eight or Nine Wise Words about Letter-Writing it is not intended to be carried in
17760-468: The most world-famous Victorian English fiction". A 2020 review in Time states: "The book changed young people's literature. It helped to replace stiff Victorian didacticism with a looser, sillier, nonsense style that reverberated through the works of language-loving 20th-century authors as different as James Joyce , Douglas Adams and Dr. Seuss ." The protagonist of the story, Alice, has been recognised as
17920-489: The mouse as "O Mouse", based on her memory of the noun declensions "in her brother's Latin Grammar , 'A mouse – of a mouse – to a mouse – a mouse – O mouse! ' " These words correspond to the first five of Latin's six cases, in a traditional order established by medieval grammarians: mus ( nominative ), muris ( genitive ), muri ( dative ), murem ( accusative ), (O) mus ( vocative ). The sixth case, mure ( ablative )
18080-579: The name that would make him famous. A romantic poem called "Solitude" appeared in The Train under the authorship of "Lewis Carroll". This pseudonym was a play on his real name: Lewis was the anglicised form of Ludovicus , which was the Latin for Lutwidge , and Carroll an Irish surname similar to the Latin name Carolus , from which comes the name Charles . The transition went as follows: "Charles Lutwidge" translated into Latin as "Carolus Ludovicus". This
18240-503: The next year he failed an important scholarship exam through his self-confessed inability to apply himself to study. Even so, his talent as a mathematician won him the Christ Church Mathematical Lectureship in 1855, which he continued to hold for the next 26 years. Despite early unhappiness, Dodgson remained at Christ Church, in various capacities, until his death, including that of Sub-Librarian of
18400-506: The original copy, on publication he was advised to find a professional illustrator so that the pictures were more appealing to his audience. He subsequently approached John Tenniel to reinterpret his visions through his own artistic eye, telling him that the story had been well-liked by the children. Carroll began planning a print edition of the Alice story in 1863. He wrote on 9 May 1863 that MacDonald's family had suggested he publish Alice . A diary entry for 2 July says that he received
18560-485: The other in the fairytale kingdoms of Elfland, Outland, and others. The fairytale world satirises English society and, more specifically, the world of academia. Sylvie and Bruno came out in two volumes and is considered a lesser work, although it has remained in print for over a century. In 1856, Dodgson took up the new art form of photography under the influence first of his uncle Skeffington Lutwidge , and later of his Oxford friend Reginald Southey . He soon excelled at
18720-476: The period in which it began) was missing; it has been speculated by biographers such as Morton N. Cohen that Dodgson may have wanted to marry the 11-year-old Alice Liddell, and that this was the cause of the unexplained break with the family in June 1863. Alice Liddell's biographer, Anne Clark, writes that Alice's descendants were under the impression that Dodgson wanted to marry her, but that "Alice's parents expected
18880-472: The play is a loose adaptation, with song styles ranging the globe. The 1992 musical theatre production Alice used both books as its inspiration. It also employs scenes with Carroll, a young Alice Liddell, and an adult Alice Liddell, to frame the story. Paul Schmidt wrote the play, with Tom Waits and Kathleen Brennan writing the music. Although the original production in Hamburg , Germany, received only
19040-419: The poem "Alice Gray" by William Mee, of which Carroll wrote a parody; Alice is a character in "Dream-Children: A Reverie", a prose piece by Charles Lamb . Carroll, an amateur photographer by the late 1850s, produced many photographic portraits of the Liddell children – and especially of Alice, of which 20 survive. Carroll began writing the manuscript of the story the next day, although that earliest version
19200-463: The possession of Eldridge R. Johnson and was displayed at Columbia University on the centennial of Carroll's birth. Alice was present, aged 80, and it was on this visit to the United States that she met Peter Llewelyn Davies , one of the brothers who inspired J. M. Barrie 's Peter Pan . Upon Johnson's death, the book was purchased by a consortium of American bibliophiles and presented to
19360-410: The possibility that Dodgson's rift with the Liddell family (and his temporary suspension from the college) might have been caused by improper relations with their children, including Alice. The research for the documentary found a "disturbing" full frontal nude of Alice's adolescent sister Lorina during filming, and speculated on the "likelihood" of Dodgson taking the photo. However, it was later revealed
19520-495: The public, having been reprinted seventeen times between 1876 and 1908, and has seen various adaptations into musicals, opera, theatre, plays and music. Painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti reputedly became convinced that the poem was about him. In 1895, 30 years after the publication of his masterpieces, Carroll attempted a comeback, producing a two-volume tale of the fairy siblings Sylvie and Bruno . Carroll entwines two plots set in two alternative worlds, one set in rural England and
19680-472: The published version of the book. The first print run was destroyed (or sold in the US) at Carroll's request because Tenniel was dissatisfied with the printing quality. There are only 22 known first edition copies in existence. The book was reprinted and published in 1866. Tenniel's detailed black-and-white drawings remain the definitive depiction of the characters. Tenniel's illustrations of Alice do not portray
19840-547: The ranks of the church to become the Bishop of Elphin in rural Ireland. His paternal grandfather, also named Charles, was an army captain fatality of the Irish rebellion of 1803 , when his two sons were hardly more than babies. The older of these sons, yet another Charles Dodgson , was Carroll's father. He went to Rugby School and then to Christ Church, Oxford . He reverted to the other family tradition and took holy orders . He
20000-676: The real Alice Liddell, who had dark hair and a short fringe. Alice has provided a challenge for other illustrators, including those of 1907 by Charles Pears and the full series of colour plates and line-drawings by Harry Rountree published in the (inter-War) Children's Press (Glasgow) edition. Other significant illustrators include: Arthur Rackham (1907), Willy Pogany (1929), Mervyn Peake (1946), Ralph Steadman (1967), Salvador Dalí (1969), Graham Overden (1969), Max Ernst (1970), Peter Blake (1970), Tove Jansson (1977), Anthony Browne (1988), Helen Oxenbury (1999), and Lisbeth Zwerger (1999). Carroll first met Alexander Macmillan ,
20160-497: The roof of Tom Quad , created around 3,000 images, and become an amateur master of the medium, though fewer than 1,000 images have survived time and deliberate destruction. He stopped taking photographs because keeping his studio working was too time-consuming. He used the wet collodion process ; commercial photographers who started using the dry-plate process in the 1870s took pictures more quickly. He often altered his photographs through blurring techniques or by painting over them,
20320-618: The rose motif in Alice alludes to the English Wars of the Roses : red roses symbolised the House of Lancaster , and white roses the rival House of York . Alice is full of linguistic play, puns, and parodies. According to Gillian Beer , Carroll's play with language evokes the feeling of words for new readers: they "still have insecure edges and a nimbus of nonsense blurs the sharp focus of terms". The literary scholar Jessica Straley, in
20480-531: The shadows. Most assuredly I accept to the full the doctrines you refer to—that Christ died to save us, that we have no other way of salvation open to us but through His death, and that it is by faith in Him, and through no merit of ours, that we are reconciled to God; and most assuredly I can cordially say, "I owe all to Him who loved me, and died on the Cross of Calvary." Dodgson also expressed interest in other fields. He
20640-490: The source of much controversy. Dodgson met the Liddell family in 1855; he first befriended Harry, the older brother, and later took Harry and Ina on several boating trips and picnics to the scenic areas around Oxford. Later, when Harry went to school, Alice and her younger sister Edith joined the party. Dodgson entertained the children by telling them fantastic stories to while away the time. He also used them as subjects for his hobby, photography. It has often been stated that Alice
20800-472: The spacious rectory. This remained their home for the next 25 years. Charles' father was an active and highly conservative cleric of the Church of England who later became the Archdeacon of Richmond and involved himself, sometimes influentially, in the intense religious disputes that were dividing the church. He was high-church, inclining toward Anglo-Catholicism , an admirer of John Henry Newman and
20960-490: The story lasting popularity with adults as well as with children. The titular character Alice shares her name with Alice Liddell , a girl Carroll knew—scholars disagree about the extent to which the character was based upon her. The book has never been out of print and has been translated into 174 languages. Its legacy includes adaptations to screen, radio, visual art, ballet, opera, and musical theatre, as well as theme parks, board games and video games. Carroll published
21120-406: The story progresses. Gillian Beer suggests that Alice looks for rules to soothe her anxiety, while Carroll may have hunted for rules because he struggled with the implications of the non-Euclidean geometry then in development. The manuscript was illustrated by Carroll, who added 37 illustrations—printed in a facsimile edition in 1887. John Tenniel provided 42 wood-engraved illustrations for
21280-622: The success of the Alice books, Dodgson began to move in the pre-Raphaelite social circle. He first met John Ruskin in 1857 and became friendly with him. Around 1863, he developed a close relationship with Dante Gabriel Rossetti and his family. He would often take pictures of the family in the garden of the Rossetti's house in Chelsea, London . He also knew William Holman Hunt , John Everett Millais , and Arthur Hughes , among other artists. He knew fairy-tale author George MacDonald well – it
21440-437: The table and cannot reach it. Alice then discovers and eats a cake labelled "Eat me", which causes her to grow to a tremendous size. Unhappy, Alice bursts into tears, and the passing White Rabbit flees in a panic, dropping a fan and two gloves. Alice uses the fan for herself, which causes her to shrink once more and leaves her swimming in a pool of her own tears. Within the pool, Alice meets various animals and birds, who convene on
21600-509: The table, and the riddle "Why is a raven like a writing desk?" is brought up. Alice impatiently decides to leave, calling the party stupid. Noticing a door on a tree, Alice passes through and finds herself back in the room from the beginning of her journey. She takes the key and uses it to open the door to the garden, which turns out to be the croquet court of the Queen of Hearts , whose guard consists of living playing cards. Alice participates in
21760-474: The tale to hear, E ager eye and willing ear, L ovingly shall nestle near. I n a Wonderland they lie, D reaming as the days go by, D reaming as the summers die: E ver drifting down the stream— L ingering in the golden gleam— L ife, what is it but a dream? In addition, all of those who participated in the Thames boating expedition where the story was originally told (Carroll, Duckworth and
21920-436: The text of both books. It has been noted that Dodgson himself repeatedly denied in later life that his "little heroine" was based on any real child, and he frequently dedicated his works to girls of his acquaintance, adding their names in acrostic poems at the beginning of the text. Gertrude Chataway 's name appears in this form at the beginning of The Hunting of the Snark , and it is not suggested that this means that any of
22080-424: The three Liddell sisters) appear in the chapter "A Caucus-Race and a Long Tale" – but only if Alice Liddell is represented by Alice herself. Several later writers have written fictional accounts of Liddell: Lewis Carroll Charles Lutwidge Dodgson ( / ˈ l ʌ t w ɪ dʒ ˈ d ɒ d s ən / LUT -wij DOD -sən ; 27 January 1832 – 14 January 1898), better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll ,
22240-616: The timeline for this research had more than met the eye. The photo currently exists in the archives of the Musée Cantini in Marseille , and was attributed to Dodgson by a currently unknown hand. It was subsequently revealed in early 2015 by the Carroll scholar Edward Wakeling that the photo first appeared in the 1970s, when it was owned by Parisian photo collectors. The provenance of the photo's link to Dodgson could be questioned. It
22400-510: The verse); and Edith Mary (aged 8; "Tertia" in the verse). The journey began at Folly Bridge , Oxford, and ended 5 miles (8 km) upstream at Godstow , Oxfordshire. During the trip, Carroll told the girls a story that he described in his diary as "Alice's Adventures Under Ground", which his journal says he "undertook to write out for Alice". Alice Liddell recalled that she asked Carroll to write it down: unlike other stories he had told her, this one she wanted to preserve. She finally received
22560-460: Was Alice in Wonderland , a musical play in London's West End by Henry Savile Clarke and Walter Slaughter , which premiered at the Prince of Wales Theatre in 1886. Twelve-year-old actress Phoebe Carlo (the first to play Alice) was personally selected by Carroll for the role. Carroll attended a performance on 30 December 1886, writing in his diary that he enjoyed it. The musical was frequently revived during West End Christmas seasons during
22720-612: Was a mathematician at Christ Church, it has been suggested that there are many references and mathematical concepts in both this story and Through the Looking-Glass . Literary scholar Melanie Bayley asserts in the New Scientist magazine that Carroll wrote Alice in Wonderland in its final form as a satire on mid-19th century mathematics. Carina Garland notes how the world is "expressed via representations of food and appetite", naming Alice's frequent desire for consumption (of both food and words), her 'Curious Appetites'. Often,
22880-445: Was a member of the Church of England , but "doubt[ed] if he was fully a 'High Churchman ' ". He added: I believe that when you and I come to lie down for the last time, if only we can keep firm hold of the great truths Christ taught us—our own utter worthlessness and His infinite worth; and that He has brought us back to our one Father, and made us His brethren, and so brethren to one another—we shall have all we need to guide us through
23040-436: Was a publishing sensation, beloved by children and adults alike. Oscar Wilde was a fan; Queen Victoria was also an avid reader of the book. She reportedly enjoyed Alice enough that she asked for Carroll's next book, which turned out to be a mathematical treatise; Carroll denied this. The book has never been out of print. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland has been translated into 174 languages. The following list
23200-785: Was a trip to Russia in 1867 as an ecclesiastic, together with the Reverend Henry Liddon . He recounts the travel in his "Russian Journal", which was first commercially published in 1935. On his way to Russia and back, he also saw different cities in Belgium, Germany, partitioned Poland and Lithuania, and France. In his early sixties, Dodgson increasingly suffered from synovitis which eventually prevented him walking and sometimes left him bed-ridden for months. Dodgson died of pneumonia following influenza on 14 January 1898 at his sisters' home, "The Chestnuts", in Guildford in
23360-465: Was accordingly presented with his next work, a scholarly mathematical volume entitled An Elementary Treatise on Determinants . Dodgson himself vehemently denied this story, commenting "... It is utterly false in every particular: nothing even resembling it has occurred"; and it is unlikely for other reasons. As T. B. Strong comments in a Times article, "It would have been clean contrary to all his practice to identify [the] author of Alice with
23520-524: Was an English author , poet , mathematician , photographer and Anglican deacon . His most notable works are Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass (1871). He was noted for his facility with word play , logic, and fantasy. His poems Jabberwocky (1871) and The Hunting of the Snark (1876) are classified in the genre of literary nonsense . Some of Alice's nonsensical wonderland logic reflects his published work on mathematical logic . Carroll came from
23680-542: Was an early member of the Society for Psychical Research , and one of his letters suggests that he accepted as real what was then called "thought reading". Dodgson wrote some studies of various philosophical arguments. In 1895, he developed a philosophical regressus-argument on deductive reasoning in his article " What the Tortoise Said to Achilles ", which appeared in one of the early volumes of Mind . The article
23840-403: Was deliberately destroyed. Dodgson also made many studies of men, women, boys, and landscapes; his subjects also include skeletons, dolls, dogs, statues, paintings, and trees. His pictures of children were taken with a parent in attendance and many of the pictures were taken in the Liddell garden because natural sunlight was required for good exposures. Dodgson also found photography to be
24000-596: Was exceptionally gifted, and achievement came easily to him. In 1852, he obtained first-class honours in Mathematics Moderations and was soon afterwards nominated to a Studentship by his father's old friend Canon Edward Pusey . In 1854, he obtained first-class honours in the Final Honours School of Mathematics, standing first on the list, and thus graduated as Bachelor of Arts. He remained at Christ Church studying and teaching, but
24160-424: Was his favourite subject in these years, but there is very little evidence to suggest this; Dodgson's diaries from 18 April 1858 to 8 May 1862 are missing. The relationship between the Liddells and Dodgson suffered a sudden break in June 1863. There was no record of why the rift occurred, since the Liddells never openly spoke of it, and the single page in Dodgson's diary recording 27–29 June 1863 (which seems to cover
24320-614: Was left to the Musée de Cantini. There was no link to Dodgson, and no link to the Liddell family. This was not explained in the documentary. The documentary raised suspicions about Dodgson being a "repressed paedophile", as one of the interviewees, Will Self , put it. This aspect was leaked to The Telegraph a week in advance. When reviewing the documentary, papers sought to link the 19th-century Carroll with 21st-century sexual conduct revelations about recent paedophiles. This attempted link could be considered an act of scapegoating inspired by
24480-475: Was mathematically gifted and won a double first degree, which could have been the prelude to a brilliant academic career. Instead, he became a country parson . Dodgson was born on 27 January 1832 at All Saints' Vicarage in Daresbury , Cheshire , the oldest boy and the third oldest of 11 children. When he was 11, his father was given the living of Croft-on-Tees , Yorkshire, and the whole family moved to
24640-402: Was on one such expedition on 4 July 1862 that Dodgson invented the outline of the story that eventually became his first and greatest commercial success. He told the story to Alice Liddell and she begged him to write it down, and Dodgson eventually (after much delay) presented her with a handwritten, illustrated manuscript entitled Alice's Adventures Under Ground in November 1864. Before this,
24800-518: Was ordained a deacon in the Church of England on 22 December 1861. In The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll , the editor states that "his Diary is full of such modest depreciations of himself and his work, interspersed with earnest prayers (too sacred and private to be reproduced here) that God would forgive him the past, and help him to perform His holy will in the future." When a friend asked him about his religious views, Dodgson wrote in response that he
24960-399: Was remembered as that of a boy who knew well how to use his fists in defence of a righteous cause", which is the protection of the smaller boys. Scholastically, though, he excelled with apparent ease. "I have not had a more promising boy at his age since I came to Rugby", observed mathematics master R. B. Mayor. Francis Walkingame's The Tutor's Assistant; Being a Compendium of Arithmetic –
25120-482: Was reprinted in the same journal a hundred years later in 1995, with a subsequent article by Simon Blackburn titled "Practical Tortoise Raising". From a young age, Dodgson wrote poetry and short stories, contributing heavily to the family magazine Mischmasch and later sending them to various magazines, enjoying moderate success. Between 1854 and 1856, his work appeared in the national publications The Comic Times and The Train , as well as smaller magazines such as
25280-662: Was the enthusiastic reception of Alice by the young MacDonald children that persuaded him to submit the work for publication. In broad terms, Dodgson has traditionally been regarded as politically, religiously, and personally conservative. Martin Gardner labels Dodgson as a Tory who was "awed by lords and inclined to be snobbish towards inferiors". William Tuckwell , in his Reminiscences of Oxford (1900), regarded him as "austere, shy, precise, absorbed in mathematical reverie, watchfully tenacious of his dignity, stiffly conservative in political, theological, social theory, his life mapped out in squares like Alice's landscape". Dodgson
25440-445: Was then translated back into English as "Carroll Lewis" and then reversed to make "Lewis Carroll". This pseudonym was chosen by editor Edmund Yates from a list of four submitted by Dodgson, the others being Edgar Cuthwellis, Edgar U. C. Westhill, and Louis Carroll. In 1856, Dean Henry Liddell arrived at Christ Church at Oxford University , bringing with him his young family, all of whom would figure largely in Dodgson's life over
25600-480: Was very close, and her brother Frederick (born 1865). At the time of her birth, her father was the Headmaster of Westminster School but was soon after appointed to the deanery of Christ Church, Oxford. The Liddell family moved to Oxford in 1856. Soon after this move, Alice met Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (Lewis Carroll), who encountered the family while photographing the cathedral on 25 April 1856. He became
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