Alice in Wonderland: a summary of selected criticism and an explication.

Abstract

There are two types of people who read Alice in Wonderland, by far the larger group being those who relegate Lewis Carroll's book to their "best loved" list, putting it in their book shelf next to the works of Edna St. Vincent Millay and ten years installments of Reader's Digest Books of the Month. Then there are the Carroll critics. These readers do not "love" Alice in Wonderland; they do not cherish it or condescend its contents. Instead they study the book as a serious work of art worthy of serious consideration. I wish to emphasize that I agree with the second group of readers. The purpose of this thesis is to achieve an accurate and, as far as possible, an objective study of Alice in Wonderland by an explication which takes into account various critical view points Chapter one is essentially biographical. In it I consider four aspects of Carroll's personality which are pertinent in giving the reader clues to the reading of Alice. These four aspects of his personality are his sense of humor, his rage for order, his logical mind, and his fondness for little girls. Each of these is important to Alice in Wonderland in that each contributes to an understanding of the peculiar combination of e,lements found in the book. His sense of humor is present in Alice, and it keeps the book from becoming pure nightmare. Carroll's rage for order in life helps explain his interest in the order or lack of order in Wonderland. His logical mind contributed to the topsy-turvy logic in Alice, and of course his interest in little girls lead to the creation of Alice herself. Chapter two is a selective survey involved with a group of critics who interpret Alice in Wonderland as satire and allegory. These critics range from arguing that Alice is a topical political and religious allegory to interpreting the book as a metaphorical version of growing up. These more general interpretations are especially helpful in showing that Alice is a child faced with a complex world. Chapter three revolves around Carroll's use of logic and language in Alice 1£ Wonderlan£. Here one discovers that the book's form is the illogical assumption that a child can go down a rabbit hole, and yet neither the reader nor Alice "forget" basic logical rutes of time and space. In Wonderland both logic and language are relative to each character. Chapter four attempts to synthesize the information collected in the first three chapters. It is an explication of the book which deals with Alice as a child's dream-vision of a relative world. Alice is an intelligent child with good sense who judges Wonderland as she moves through its absurd places and characters. But, because she cannot adjust to vlonderland's absurdities, she becomes aggressive .and hostile, finally destroying Wonderland's insane order to save her own sanity. The book's final irony is the narrator's paradoxical denial and affirmation of order.