essay on my favourite book alice in wonderland

Sarah's Book Life

Some of my favourite Alice in Wonderland re-imaginings/re-tellings (books, TV shows and films)

Alice in Wonderland is one of my favourite books and one of the classics that I love to see being re-imagined by authors and on screen. I love reading and watching the new ways that creators re-imagine the classic tale, or take inspiration from it to create something entirely new. And with a new anthology of tales inspired by the story, Wonderland: an Anthology, I thought that it would be fun to recommend some of my favourite re-tellings and re-imagines of Alice in Wonderland.

There are many, many books based on Alice in Wonderland and sadly I haven’t read them all. There are many that I want to get my hands on and read but sadly don’t have the money or time too. But I have read enough to have a few favourites, so here are three of my favourite books/series based on, inspired and are re-tellings of Alice in Wonderland.

The Looking Glass Wars trilogy by Frank Beddor

essay on my favourite book alice in wonderland

Lewis Carroll got the story wrong. Alice (Alyss) wasn’t just some girl that fell down a rabbit hole. No. She lived there. She was Wonderland’s princess, the next in line to the throne, until her aunt took everything away from her and forced her to leave everything she knew behind and come to live in our world as a child.

Forced to adapt to live outside of Wonderland, Alyss grows up as just another girl. She looses her powerful imagination, her royal power to make whatever she can imagine real, as she is forced to forget her life and convinces herself that it was all a dream. Until she is dragged back to Wonderland and must come to terms with her past and the role she has to pay in the future of her kingdom.

This is one of my favourite book series based on Alice in Wonderland. I love how creative Beddor was with the world and the characters. Changing so much of the story to create something completely new and different, and planting so many little easter eggs in the three books. I really loved reading this series and would highly recommend it to anyone that loves Alice in Wonderland.

Ever Alice by H.J. Ramsay

Alice’s stories of Wonderland did more than raise a few eyebrows—it landed her in an asylum. Now at 15 years of age, she’s willing to do anything to leave, which includes agreeing to an experimental procedure. When Alice decides at the last minute not to go through with it, she escapes with the White Rabbit to Wonderland and trades one mad house for another: the court of the Queen of Hearts. Only this time, she is under orders to take out the Queen. When love, scandal, and intrigue begin to muddle her mission, Alice finds herself on the wrong side of the chopping block.

I really loved how this story explored what might happen after Alice left Wonderland and returned home after her adventures down the rabbit hole. This was more of a continuation than a retelling or reimagining of the original tale, but I feel like it can still count. I really loved that Ramsay kept the essense of the original story and built on and kept the whimsy, maddness and nonsensical nature of Wonderland alive in this story. I also really loved how the existing characters were explored, and I felt that the new characters introduced fit so well. I was very lucky to recieve and eARC copy of this book from NetGalley, it is now published and you can read my review here .

Alice by Christina Henry

Locked away in a hospital for reason she doesn’t know in a warren of crumbling buildings and desperate people called the Old City. The woman doesn’t even know who she is, all she can remember is long ears, a tea party and blood from long ago.

Then, one night, a fire at the hospital gives the woman a chance to escape, tumbling out of the hole that imprisoned her, leaving her free to uncover the truth about what happened to her all those years ago.

But she is not alone. Some dark and dangerous escaped with her. To find the truth she will have to go into the very heart of the Old City, where danger lurks around every corner, where the rabbit waits for his Alice.

This is another take on what happens after Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Expect she never came back to our world. Instead these worlds are one in the same. I really liked that Alice has to rediscover what had happened and what had happened to her when she was younger, and how it landed her in an asylum.

Sadly there aren’t that many TV shows based on Alice in Wonderland. Which is very disappointing in my mind. And so, I only have one recommendation for this category (if you know any more I would love to hear about them), so here is my recommended TV show based on Alice in Wonderland.

Alice (2009) also known as Syfy’s Alice 2009

Set 150 years after the first Alice fell down the rabbit hole, a modern Alice falls through the looking glass into an advanced Wonderland still ruled by the Red Queen with fear, her temper and iron fist. Alice is unwillingly tangled up in a power struggle between the rebels and the Red Queen when she is given a key part to run the looking glasses that connect the two worlds. Alice, with the help of the Mad Hatter, tries to find and rescue her fiance Jack so that they can return home and continue their lives. But Jack has secrets, secrets that tie him to Wonderland and are the very reason why he was kidnapped in the first place.

This is one of my all-time favourite shows. I love this miniseries so much. I think that it’s fun and creative and a really unique take on re-imagining the story and bringing it into the modern era. It takes inspiration from both Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. It’s a great watch, sometimes a little corny, but really fun. This miniseries is only two episodes, is about 3-hours long, and can be easily watched in one go (if you want too).

Unlike TV shows there has been plenty of films based on Alice in Wonderland over the years. Many of which only portray the original story, sometimes mixed with Through the Looking Glass, and not that many were the re-imagine the story to make a new one. The two films that come to mind for me are Disney’s/Tim Burton’s adaptions. As the are set when Alice is older and returns to Wonderland.

Alice in Wonderland (2010) and the sequel Alice Through the Looking Glass (2016)

A young girl when she first visited magical Underland, Alice Kingsleigh is now a teenager with no memory of the place, but still holds onto her strong imagination and unique mind. She can only remember Wonderland now in in her dreams. Her life takes a turn for the unexpected when, at a garden party when she’s being proposed to, she spots a certain white rabbit and tumbles down a hole after him. Reunited with her friends the Mad Hatter, the Cheshire Cat and others, Alice learns it is her destiny to end the Red Queen’s reign of terror.

Both of these films are really fun and put a new spin on the world of Wonderland and it’s characters. It’s made up of a wonderful cast who I think portray the characters brilliantly. I really do love the story that is told and how Alice deals with having to save Wonderland and try to remember things from her childhood. I also really liked that in these films Alice isn’t ostracised from society or sent to an asylum because of her talk about her childhood adventures. As much as I enjoy that kind of plot I do think that it is beginning to get over used in adaptions/re-tellings.

Lastly here are two film adaptions that I love that I think deserve honourary mentions; Alice in Wonderland (1951) , an animated Disney film, and Alice in Wonderland (1999) which is a live adaption. These are two adaptions that I really loved growing up and hold a special place in my heart. Especially as they are a huge part of why I love the story so much.

Have you read or watched any of the books, TV shows or films I’ve mention? If so what do you think of them? And are there any that you think I would enjoy? Please let me know down in the comments, and I hope that if you read or watch any of my recommendations you enjoy them as much as I did. 😊

Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll Essay

The book Alice in Wonderland was first written by Lewis Carroll as a means of entertaining Alice Pleasant Liddell, a little girl he knew (Susina 2005). The book has been studied from a variety of different angles and revealed to contain numerous themes and comments on society. One of the themes that are often traced through the book is its commentary, whether voluntary or involuntary, on the society from which it sprang. The story was published in 1865 which was during the Victorian period. This period was characterized by a strict limitation of women. Women of high status were sometimes educated to some degree, but generally, education was not considered overly important. The role of women was to decorate the home and raise the children.

They were not expected to be clever and did not have any rights of their own that would allow them to make any of their own decisions. They were expected to be quiet and demure and to always listen to their elders and the male members of society. The most important things they had to learn were how to control themselves, how to play music, and how to sew. When it was published, many young girls saw themselves as Alice figures, identifying themselves with something they saw in Alice’s behavior. In some ways, Alice resembles the ideal female character of the period, but there are also several ways in which she breaks the mold, such as in her willingness to assert herself and her ability to think.

Alice is introduced initially as a young lady in training. She is learning to be a proper young lady as she sits along the bank of a stream with her sister, who is spending the afternoon quietly reading.

However, she quickly emerges as being incapable of keeping up the proper passive attitude or of adopting her book to read. “Once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, ‘and what is the use of a book,’ thought Alice ‘without pictures or conversation?’ (Carroll, 1). As is demonstrated through her numerous attempts to show off her knowledge, her lessons have been learned not so much for her edification, but instead to give her the proper appearance. “Alice uses her knowledge as a marker of social status … Her education is shown to have little to do with understanding a subject but rather with making one feel superior to someone else” (Susina 2005). Her appearance, as reflected in the pictures within the book, also reinforces the concept of the stereotypical young Victorian child. She wears a dress with numerous petticoats and a bright white apron that never seems to get soiled. She also has puffed sleeves, white stockings, and patent leather shoes.

Her hair is fashionably curled into ringlets and she appears to be everything every little girl would want to be. The White Rabbit reflects these same assumptions when he sees a girl and automatically assumes she is his maid. “Very soon the Rabbit noticed Alice, as she went hunting about, and called out to her in an angry tone, ‘Why, Mary Ann, what ARE you doing out here? Run home this moment, and fetch me a pair of gloves and a fan!” (Ch. 4). Demonstrating that her manners have been well-ingrained and again reflecting the social expectations, Alice doesn’t even think to stop and correct him on his mistake, but instead turns around and does just as she’s been told.

However, Alice’s mind is incapable of staying within the limited confines of this restricted social role. “In Wonderland and Looking-Glass, Carroll ultimately suggests that both adults and children want power as well as comfort and that the domestic world of little girls and fairy tales is the unlikely site of power struggles over the comforts of home and childhood” (Geer, 2005). This need for the fairy tale is evidenced first in Alice’s chase after the White Rabbit but is continuously shown in her clever thoughts throughout the book. She is not afraid to question herself, as is seen in Chapter 2 when she attempts to sort out what has been happening to her, “I wonder if I’ve been changed in the night? Let me think: was I the same when I got up this morning?

I almost think I can remember feeling a little different. But if I’m not the same, the next question is ‘Who in the world am I?’ Ah, that’s the great puzzle!” As she makes her way through Wonderland, she must continuously make mental leaps to keep up with the other characters around her. It is noted in Natov (2005), that, for the child reader, “it must be particularly satisfying when Carroll allows the child to be the knowledgeable one, the one who gets the joke, since children often suffer from confusion about adult figurative language, taking it in its literal sense.” However, even as Alice is seen to have a much clearer understanding of what is going on around her than the other characters in many scenes, this doesn’t seem to change things at a fundamental level.

Perhaps more importantly, she can recognize that she is unsure of just who she is yet, something that most adults aren’t even aware of. Her journey through Wonderland becomes a journey to herself and Alice, continuously challenged to explain herself in specific and literal terms,

emerges from it with a more independent and well-defined concept of herself than the softly, externally defined female she is supposed to be. The imagery again supports this contention. According to Renee Hubert, “Carroll always conceived of Alice as an illustrated book … Carroll’s sketches show an ordinary girl who makes extraordinary encounters and undergoes incredible transformations. The girl’s reactions rather than the setting are emphasized; for example, a room conveys the idea of imprisonment” (2003). As the story begins, Alice continuously struggles through confining spaces yet as it progresses, her surroundings become increasingly open for her.

In addition to her unusual tendency to think, or at least a tendency that wasn’t often portrayed in Victorian novels of any kind, Alice also tends to act. Again, this is immediately illustrated in her headlong pursuit of the White Rabbit down the burrow. However, she is often seen to directly link her thoughts with her actions, impulsively contradicting her elders and others to whom she would otherwise be expected to defer. This is particularly evident in Chapter 12 when Alice comes into contact with the Queen of Hearts.

While the Queen begins demanding information from her, Alice realizes to herself, “Why, they’re only a pack of cards, after all. I needn’t be afraid of them!” This realization enables her to face up to this authority with unusual bravado and unfeminine strength. When the queen questions her about the cards that are prostrated at her feet, Alice answers “How should I know?’ said Alice, surprised at her courage. ‘It’s no business of Mine’” (Ch. 12). The comment that even Alice was surprised at her courage in facing down a pack of cards reveals the strength of the training she had received that had taught her to always respect her elders and to never question or otherwise disrespect authority. She moves even further in this direction when she stands up to the queen’s order to decapitate her. “Nonsense!’ said Alice, very loudly and decidedly, and the Queen was silent” (Ch. 12). Not only has she managed to overcome her proper female training, but her assertiveness has forced even the loud-mouthed Queen to back down, at least for the moment, shocked at this young girl’s temerity. Through these actions within the story, “the child takes hold and writes what it wants, taking writing in new directions” and determining the direction in which she will go rather than constantly being required to follow the directives of others (Polhemus, 2004).

Throughout the story, Alice reveals herself to be a thinking, acting, assertive girl that is quite different from the passive, sedate, and thoughtless girls of the era.

While most girls were trained to hold their tongues even when they were thinking something, Alice seems incapable of curbing her thoughts to even the slightest degree. At a time when girls were thought to be naturally suited to quiet, sedate activities, Alice is impulsive and active, easily finding herself involved in activities beyond the normal and quite capable of coping with the strangeness of any situation that presents itself. Throughout the book, she continues to demonstrate how she has been brought up within the proper English Victorian society. This is done not only through her appearance as she is depicted in drawings throughout the book, but also in her concern about tea times, appropriate appearances, and proper manners. Perhaps because she can appear ‘normal’ to Victorian society yet remains incapable of fitting herself within the proper mode of feminine behavior, she appeared to many young girls as a hero. She represented a shift out of the constrained social box of her society without alienating herself from that same society.

Works Cited

Carroll. Lewis. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass. Place of publication: Publisher name, Date of publication.

Geer, Jennifer. “All Sorts of Pitfalls and Surprises: Competing Views of Idealized Girlhood in Lewis Carroll’s Alice Books.” Children’s Literature Review. Tom Burns (Ed.). Vol. 108. Detroit: Gale, 2005: 1-24.

Hubert, Renee Riese. “The Illustrated Book: Text and Image.” Nineteenth Century Literature Criticism. Lynn M. Zott (Ed.). Vol. 120. Detroit: Gale, 2003: 177-195.

Natov, Roni. “The Persistence of Alice.” Children’s Literature Review. Tom Burns (Ed.). Vol. 104. Detroit: Gale, 2005: 38-61.

Polhemus, Robert M. “Lewis Carroll and the Child in Victorian Fiction.” Nineteenth Century Literature Criticism. Marie C. Toft & Russel Whitaker (Eds.). Vol. 139. Detroit: Gale, 2004: 579-607.

Susina, Jan. “Educating Alice: The Lessons of Wonderland.” Children’s Literature Review. Tom Burns (Ed.). Vol. 108. Detroit: Gale, 2005: 3-9.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll Literature Analysis
Social Challenges in "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" by Carroll
Depiction of Authority Figures in Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and in C. S. Lewis’s The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe
Edger Allen Poe's “The Tell-Tale Heart” Analysis
Symbolism in “Lord of the Flies” by William Golding
Frankenstein: The Novel or the Movie?
Social Democracy as the Ultimate Form of Government: "War of the Worlds" by H. Wells
Marriage in George Eliot's Novel 'Middlemarch'
Chicago (A-D)
Chicago (N-B)

IvyPanda. (2021, September 15). Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. https://ivypanda.com/essays/alice-in-wonderland-by-lewis-carroll/

"Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll." IvyPanda , 15 Sept. 2021, ivypanda.com/essays/alice-in-wonderland-by-lewis-carroll/.

IvyPanda . (2021) 'Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll'. 15 September.

IvyPanda . 2021. "Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll." September 15, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/alice-in-wonderland-by-lewis-carroll/.

1. IvyPanda . "Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll." September 15, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/alice-in-wonderland-by-lewis-carroll/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll." September 15, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/alice-in-wonderland-by-lewis-carroll/.

Experience the Joy of Learning

Just Great DataBase
Study Guides
Alice in Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland Essays

From a young age Charles Dodgson’s fondness for writing was already made apparent. He had made several contributions to some national publications in England as well as to two local publications in Oxford (Karoline 31). It was in one of his contributions to the latter where he used the pseudonym...

2 491 words

Lewis Carroll's works Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There are by many people considered nonsense books for children. Of course, they are, but they are also much more. Lewis Carroll had a great talent of intertwining nonsense and logic...

1 657 words

At the mention of the name Alice, one tends to usually think of the children's stories by Lewis Carroll. Namely, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass are two classic works of children's literature that for over a century have been read by children and adults alike. These...

1 257 words

Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland has entertained not only children but adults for over one hundred years. The tale has become a treasure of philosophers, literary critics, psychoanalysts, and linguists. It also has attracted Carroll's fellow mathematicians and logicians. There...

1 786 words

www. eReferate. ro -Cea mai buna inspiratie? Alice's Adventures in Wonderland Lewis Carroll Some of the most lastingly delightful children's books in English are "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking-Glass". Here are what Albert Baugh write about them in "A Literary History...

Ursula K Le Guin stated; ? It is good to have an end to journey towards but it's the journey that matters in the end. ' This statement reflects the attitudes of composers of texts such as Shakespeare's ? The Tempest', Geok Lin Lim's extract from ? The Town Where Time Stands Still' and Lewis...

1 391 words

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland: Who's the Boss? Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is a story that deals with the issues of coming of age. It is the growth of Alice from an immature and undisciplined child to an intelligent and clever young woman. The fantasy world that Carroll...

1. How would you characterize Alice? Based on the novel Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Caroll, Alice, the heroine of the story is a curious, imaginative, strong- willed, and honest young English girl. Her adventures begin when she falls asleep by the side of a stream in a meadow and dreams that she...

1 168 words

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland; Analytical Essay Any story of literary merit must have some sort of lasting appeal that allows it to ascend the generations and appeal to a wide variety of cultures, and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is a fine example. It was undoubtedly both a popular and...

1 222 words

Growth into Adulthood This theme is central to both books. Alice's adventures parallel the journey from childhood to adulthood. She comes into numerous new situations in which adaptability is absolutely necessary for success. She shows marked progress throughout the course of the book; in the...

Personification, pun, syntax, and diction, these are some of the different devices of wordplay that authors use. Authors use wordplay for many different reasons. They use it to poke fun at the weaknesses and problems of the society; they also use it to make their literature more fun, and...

As the Cheshire-Cat appears and sits on a limb of a tree with his grinning face while Alice is walking in the forest he explains to her that everyone in wonderland is mad even Alice, which is why she is there. Alice did not agree with the Cheshire-Cat but continued on her way to see the March Hare...

On the bank of a tranquil river, Alice (Kathryn Beaumont) grows bored listening to her older sister read aloud from a history book about William I of England. Alice's sister scolds her, gently but firmly, for her lack of attention. At that moment, Alice dreams of living in a world of nonsense ("A...

The publication of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland in 1865 marks the beginning of what is often called the Golden Age of children's literature, a period when, for the first time, children's works were written for purposes other than moral uplift. Author Lewis Carroll invented a dreamworld where...

Dream Analysis of Alice in Wonderland Who’s who and what’s real; are we who we claim we are, and is reality really real or is everything just a fragment of what we think is the universe? A dream sequence is a technical term used mostly in film and television to set apart a brief interlude from the...

The famous fairy tale Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll, is an allusion in its entirety to life after childhood innocence is shed, and adulthood is reached. This is shown in the decisions that Alice must make, and the things that she experiences regarding trust, puzzles...

1 351 words

The book Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll evokes many intriguing thoughts in the reader’s mind, delving into themes such as the loss of childhood innocence, dreams, death, and discouragement in life. Alice’s journey through a dream world begins when she follows a white rabbit she...

Lewis Carroll’s novel, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, has been interpreted as an absurd and nonsense book for children. It is a nonsense book, but it is also so much more. Carroll has intertwined nonsense and logic therefore creating sense with nonsense. By looking past the...

In his fictional adventure novel, Alice in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll applies satirical reflections in his characters that relate to certain human characteristics and tendencies in society. These aspects are vividly presented in Carroll’s characters of the Queen of Hearts, the Mock Turtle...

Wonderland Confectionaries is a well – developed chain of restaurants that is willing to invest large sums of money into a theme park, based on the model of their competitor and surrogate company, Alice Limited. Given the facts, I will now try to establish whether the management’s decision to...

2 494 words

books + nefarious plots

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland Review (My Favorite Book Everrrr)

Synopsis: Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, “and what is the use of a book,” thought Alice, “without pictures or conversations?”

So begins the tale of Alice, following a curious White Rabbit down a rabbit-hole and falling into Wonderland. A fantastical place, where nothing is quite as it seems: animals talk, nonsensical characters confuse, Mad Hatter’s throw tea parties and the Queen plays croquet. Alice’s attempts to find her way home become increasingly bizarre, infuriating and amazing in turn. A beloved classic, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland has continued to delight readers, young and old for over a century.

Review: it’s a cliché and cheesy and I hate when people say it, but…ALL OF THE STARS

THIS IS MY FAVORITE BOOK.

No qualifier. No excuse. No “one of my favorites.” This one is it , y’all.

Well, also Through the Looking Glass. But THAT’S PRACTICALLY THE SECOND HALF OF THE SAME BOOK. (And other examples of my inability to make decisions or commit in any way to anything.)

I currently have 18 copies of this book. I’ve attempted to read it at least annually for the past three years. And by “annually,” I mean I last revisited this book less than nine months ago.

But hey, it was a different year then, technically speaking.

How do I even review this? I don’t know where to begin. (Just a heads up that my obsessive personality is going to become verrrrry clear as this review progresses. I’m not proud. This is who I am, you guys. I was a member of the fandoms of some teen pop sensation or other for nearly ten consecutive years. I’m no longer thirteen but I still need an outlet. Honestly I’m quite afraid that if I don’t have an obsession, I’ll become a drug addict. Lots of pent up energy.)

Well, I’ll say that I always, always, always feel enveloped by this book. I have never picked this up without feeling instantly submersed in Wonderland. And it’s really my favorite place to be. It’s hard to feel unhappy when you’re in the greatest setting ever created.

And there’s that. I firmly believe this is the most amazing and beautiful and confusing and curious setting of all time. It’s immersive, and it’s strange, and it’s so unique and fantastic and creative and I love it so much. I can come up with even more loosely positive adjectives if that overwhelming number didn’t suffice.

Wonderland is my Hogwarts. While many readers pray their letters just got lost in the mail, I’m constantly hoping I’ll see a white rabbit in a waistcoat and fall down, down, down into what must be the center of the earth.

I love Alice and her curiosity. She may also be my favorite character ever. She’s funny and sweet and childish and such a blast to read about. Her reactions to everything are so, so funny. Her curiosity always outweighs confusion and fear. I’d like to wake up one day and be Alice. I’ll likely become one of those creeps who pays millions for plastic surgery in order to “resemble” some celebrity or other.

On an unrelated note, anyone have millions of dollars they’re trying to get rid of?

I’m also fiercely protective of this book. I constantly pick up retellings only to be utterly disappointed. (Like Heartless . Get out of here with your shoddy Carroll-stealing.) DO NOT, DO NOT! GET ME STARTED ON THE TIM BURTON FILM ADAPTATION. Horrific. Alice, an adult? Alice, engaged? Alice FIGHTING THE GODDAMN JABBERWOCK?

But I do love the original animated Disney adaptation. There’s a certain quality to the book that’s captured within that film, which I haven’t found recreated in any other retelling or use of the setting or adaptation.

Oh, and one more thing, while I’m here.

THIS BOOK ISN’T ABOUT DRUGS, YOU SURFACE-LEVEL INTERPRETERS OF SYMBOLISM. It’s not that easy, boo.

In the words of BBC News, “[the drug] references may say more about the people making them than the author.”

Lewis Carroll isn’t thought to have been a user of drugs, the Caterpillar was smoking tobacco, and the mushroom is no more magic than the various cakes Alice eats.

Honestly, the drug reading is simple and boring. It’s such a stretch to attempt to read each character as a different substance. And scrolling through countless quasi-psychedelic GIFs to find actual ones was irritating, too. Ah, yes, real art: taking images from a 1951 children’s film but messing with the colors and movement until it looks like nothing more than a trigger for epilepsy. Enough, Tumblr.

Alice in Wonderland carries as much or as little significance as you want it to. It’s everything from a mindless romp in an imaginative land to a depiction of the effects of a ruthlessly authoritarian system of justice.

Just have fun with it.

And please, for the love of God, stop applying your weird psychedelic edits to a Disney movie.

Note on the audiobook: This time around, I listened to the audiobook, to switch things up. Scarlett Johansson read it. I loved her funny accents and hated her overly-acted narration. A mixed bag.

Bottom line: This is my favoritest and I doubt it will be dethroned anytime soon. Come at me, every other book.

plz give me attention Cancel reply

Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
Subscribe Subscribed
Copy shortlink
Report this content
View post in Reader
Manage subscriptions
Collapse this bar

A Summary and Analysis of Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)

There is a famous anecdote about Lewis Carroll and Queen Victoria: Victoria enjoyed Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) so much that she requested a first edition of Carroll’s next book. Carroll duly sent her a copy of the next book he published – a mathematical work with the exciting title An Elementary Treatise on Determinants .

Unfortunately, like most good anecdotes, this one isn’t true, but such a story does highlight the oddness of Carroll’s double life. Carroll, despite the radical nature of his nonsense fiction, was a conservative mathematician and don at the University of Oxford, real name Charles Dodgson.

But what does this novel, one of the most popular Victorian books for children, mean? Before we analyse Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland , it might be worth recapping the novel’s plot.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland : summary

The novel begins with a young girl named Alice, who is bored with a book she is reading outside, following a smartly-dressed rabbit down a rabbit hole. She falls a long way until she finds herself in a room full of locked doors. However, she finds a key, but it’s for a door that’s too small for her.

However, there is a bottle labelled ‘DRINK ME’ on a table, so she drinks down its contents and promptly shrinks. But now she’s too small to reach the key on the table! She eats a cake labelled ‘EAT ME’, and she now grows to be too big – much bigger than her usual size. She begins to cry.

After shrinking back to her usual size, Alice starts to swim on the tide of her own tears, meeting a range of other animals including a mouse and a dodo. The latter declares there should be a Caucus-Race: everyone runs around in a circle but nobody wins. When Alice starts to talk about her cat back home, she inadvertently frightens all of the animals away.

The White Rabbit orders Alice to go into the house and find the gloves belonging to a duchess. Alice finds another potion in the house, which makes her grow large again when she drinks it. When animals hurl stones at her, these turn into cakes and she eats them, returning to her normal size.

Alice meets a blue caterpillar sitting on a mushroom and smoking a hookah pipe. The caterpillar tells Alice that one side of the mushroom will make her taller, while the other side will make her shorter. She breaks off two pieces from the mushroom and eats them. Sure enough, one side shrinks her again, while the other side makes me grow into a giant.

Alice sees a fish, working as a footman, delivering an invitation for the Duchess who lives at the house; he hands the letter to a frog who is working as the Duchess’ footman. Alice goes inside the house again. The Cheshire Cat appears in a tree, directing her to the March Hare’s house. He disappears but his grin remains when the rest of him has gone.

Alice attends the Mad Hatter’s tea party, along with the Marsh Hare and Dormouse. They throw lots of riddles at her until she becomes fed up with them and leaves. She finds herself in a garden in which playing cards are busy painting flowers.

Alice meets the King and Queen, the latter of whom orders her to play a game of croquet in which live flamingos are used instead of croquet mallets (and hedgehogs are deployed as balls!).

The Duchess, who owns the Cheshire Cat, turns up just as the Queen is trying to have the Cheshire Cat beheaded. A Gryphon takes Alice to meet the Mock Turtle, who tells Alice he used to be a real turtle and is now sad because he was mocked when young. The Mock Turtle and the Gryphon then dance to the Lobster Quadrille.

The Queen of Hearts demands Alice’s head be removed: ‘Off with her head!’ But when Alice stands up to her, the Queen falls silent. Alice attends a trial at which the Knave of Hearts is accused of stealing the Queen’s tarts. Alice realises she is starting to grow bigger.

She is summoned as a witness at the trial, but she has grown so big now that she accidentally knocks over the jury box containing the animals on the jury.

The Queen accuses Alice of stealing the tarts and once more demands her head. Alice stands up to them, and as the playing cards advance on her, she is wakened from her dream, and finds her sister shaking her: the playing cards have become leaves that have fallen on her. She is back in the real world.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland : analysis

‘Lewis Carroll’ was really a man named Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, a mathematician at Christ Church, Oxford. As such, he led something of a double life: to the readers of his Alice books he was Lewis Carroll, while to the world of mathematics and to his colleagues at the University of Oxford he was (Reverend) Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, a man who formed his pen name by reversing his first two names (‘Charles Lutwidge’ became ‘Lewis Carroll’).

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland began life on 4 July 1862, when Charles Dodgson accompanied the Liddell children – one of whom was named Alice – on a boat journey, and told them the story that formed the basis of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland , which appeared three years later.

Although its working title was Alice’s Adventures Underground , it was published with the more enchanting title which captures the magic, illogic, and nonsense which characterise the world ‘down the rabbit-hole’ in which Alice finds herself.

Carroll’s was by no means the first portal fantasy novel of this kind: two years earlier, in 1863, Charles Kingsley’s The Water-Babies had appeared. The book tells the story of the boy chimney-sweep, Tom, who goes beneath the water and becomes a ‘water-baby’.

In many ways the tale of a child slipping underwater into an alternate world of fantasy, where the Victorian world is curiously inverted, foreshadows Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland , although Carroll came up with his story independently, before Kingsley’s novel was published. (Curiously, the phrases ‘mad as a March-hare’ and ‘grinning like a Cheshire cat’, by the by, both appear in The Water-Babies .)

But for all of their passing similarities, the chief difference between Carroll’s novel and Kingsley’s – and, indeed, between Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and 99% of the children’s fiction produced at the time – is that Carroll refused to use his story to offer his young readers a moral.

You can see the moral message of a Victorian children’s story coming a mile off, but Carroll not only avoids such heavy-handed moralising, but actively criticises the very idea:

She had quite forgotten the Duchess by this time, and was a little startled when she heard her voice close to her ear. ‘You’re thinking about something, my dear, and that makes you forget to talk. I can’t tell you just now what the moral of that is, but I shall remember it in a bit.’

‘Perhaps it hasn’t one,’ Alice ventured to remark.

‘Tut, tut, child!’ said the Duchess. ‘Everything’s got a moral, if only you can find it.’ And she squeezed herself up closer to Alice’s side as she spoke.

This exchange, from ‘The Mock Turtle’s Story’ (Chapter 9), pit the mainstream Victorian attitude held by adults against the rebellious innocence of the child, with the censorious morality of the adult (‘Tut, tut, child!’) immediately closing down the child’s instinct to speculate, question, and retain an open mind (‘Perhaps it hasn’t one’).

So much for the moral meaning of Carroll’s novel. But does that mean that the glorious nonsense of the book, the subversion and inversion of the reality of the world, the fantastical creatures and episodes, are just that: ‘nonsense’, not meant to mean anything beyond themselves?

Critics have been tempted to analyse the novel through a Freudian or psychoanalytic lens: the novel is about a child’s awareness of itself in the world, discovering its own body and its place in that world.

In finding herself in a completely mad world – full of tyrannical queens and mad hatters – Alice must learn to assert herself (something she does decisively at the end, when confronting the Queen of Hearts) and also, quite literally, keep her head about her while all about her are losing theirs (and often blaming it on her).

Or, even if we drop the Freudian label, we might view the novel as an exploration of a child’s journey through the world, making sense of everything and realising that sometimes grown-ups – those authority figures the child is told to obey because they are older and wiser than she is – are the stupidest people in the room.

For all that, should we analyse Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland as a scathing satire on radical new ideas in nineteenth-century mathematics, ideas for which Carroll/Dodgson had little time? Melanie Bayley thinks so, and published an article in the New Scientist in 2009 in which she set out her thesis. You can read Bayley’s article here .

If you enjoyed this analysis of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland , you might also like our summary and analysis of the book’s sequel, Through the Looking-Glass .

Discover more from Interesting Literature

Subscribe to get the latest posts to your email.

Type your email…

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland

44 pages • 1 hour read

Alice's Adventures In Wonderland

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Introduction-Chapter 3

Chapters 4-6

Chapters 7-9

Chapters 10-12

Character Analysis

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Discussion Questions

Time is a source of stress in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland . Choose a character who experiences time-induced stress and discuss how their situation relates to the novel’s themes.

Find one of the didactic verses that Alice recites incorrectly, and compare and contrast it with its original version. What does Carroll achieve by presenting the nonsensical version?

Find a poem or nursery rhyme not included in the novel and write your own nonsense version of it. Discuss the activity: Was it difficult to write nonsense? Did you discover any surprising ideas or word combinations? How does your version relate to the original?

Don't Miss Out!

Access Study Guide Now

Related Titles

By Lewis Carroll

Jabberwocky

Lewis Carroll

The Walrus and the Carpenter

Through The Looking Glass

Featured Collections

Action & Adventure

View Collection

Childhood & Youth

Children's & Teen Books Made into Movies

Coming-of-Age Journeys

Required Reading Lists

School Book List Titles

Victorian Literature

Victorian Literature / Period

Poem: “All in the golden afternoon”
Chapter 1: Down the Rabbit-Hole
Chapter 2: The Pool of Tears
Chapter 3: A Caucus-Race and a long Tale
Chapter 4: The Rabbit sends in a little Bill
Chapter 5: Advice from a Caterpillar
Chapter 6: Pig and Pepper
Chapter 7: A Mad Tea-Party
Chapter 8: The Queen’s Croquet-Ground
Chapter 9: The Mock Turtle’s Story
Chapter 10: The Lobster Quadrille
Chapter 11: Who stole the Tarts?
Chapter 12: Alice’s Evidence
An Easter Greeting to every child who loves Alice
Christmas Greetings
Dramatis Personae and chessboard
Poem: “Child of the pure unclouded brow”
Chapter 1: Looking-Glass House
Chapter 2: The Garden of Live Flowers
Chapter 3: Looking-Glass Insects
Chapter 4: Tweedledum and Tweedledee
Chapter 5: Wool and Water
Chapter 6: Humpty Dumpty
Chapter 7: The Lion and the Unicorn
Chapter 8: “It’s my own Invention”
Chapter 9: Queen Alice
Chapter 10: Shaking
Chapter 11: Waking
Chapter 12: Which dreamed it?
Poem: “A boat beneath a sunny sky”
To All Child-Readers of “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”
Preface to Alice’s Adventures Under Ground
Alice’s Adventures Under Ground – Chapter 1
Alice’s Adventures Under Ground – Chapter 2
Alice’s Adventures Under Ground – Chapter 3
Alice’s Adventures Under Ground – Chapter 4
The Nursery ‘Alice’ – Preface
Chapter 1: The White Rabbit
Chapter 2: How Alice grew tall
Chapter 3: The Pool of Tears
Chapter 4: The Caucus-Race
Chapter 5: Bill, the Lizard
Chapter 6: the dear little Puppy
Chapter 7: The Blue Caterpillar
Chapter 8: The Pig-Baby
Chapter 9: The Cheshire-Cat
Chapter 10: The Mad Tea-Party
Chapter 11: The Queen’s Garden
Chapter 12: The Lobster-Quadrille
Chapter 13: Who stole the tarts?
Chapter 14: The Shower of Cards
The lost chapter: a Wasp in a Wig
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland summary
Through the Looking-Glass summary
Disney movie script
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
Through the Looking-Glass
Alice’s Adventures Under Ground
Nursery Alice
Disney’s Alice in Wonderland
Lewis Carroll, Alice Liddell and John Tenniel
Caterpillar
Cheshire Cat
Queen of Hearts
Tweedledum and Tweedledee
Tulgey Wood inhabitants
Walrus and Carpenter
White Rabbit
About the book “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”
About the book “Through the Looking-Glass and what Alice found there”
About John Tenniel’s illustrations
About Lewis Carroll
About Alice Liddell
About Disney’s “Alice in Wonderland” 1951 cartoon movie
Alice in Wonderland trivia
Alice on the Stage
Story origins
Picture origins
Jabberwocky
Themes and motifs
Conflict and resolution, protagonists and antagonists
Science-Fiction and Fantasy Books by Lewis Carroll
An Analysis of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
To stop a Bandersnatch
“Lewis Carroll”: A Myth in the Making
The Man Who Loved Little Girls
The Liddell Riddle
The Duck and the Dodo: References in the Alice books to friends and family
The influence of Lewis Carroll’s life on his work
Tenniel’s illustrations for Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass
The Jabberwocky
Drug influences in the books
The truth about “Alice”
Lewis Carroll and the Search for Non-Being
Alice’s adventures in algebra: Wonderland solved
Diluted and ineffectual violence in the ‘Alice’ books
How little girls are like serpents, or, food and power in Lewis Carroll’s Alice books
A short list of other possible explanations
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Interpretive essays

A lthough Carroll invented Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland for the entertainment of children, many scholars have thought to discover various underlying influences in his work. The books have been explained from all kinds of viewpoints, like drug use, Freudian influences, mathematics, political satire, sex and pedophilia, nonsense, etc.

On this page you can find a collection of articles that deal about those underlying meanings that Carroll is supposed to have added (consciously or not) in the Alice books.

Please mind that these texts were not written by me personally. References to the author and publication details can be found on the page itself. The articles are reproduced on this site with permission from the authors.

“If any one of them can explain it,” said Alice, “I’ll give him sixpence. I don’t believe there’s an atom of meaning in it.”

General discussion of the ‘Alice’ books

An Analysis of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

Discussion of Lewis Carroll, the author, in relation to Alice

“Lewis Carroll”: A Myth in the Making – about the tendency to create a myth around the name “Lewis Carroll”, in stead on focusing on who Charles Dodgson really was.
The Man Who Loved Little Girls – should we really frown upon Dodgson’s nude photographs of children?
The Liddell Riddle – about the missing pages in Dodgsons diary and his break with the Liddell family

What/who influenced Carroll while writing the story

The influence of Lewis Carroll’s life on his work

Illustrations

Tenniel’s illustrations

Drugs and hallucinations

The truth about “Alice” – how Alice in Wonderland can be seen as a political satire about the Wars of the Roses

Philosophic reasoning

Mathematics.

Alice’s adventures in algebra: Wonderland solved

Other subjects

Diluted and ineffectual violence in the ‘Alice’ books
How little girls are like serpents, or, food and power in Lewis Carroll’s Alice books – About the role of food in the ‘Alice’ books and how it relates to class differences

External sources

On the Lewis Carroll section of the Victorian web , you can find many more interesting essays about a.o. the social and political , religious and philosophical , economic , science and technological , and many other themes and contexts in the Alice books.
Read about Carroll’s relations to Victorian art and his use of fantasy .
In an article in Knight Letter nr. 79, Alison Tannenbaum analyses what species of plants appear in Lewis Carroll’s and John Tenniel’s illustrations, and argues that they do not cary much symbolism in the story.
© Alice-in-Wonderland.net
Terms, conditions, cookies and privacy
Customer Service

for kids who love books & creative writing

Book review: Alice in Wonderland

Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland illustrated by Sir John Tenniel

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, illustrated by Sir John Tenniel, MacMillan Children’s Books, ISBN 9781509865727

Molly reviewed her own copy of this book. This review was shortlisted in Alphabet Soup’s 2020 Young Book Reviewers’ Competition.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is a fictional novel written by Lewis Carroll in 1865 and illustrated by Sir John Tenniel. It was published by Macmillan Publishers.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is a story made up of many adventures. It is about a young girl named Alice. Alice follows a white rabbit down a rabbit hole and that is where her weird and wonderful journey begins. Along her journey she meets some interesting characters like the Cheshire cat, Caterpillar, Tweedle-dee and Tweedle-dum, the Mad Hatter and many more.

One of my favourite parts in the book would definitely be the tea party with the Mad Hatter, which I would describe as, in the words of Alice, “curiouser and curiouser!” because the tea party was absolutely crazy.

I would rate this book 5/5 because it is very interesting. My favourite character is Alice because even though she is put in strange and crazy situations she manages to remain calm and reasonable. I found the book fun and exciting never knowing what was going to happen next. This book is a delightful book for any age. I found I grew more curious as to what would happen next with every page I turned. If you love adventures this book is definitely the book for you.

During May and June Alphabet Soup will be posting all the book reviews by those longlisted in our 2020 Book Reviewers’ Competition.

Published by Alphabet Soup

This post was added by Rebecca Newman. Rebecca is a children's writer and poet, and the editor of the Australian children's literary blog, Alphabet Soup. For more about Rebecca visit: rebeccanewman.net.au. View all posts by Alphabet Soup

Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
Subscribe Subscribed
Copy shortlink
Report this content
View post in Reader
Manage subscriptions
Collapse this bar

Home — Essay Samples — Literature — Alice in Wonderland — Psychological Analysis Of Alice In Wonderland

Psychological Analysis of Alice in Wonderland

Categories: Alice in Wonderland Psychoanalysis

About this sample

Words: 1812 |

10 min read

Published: Apr 29, 2022

Words: 1812 | Pages: 4 | 10 min read

Cite this Essay

Let us write you an essay from scratch

450+ experts on 30 subjects ready to help
Custom essay delivered in as few as 3 hours

Get high-quality help

Dr. Heisenberg

Verified writer

Expert in: Literature Psychology

+ 120 experts online

By clicking “Check Writers’ Offers”, you agree to our terms of service and privacy policy . We’ll occasionally send you promo and account related email

No need to pay just yet!

Related Essays

4.5 pages / 1974 words

3 pages / 3095 words

1 pages / 642 words

4 pages / 1725 words

Remember! This is just a sample.

You can get your custom paper by one of our expert writers.

121 writers online

Psychological Analysis of Alice in Wonderland Essay

Still can’t find what you need?

Browse our vast selection of original essay samples, each expertly formatted and styled

Related Essays on Alice in Wonderland

Written by Lewis Carroll in 1865, the novel has sparked much debate and analysis regarding its portrayal of morality and ethics. In this essay, we will delve into the moral issues present in Alice in Wonderland, examining the [...]

Alice in Wonderland, written by Lewis Carroll in 1865, is a timeless classic that has captivated readers for generations. The whimsical and fantastical world that Alice finds herself in has sparked countless interpretations and [...]

Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is a timeless classic that has captivated readers for generations. The whimsical and surreal world of Wonderland is populated by a variety of eccentric and memorable [...]

When we think of Wonderland, we often think of the whimsical and nonsensical world depicted in Lewis Carroll's classic novel, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. However, what if I were to tell you that Wonderland is not just a [...]

As a popular and widely loved novel, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland; and, Through the looking Glass and What Alice Found There has been translated to well over a hundred languages and is a household tale that most people have [...]

Lewis Carroll has a lot of fun playing with language in Alice in Wonderland. He points out its flexibility, inadequacies, and the confusion that it can produce when taken at face value without common sense and interpretation. [...]

Get Your Personalized Essay in 3 Hours or Less!

We use cookies to personalyze your web-site experience. By continuing we’ll assume you board with our cookie policy .

Instructions Followed To The Letter
Deadlines Met At Every Stage
Unique And Plagiarism Free

What food adventures await you next?

Foods and Drinks in the Children’s Novel “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” by Lewis Carroll

Published: 14 July 2022

First published in 1865, the British children’s book “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” by Lewis Carroll has captured the hearts of children and adults alike with its absurd scenarios and endearing anthropomorphic creatures. This one-sitting wonder explores the captivating tale of a young girl named Alice as she ventures into the magical and quirky fantasy world of Wonderland.

To my surprise, there is quite a number of food references sprinkled throughout this beloved English novel. Without further ado, let’s explore the foods and dishes showcased in the book “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” .

Orange marmalade

Marmalade is a must for a British breakfast table. If Paddington Bear and the Queen can agree on marmalade sandwiches for afternoon tea, surely it must have something going for it!

In the very beginning of chapter 1, Alice mentions a jar of sweet orange spread right after falling down the rabbit hole.

“ She took down a jar from one of the shelves as she passed: it was labelled “ORANGE MARMALADE,” but to her great disappointment it was empty : she did not like to drop the jar, for fear of killing somebody underneath, so managed to put it into one of the cupboards as she fell past it “ – Chapter 1, page 4.

The traditional image of a cat drinking milk out of a saucer is ingrained in most people’s psyche. Funnily enough, a majority of our feline pets are actually lactose intolerant. Regardless, it’s Dinah’s favourite afternoon treat.

“‘Dinah’ll miss me very much to-night, I should think!’ (Dinah was the cat.) ‘I hope they’ll remember her saucer of milk at teatime. Dinah, my dear! I wish you were down here with me! There are no mice in the air, I’m afraid, but you might catch a bat, and that’s very like a mouse, you know. But do cats eat bats, I wonder?'” – Chapter 1, page 4.

“Drink me”

The mysterious “drink me” bottles are simply iconic and an integral part of any Wonderland menu.

“There seemed to be no use in waiting by the little door, so she went back to the table, half hoping she might find another key on it, or at any rate a book of rules for shutting people up like telescopes: this time she found a little bottle on it (‘which certainly was not here before,’ said Alice), and tied round the neck of the bottle was a paper label, with the words ‘DRINK ME’ beautifully printed on it in large letters ” – Chapter 1, pages 5-6.

Stumbling upon “DRINK ME” potions is common currency for Alice throughout her journey. Despite having zero information on the nature of the drink, Alice is able to provide more insight on the peculiar taste of the curious refreshment that shrunk her to ten inches.

“However, this bottle was not marked “poison,” so Alice ventured to taste it, and, finding it very nice (it had, in fact, a sort of mixed flavour of cherry-tart, custard, pine-apple, roast turkey, toffy, and hot buttered toast ), she very soon finished it off.” – Chapter 1, page 6.

“Drink me” doesn’t provide much information on the product now, does it? No wonder why Alice fearlessly picks up an unlabelled drink in chapter 4.

“ There was no label this time with the words ‘DRINK ME,’ but nevertheless she uncorked it and put it to her lips . ‘I know something interesting is sure to happen,’ she said to herself, ‘whenever I eat or drink anything: so I’ll just see what this bottle does. I do hope it’ll make me grow large again, for really I’m quite tired of being such a tiny little thing!’ It did so indeed, and much sooner than she had expected: before she had drunk half the bottle, she found her head pressing against the ceiling, and had to stop to save her neck from being broken .” – Chapter 4, page 19

“Eat me”

Only in Wonderland does one gain height rather than weight from cake eating.

“Soon her eye fell on a little glass box that was lying under the table: she opened it, and found in it a very small cake, on which the words ‘EAT ME’ were beautifully marked in currants ” – Chapter 1, page 7.

Carroll later details how Alice opens out “like the largest telescope that ever was” after finishing the currant cake.

In chapter 4, cakes return when Alice desperately looks for a way to shrink while stuck inside Rabbit’s house.

“Alice noticed, with some surprise, that the pebbles were all turning into little cakes as they lay on the floor, and a bright idea came into her head. ‘If I eat one of these cakes,’ she thought, ‘it’s sure to make some change in my size ; and, as it can’t possibly make me larger, it must make me smaller, I suppose.’ So she swallowed one of the cakes, and was delighted to find that she began shrinking directly ” – Chapter 4, page 22.

Liquorice comfits are another British classic. Comfits are confectionery consisting of dried fruits, seeds, spices or nuts coated with a colourful hard sugar coating.

Comfits make an appearance in chapter 3, right after the race-course with all the animals.

“ Alice had no idea what to do, and in despair she put her hand in her pocket, and pulled out a box of comfits (luckily the salt water had not got into it), and handed them round as prizes. There was exactly one a-piece, all round” – Chapter 3, page 15.

“ The next thing was to eat the comfits: this caused some noise and confusion , as the large birds complained that they could not taste theirs, and the small ones choked and had to be patted on the back.” – Chapter 3, page 15.

Apples (but actually potatoes)

Can you dig for apples? Earth apples maybe? In fact, Irish apples was a slang word used to refer to potatoes during the Victorian times.

In chapter 4, the White Rabbit calls upon Pat, the gardener, for help while Alice remains stuck inside Rabbit’s house.

“Next came an angry voice—the Rabbit’s— ‘Pat! Pat! Where are you?’ And then a voice she had never heard before, ‘Sure then I’m here! Digging for apples, yer honour!’ ‘Digging for apples, indeed!’ said the Rabbit angrily. ‘Here! Come and help me out of this!’ (Sounds of more broken glass.)” – Chapter 4, page 20.

Mushrooms are first introduced at the same time as the mysterious blue caterpillar. But these are not your regular mushrooms…

“ There was a large mushroom growing near her, about the same height as herself; and, when she had looked under it, and on both sides of it, and behind it, it occurred to her that she might as well look and see what was on the top of it. She stretched herself up on tiptoe, and peeped over the edge of the mushroom, and her eyes immediately met those of a large blue caterpillar, that was sitting on the top, with its arms folded, quietly smoking a long hookah, and taking not the smallest notice of her or of anything else” – Chapter 4, page 23.

“ Alice remained looking thoughtfully at the mushroom for a minute, trying to make out which were the two sides of it; and, as it was perfectly round, she found this a very difficult question. However, at last she stretched her arms round it as far as they would go, and broke off a bit of the edge with each hand. ‘And now which is which?’ she said to herself, and nibbled a little of the right-hand bit to try the effect. The next moment she felt a violent blow underneath her chin: it had struck her foot!” – Chapter 5, page 27.

Alice continues nibbling on pieces of mushroom throughout her adventures, swiftly growing and shrinking as she sees fit.

“ After a while she remembered that she still held the pieces of mushroom in her hands, and she set to work very carefully, nibbling first at one and then at the other, and growing sometimes taller, and sometimes shorter, until she had succeeded in bringing herself down to her usual height” – Chapter 5, page 29.

“‘Whoever lives there,’ thought Alice, ‘it’ll never do to come upon them this size: why, I should frighten them out of their wits!’ So she began nibbling at the right-hand bit again, and did not venture to go near the house till she had brought herself down to nine inches high” – Chapter 5, page 29.

“It was so large a house, that she did not like to go nearer till she had nibbled some more of the left-hand bit of mushroom, and raised herself to about two feet high : even then she walked up towards it rather timidly, saying to herself ‘Suppose it should be raving mad after all! I almost wish I’d gone to see the Hatter instead!’” – Chapter 6, page 35.

“ Then she went to work nibbling at the mushroom (she had kept a piece of it in her pocket) till she was about a foot high: then she walked down the little passage: and then—she found herself at last in the beautiful garden, among the bright flower-beds and the cool fountains” – Chapter 7, page 41.

Suet is a common ingredient in many traditional British recipes including Christmas pudding and dumplings. This fat is usually taken from around the kidneys and loin areas of beef, lamb or mutton.

Alice bring it up in chapter 5 while reciting ‘You are old, Father William’ to the blue caterpillar:

“’You are old,’ said the youth, ‘and your jaws are too weak For anything tougher than suet; Yet you finished the goose, with the bones and the beak— Pray, how did you manage to do it?” – Chapter 5, page 25.

When Alice encounters the Pigeon in chapter 5, she candidly expresses her fondness for eggs.

“‘I’ve seen a good many little girls in my time, but never one with such a neck as that! No, no! You’re a serpent; and there’s no use denying it. I suppose you’ll be telling me next that you never tasted an egg!’ ‘I have tasted eggs, certainly,’ said Alice, who was a very truthful child; ‘but little girls eat eggs quite as much as serpents do, you know’ “ – Chapter 5, page 28.

Peppery soup & Turtle soup

We don’t get much intel on the kind of soup the cook is preparing in chapter 6. Even so, Alice’s repeated sneezing says a lot about the levels of pepper added to the cauldron.

“The door led right into a large kitchen, which was full of smoke from one end to the other: the Duchess was sitting on a three-legged stool in the middle, nursing a baby: t he cook was leaning over the fire, stirring a large cauldron which seemed to be full of soup. ‘There’s certainly too much pepper in that soup!’ Alice said to herself, as well as she could for sneezing” – Chapter 6, page 31.

The relationship between food behaviours and personality traits is further explored by Alice in this next quote.

“Alice was very glad to find her in such a pleasant temper, and thought to herself that perhaps it was only the pepper that had made her so savage when they met in the kitchen. ‘When I’m a Duchess,’ she said to herself (not in a very hopeful tone, though), ‘I won’t have any pepper in my kitchen at all. Soup does very well without—Maybe it’s always pepper that makes people hot-tempered,’ she went on, very much pleased at having found out a new kind of rule, ‘and vinegar that makes them sour —and camomile that makes them bitter —and—and barley-sugar and such things that make children sweet-tempered. I only wish people knew that: then they wouldn’t be so stingy about it, you know——'” – Chapter 9, page 49.

The Duchess’s cook is known to make everyone sneeze. Clearly, her love for pepper cannot be measured.

“The next witness was the Duchess’s cook. She carried the pepper-box in her hand, and Alice guessed who it was, even before she got into the court, by the way the people near the door began sneezing all at once” – Chapter 11, page 65.

Soup is also brought up during the Mock Turtle’s rendition of “Turtle Soup” in chapter 10.

“‘Hm! No accounting for tastes! Sing her ‘Turtle Soup,’ will you, old fellow?’ The Mock Turtle sighed deeply, and began, in a voice choked with sobs, to sing this:— ‘Beautiful Soup, so rich and green, Waiting in a hot tureen! Who for such dainties would not stoop? Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup! Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup! Beau—ootiful Soo—oop! Beau—ootiful Soo—oop! Soo—oop of the e—e—evening, Beautiful, beautiful Soup! Beautiful Soup! Who cares for fish, Game, or any other dish? Who would not give all else for two Pennyworth only of beautiful Soup? Pennyworth only of beautiful Soup? Beau—ootiful Soo—oop! Beau—ootiful Soo—oop! Soo—oop of the e—e—evening, Beautiful, beauti—FUL SOUP!'” – Chapter 10, pages 59-60.

Figs or pigs? That is the question!

Alice’s encounters with the charismatic and quirky Cheshire cat is by far one of the most memorable moments in Wonderland.

“As she said this, she looked up, and there was the Cat again, sitting on a branch of a tree. ‘Did you say ‘pig’, or ‘fig’?’ said the Cat. ‘I said ‘pig’,’ replied Alice; ‘and I wish you wouldn’t keep appearing and vanishing so suddenly: you make one quite giddy.’ ‘All right,’ said the Cat; and this time it vanished quite slowly, beginning with the end of the tail, and ending with the grin, which remained some time after the rest of it had gone” – Chapter 6, page 35.

Tea, bread and butter

In chapter 7, a modest spread awaits Alice for afternoon tea with the Hatter, the March Hare and the Dormouse.

“Alice considered a little, and then said ‘The fourth.’ ‘Two days wrong!’ sighed the Hatter. ‘I told you butter wouldn’t suit the works!’ he added looking angrily at the March Hare. ‘It was the best butter,’ the March Hare meekly replied. ‘Yes, but some crumbs must have got in as well,’ the Hatter grumbled: ‘you shouldn’t have put it in with the bread-knife.’ The March Hare took the watch and looked at it gloomily: then he dipped it into his cup of tea, and looked at it again: but he could think of nothing better to say than his first remark, ‘It was the best butter, you know’ “ – Chapter 7, page 37.

“A bright idea came into Alice’s head. ‘ Is that the reason so many tea-things are put out here?’ she asked. ‘Yes, that’s it,’ said the Hatter with a sigh: ‘it’s always tea-time, and we’ve no time to wash the things between whiles.’ ‘ Then you keep moving round, I suppose?’ said Alice. ‘Exactly so,’ said the Hatter: ‘as the things get used up’ “ – Chapter 7, page 39.

The Hatter goes as far as to appear as a witness at the trial with his tea and afternoon snack, both of which are brought up multiple times throughout the chapter.

“‘Call the first witness,’ said the King; and the White Rabbit blew three blasts on the trumpet, and called out, ‘First witness!’ The first witness was the Hatter. He came in with a teacup in one hand and a piece of bread-and-butter in the other. ‘I beg pardon, your Majesty,’ he began, ‘for bringing these in; but I hadn’t quite finished my tea when I was sent for'” – Chapter 11, page 62.

“‘Give your evidence,’ said the King; ‘and don’t be nervous, or I’ll have you executed on the spot.’ This did not seem to encourage the witness at all: he kept shifting from one foot to the other, looking uneasily at the Queen, and in his confusion he bit a large piece out of his teacup instead of the bread-and-butter” – Chapter 11, page 63.

“‘I’m a poor man, your Majesty,’ the Hatter began, in a trembling voice, ‘—and I hadn’t begun my tea—not above a week or so—and what with the bread-and-butter getting so thin—and the twinkling of the tea——'” – Chapter 11, page 63.

“The miserable Hatter dropped his teacup and bread-and-butter, and went down on one knee. ‘I’m a poor man, your Majesty,’ he began. ‘You’re a very poor speaker,’ said the King – Chapter 11, page 64.

Ode to the Great British cuppa, tea is brought up one last time after Alice wakes up from her barmy adventures.

“‘Oh, I’ve had such a curious dream!’ said Alice. And she told her sister, as well as she could remember them, all these strange Adventures of hers that you have just been reading about; and, when she had finished, her sister kissed her, and said, ‘It was a curious dream, dear, certainly; but now run in to your tea: it’s getting late.’ So Alice got up and ran off, thinking while she ran, as well she might, what a wonderful dream it had been” – Chapter 12, page 70.

Wine is mentioned once during tea-time with the March Hare, the Hatter and the Dormouse, although none is served at the time.

“‘Have some wine,’ the March Hare said in an encouraging tone. Alice looked all round the table, but there was nothing on it but tea. ‘I don’t see any wine,’ she remarked. ‘There isn’t any,’ said the March Hare. ‘Then it wasn’t very civil of you to offer it,’ said Alice angrily. ‘It wasn’t very civil of you to sit down without being invited,’ said the March Hare” – Chapter 7, page 36.

Also known as blackstrap molasses in the US, treacle is a very dark and thick sugar syrup that was primarily used to treat snakebites during the 17th century. Nowadays, treacle is used in an array of British specialities, from toffee and puddings to Christmas drinks and cocktails.

In Wonderland, treacle is brought up multiple times as the Dormouse narrates his story.

“‘Once upon a time there were three little sisters,’ the Dormouse began in a great hurry; ‘and their names were Elsie, Lacie, and Tillie; and they lived at the bottom of a well——’ ‘What did they live on?’ said Alice, who always took a great interest in questions of eating and drinking. ‘They lived on treacle,’ said the Dormouse, after thinking a minute or two” – Chapter 7, page 39.

“Alice did not quite know what to say to this: so she helped herself to some tea and bread-and-butter, and then turned to the Dormouse, and repeated her question. ‘Why did they live at the bottom of a well?’ The Dormouse again took a minute or two to think about it, and then said, ‘It was a treacle-well'” – Chapter 7, page 40.

“Alice did not wish to offend the Dormouse again, so she began very cautiously: ‘But I don’t understand. Where did they draw the treacle from?’ ‘You can draw water out of a water-well,’ said the Hatter; ‘so I should think you could draw treacle out of a treacle-well—eh, stupid?'” – Chapter 7, page 40.

Tulip-roots

Tulip bulb consumption is said to have originated during WWII. As a result of the Dutch famine of 1944–1945, Dutch authorities started selling the unplanted tulip bulbs of farmers who had stopped their activities due to the war.

When prepared correctly, tulips are edible so long as they are not treated with chemicals. However, it is worth noting that the bulbs can be poisonous, with large amounts resulting in severe clinical signs including dizziness, vomiting and convulsions.

At the Royal garden, Five and Seven mention tulip-roots during their arguments in front of the freshly painted roses.

“‘You’d better not talk!’ said Five. ‘I heard the Queen say only yesterday you deserved to be beheaded.’ ‘What for?’ said the one who had spoken first. ‘That’s none of your business, Two!’ said Seven. ‘Yes, it is his business!’ said Five. ‘And I’ll tell him—it was for bringing the cook tulip-roots instead of onions'” – Chapter 8, page 42.

According to the Duchess, mustard and flamingoes have more in common than we think!

“‘Very true,’ said the Duchess: ‘flamingoes and mustard both bite. And the moral of that is—‘Birds of a feather flock together.’ ‘Only mustard isn’t a bird,’ Alice remarked. ‘Right, as usual,’ said the Duchess: ‘what a clear way you have of putting things!’ ‘It’s a mineral, I think,’ said Alice. ‘Of course it is,’ said the Duchess, who seemed ready to agree to everything that Alice said; ‘there’s a large mustard-mine near here. And the moral of that is—‘The more there is of mine, the less there is of yours.’ ‘Oh, I know!’ exclaimed Alice, who had not attended to this last remark. ‘It’s a vegetable. It doesn’t look like one, but it is.’ ‘I quite agree with you,’ said the Duchess; ‘and the moral of that is—‘Be what you would seem to be’—or, if you’d like it put more simply—‘Never imagine yourself not to be otherwise than what it might appear to others that what you were or might have been was not otherwise than what you had been would have appeared to them to be otherwise’” – Chapter 9, page 50.

In chapter 10, Alice rightfully conceals her appetite for lobsters during her discussion with the sorrowful Mock Turtle.

“At last the Mock Turtle recovered his voice, and, with tears running down his cheeks, he went on again:— ‘You may not have lived much under the sea—’ (‘I haven’t,’ said Alice)—’and perhaps you were never even introduced to a lobster—’ (Alice began to say ‘I once tasted——’ but checked herself hastily, and said ‘No, never’) ‘——so you can have no idea what a delightful thing a Lobster-Quadrille is!’ ‘No, indeed,’ said Alice. ‘What sort of a dance is it?'” – Chapter 10, page 55.

For fear of offended and frightening the Mock Turtle, Alice omits her pescetarianism.

“‘Oh, as to the whiting,’ said the Mock Turtle, ‘they—you’ve seen them, of course?’ ‘Yes,’ said Alice, ‘I’ve often seen them at dinn——’ she checked herself hastily. ‘I don’t know where Dinn may be,’ said the Mock Turtle; ‘but, if you’ve seen them so often, of course you know what they’re like?’ ‘I believe so,’ Alice replied thoughtfully. ‘They have their tails in their mouths—and they’re all over crumbs'” – Chapter 10, pages 56-57.

Pie-crust and gravy and meat

Pie-crust, gravy and meat come up as Alice, the Gryphon and the Mock Turtle discuss the infamous Lobster-Quadrille.

“Alice did not dare to disobey, though she felt sure it would all come wrong, and she went on in a trembling voice:— ‘I passed by his garden, and marked, with one eye, How the Owl and the Panther were sharing a pie: [later editions continued as follows: The Panther took pie-crust, and gravy, and meat, While the Owl had the dish as its share of the treat. When the pie was all finished, the Owl, as a boon, Was kindly permitted to pocket the spoon: While the Panther received knife and fork with a growl, And concluded the banquet by——’]” – Chapter 10, page 59.

These baked desserts are a big part of chapter 11, as it focuses on the trial of the Knave of Hearts, who allegedly stole the Queen of Hearts’ tray of tarts.

“In the very middle of the court was a table, with a large dish of tarts upon it: they looked so good, that it made Alice quite hungry to look at them— ‘I wish they’d get the trial done,’ she thought, ‘and hand round the refreshments!'” – Chapter 11, page 61.

“On this the White Rabbit blew three blasts on the trumpet, and then unrolled the parchment-scroll, and read as follows:— ‘The Queen of Hearts, she made some tarts, All on a summer day: The Knave of Hearts, he stole those tarts, And took them quite away!’ ‘Consider your verdict,’ the King said to the jury. ‘Not yet, not yet!’ the Rabbit hastily interrupted. ‘There’s a great deal to come before that!’ – Chapter 11, page 62.

Fun fact: Treacle tart is also referenced in Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. Of course, in the Wonderland version of this traditional English dessert, pepper is unavoidable.

“‘Well, if I must, I must,’ the King said with a melancholy air, and, after folding his arms and frowning at the cook till his eyes were nearly out of sight, he said, in a deep voice, ‘What are tarts made of?’ ‘Pepper, mostly,’ said the cook. ‘Treacle,’ said a sleepy voice behind her. ‘Collar that Dormouse,’ the Queen shrieked out” – Chapter 11, page 65.

“‘All right, so far,’ said the King; and he went on muttering over the verses to himself: ”We know it to be true’—that’s the jury, of course—‘If she should push the matter on’—that must be the Queen—‘What would become of you?’—What, indeed!—‘ I gave her one, they gave him two’—why, that must be what he did with the tarts, you know——’ ‘But it goes on ‘they all returned from him to you,’’ said Alice. ‘Why, there they are!’ said the King triumphantly, pointing to the tarts on the table'” – Chapter 12, page 69.

Foods and Drinks in the Book “Pan’s Labyrinth” by Guillermo Del Toro & Cornelia Funke

Food and Drinks in the Book “Coraline” by Neil Gaiman

Foods and Drinks in the TV Show “Gilmore Girls” : The Ultimate Guide to Lorelai and Rory’s Food Moments

Foods and Drinks in the Book “Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm: A New English Version” by Philip Pullman

Leave a reply cancel reply, discover more from.

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Type your email…

Reader's Digest

35 Alice in Wonderland Quotes That Will Transport You Through the Looking Glass

Posted: November 4, 2023 | Last updated: November 4, 2023

Curiouser and curiouser Alice in Wonderland quotes

The timeless classic Alice's Adventures in Wonderland offers bookworms of every age a whimsical escape from the ordinary. Lewis Carroll led readers headfirst into the topsy-turvy world of Wonderland, a place where logic takes a backseat and the laws of reality are merely suggestions. Whether you're a seasoned wanderer of Wonderland or a curious newcomer, you'll find something undeniably magical within the pages of this story. It's why Alice in Wonderland quotes are so enduring.

Book quotes are one of the ways I love to quickly re-immerse myself in the whimsy of my favorite books . To give you a quick Alice fix, I've collected dozens of Alice in Wonderland quotes from the original book and its sequel, Through the Looking-Glass . I've also thrown in some quotes from the film adaptations, which are as wonderfully weird as their source material. Grab your teacup, put on your most eccentric hat and prepare for a journey as we explore the profound and peculiar words of Carroll's masterpiece.

Get Reader’s Digest ’s Read Up newsletter for more quotes, books, humor, cleaning, travel, tech and fun facts all week long.

<p>1. "Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast." —<em>The White Queen in </em>Through the Looking-Glass</p> <p>2. "Off with their heads!" —<em>The Queen of Hearts in</em> Alice's Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>3. "I wonder if the snow <em>loves</em> the trees and fields, that it kisses them so gently? And then it covers them up snug, you know, with a white quilt; and perhaps it says, 'Go to sleep, darlings, till the summer comes again.'" —<em>Alice in</em> Through the Looking-Glass</p> <p>4. "'The time has come,' the walrus said, 'to talk of many things: Of shoes—and ships—and sealing wax—of cabbages and kings." —<em>Tweedledee in</em> Through the Looking-Glass</p> <p>5. "The Duchess! The Duchess! Oh my dear paws! Oh my fur and whiskers! She'll get me executed, as sure as ferrets are ferrets!" —<em>The White Rabbit in</em> Alice's Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>6. "You know you say things are 'much of a muchness'—did you ever see such a thing as a drawing of a muchness?" —<em>The Dormouse in</em> Alice's Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>7. "If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is because everything would be what it isn't. And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn't be. And what it wouldn't be, it would. You see?" —<em>Alice in Disney's</em> Alice in Wonderland</p> <p>8. "'Contrariwise,' continued Tweedledee, 'if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic.'" —<em>Tweedledee in</em> Through the Looking-Glass</p> <p>9. "It's a poor sort of memory that only works backwards." —<em>The White Queen in</em> Through the Looking-Glass</p> <p>10. "'Well, I never heard it before,' said the Mock Turtle; 'but it sounds uncommon nonsense.'" —<em>The Mock Turtle in</em> Alice's Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p><em>Alice in Wonderland</em> is known for some of the <a href="https://www.rd.com/list/funniest-quotes-all-time/" rel="noopener noreferrer">funniest quotes</a>, and we have Carroll's creative language to thank for that. He was a master at playing with form, resulting in whimsical sentences that might seem like gibberish at first glance yet frequently reveal their own kind of sense.</p>

Trippy Alice in Wonderland quotes

1. "Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast." — The White Queen in Through the Looking-Glass

2. "Off with their heads!" — The Queen of Hearts in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

3. "I wonder if the snow loves the trees and fields, that it kisses them so gently? And then it covers them up snug, you know, with a white quilt; and perhaps it says, 'Go to sleep, darlings, till the summer comes again.'" — Alice in Through the Looking-Glass

4. "'The time has come,' the walrus said, 'to talk of many things: Of shoes—and ships—and sealing wax—of cabbages and kings." — Tweedledee in Through the Looking-Glass

5. "The Duchess! The Duchess! Oh my dear paws! Oh my fur and whiskers! She'll get me executed, as sure as ferrets are ferrets!" — The White Rabbit in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

6. "You know you say things are 'much of a muchness'—did you ever see such a thing as a drawing of a muchness?" — The Dormouse in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

7. "If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is because everything would be what it isn't. And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn't be. And what it wouldn't be, it would. You see?" — Alice in Disney's Alice in Wonderland

8. "'Contrariwise,' continued Tweedledee, 'if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic.'" — Tweedledee in Through the Looking-Glass

9. "It's a poor sort of memory that only works backwards." — The White Queen in Through the Looking-Glass

10. "'Well, I never heard it before,' said the Mock Turtle; 'but it sounds uncommon nonsense.'" — The Mock Turtle in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland is known for some of the funniest quotes , and we have Carroll's creative language to thank for that. He was a master at playing with form, resulting in whimsical sentences that might seem like gibberish at first glance yet frequently reveal their own kind of sense.

<p>11. "We're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad." —<em>The Cheshire Cat</em><em> in</em> Alice's Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>12. "'Begin at the beginning,' the King said gravely, 'and go on till you come to the end: then stop.'" —<em>The King</em><em> in</em> Alice's Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>13. "'No, no! The adventures first,' said the Gryphon in an impatient tone: 'explanations take such a dreadful time.'" —<em>The Gryphon</em><em> in</em> Alice's Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>14. "Well, some go this way, and some go that way. But as for me, myself, personally, I prefer the shortcut." —<em>The Cheshire Cat in Disney’s </em>Alice in Wonderland</p> <p>15. "You may have noticed that I'm not all there myself." —<em>The Cheshire Cat in Disney’s </em>Alice in Wonderland </p> <p>16. "If everybody minded their own business, the world would go around a great deal faster than it does." —<em>The Duchess</em><em> in</em> Alice's Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>17. "Now, <em>here</em>, you see, it takes all the running <em>you</em> can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!" —<em>The Red Queen in</em> Through the Looking-Glass</p> <p>The randomness and humor found in <em>Alice's Adventures in Wonderland</em> and <em>Through the Looking-Glass</em> continue to make these beloved <a href="https://www.rd.com/list/the-best-childrens-books-ever-written/" rel="noopener noreferrer">children's books</a> charming even over a century later, and these comical quotes are a prime example of that enduring appeal.</p>

Funny Alice in Wonderland quotes

11. "We're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad." — The Cheshire Cat in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

12. "'Begin at the beginning,' the King said gravely, 'and go on till you come to the end: then stop.'" — The King in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

13. "'No, no! The adventures first,' said the Gryphon in an impatient tone: 'explanations take such a dreadful time.'" — The Gryphon in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

14. "Well, some go this way, and some go that way. But as for me, myself, personally, I prefer the shortcut." — The Cheshire Cat in Disney’s Alice in Wonderland

15. "You may have noticed that I'm not all there myself." — The Cheshire Cat in Disney’s Alice in Wonderland

16. "If everybody minded their own business, the world would go around a great deal faster than it does." — The Duchess in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

17. "Now, here , you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!" — The Red Queen in Through the Looking-Glass

The randomness and humor found in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass continue to make these beloved children's books charming even over a century later, and these comical quotes are a prime example of that enduring appeal.

<p>18. "'Really, now you ask me,' said Alice, very much confused, 'I don't think—'<br> 'Then you shouldn't talk,' said the Hatter." —<em>The Mad Hatter and Alice in</em> Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>19. "'If you knew Time as well as I do,' said the Hatter, 'you wouldn't talk about wasting <em>it</em>. It's <em>him</em>.'" —<em>The Mad Hatter and Alice in</em> Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>20. "Have I gone mad?" —<em>The Mad Hatter in Tim Burton's </em>Alice in Wonderland</p> <p>21. "Why is a raven like a writing-desk?" —<em>The Mad Hatter in</em> Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>22. "You're not the same as you were before. You were much more, muchier. You've lost your muchness." —<em>The Mad Hatter in Tim Burton's </em>Alice in Wonderland</p> <p>The Hatter is known for saying provocative things that could be perceived as offensive—but that is also what makes him a fan favorite. And while all the <em>Alice in Wonderland</em> quotes above don't necessarily come from the book, the Hatter's <a href="https://www.rd.com/list/memorable-movie-quotes/" rel="noopener noreferrer">memorable movie quotes</a> are just as punchy.</p>

Mad Hatter quotes

18. "'Really, now you ask me,' said Alice, very much confused, 'I don't think—' 'Then you shouldn't talk,' said the Hatter." — The Mad Hatter and Alice in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

19. "'If you knew Time as well as I do,' said the Hatter, 'you wouldn't talk about wasting it . It's him .'" — The Mad Hatter and Alice in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

20. "Have I gone mad?" — The Mad Hatter in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland

21. "Why is a raven like a writing-desk?" — The Mad Hatter in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

22. "You're not the same as you were before. You were much more, muchier. You've lost your muchness." — The Mad Hatter in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland

The Hatter is known for saying provocative things that could be perceived as offensive—but that is also what makes him a fan favorite. And while all the Alice in Wonderland quotes above don't necessarily come from the book, the Hatter's memorable movie quotes are just as punchy.

<p>23. "Curiouser and curiouser!" —<em>Alice in</em> Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>24. "I do wish I hadn't drunk quite so much!" —<em>Alice in</em> Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>25. "'I could tell you my adventures—beginning from this morning,' said Alice a little timidly: 'but it's no use going back to yesterday, because I was a different person then.'" —<em>Alice in</em> Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>26. "When I used to read fairy-tales, I fancied that kind of thing never happened, and now here I am in the middle of one! There ought to be a book written about me, that there ought!" —<em>Alice in</em> Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>27. "And what is the use of a book, thought Alice, without pictures or conversations?" —<em>Alice in</em> Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>28. "It would be so nice if something made sense for a change." —<em>Alice in Disney's</em> Alice in Wonderland</p> <p>29. "Who in the world am I? Ah, <em>that's</em> the great puzzle!" —<em>Alice in</em> Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>30. "'Who cares for you?' said Alice, (she had grown to her full size by this time.) 'You're nothing but a pack of cards!'" —<em>Alice in</em> Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>Alice is endlessly curious, extremely trusting and a very caring young woman. Just how famous are her famous lines? Both her book and <a href="https://www.rd.com/article/disney-movie-quotes/" rel="noopener noreferrer">Disney movie quotes</a> can be found printed on T-shirts, mugs and wall posters around the world.</p>

Alice quotes

23. "Curiouser and curiouser!" — Alice in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

24. "I do wish I hadn't drunk quite so much!" — Alice in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

25. "'I could tell you my adventures—beginning from this morning,' said Alice a little timidly: 'but it's no use going back to yesterday, because I was a different person then.'" — Alice in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

26. "When I used to read fairy-tales, I fancied that kind of thing never happened, and now here I am in the middle of one! There ought to be a book written about me, that there ought!" — Alice in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

27. "And what is the use of a book, thought Alice, without pictures or conversations?" — Alice in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

28. "It would be so nice if something made sense for a change." — Alice in Disney's Alice in Wonderland

29. "Who in the world am I? Ah, that's the great puzzle!" — Alice in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

30. "'Who cares for you?' said Alice, (she had grown to her full size by this time.) 'You're nothing but a pack of cards!'" — Alice in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

Alice is endlessly curious, extremely trusting and a very caring young woman. Just how famous are her famous lines? Both her book and Disney movie quotes can be found printed on T-shirts, mugs and wall posters around the world.

<p>31. "Everything's got a moral, if only you can find it." —<em>The Duchess in </em>Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>32. "But that's just the trouble with me. I give myself very good advice, but I very seldom follow it." —<em>Alice in Disney's</em> Alice’s in Wonderland</p> <p>33. "'I can't explain <em>myself</em>, I'm afraid, sir,' said Alice, 'because I'm not myself, you see.'" —<em>Alice in</em> Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>34. "How puzzling all these changes are! I'm never sure what I'm going to be, from one minute to another." —<em>Alice in</em> Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>35. "Oh, 'tis love, 'tis love, that makes the world go round!" —<em>The Duchess in</em> Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</p> <p>While there are many trippy <em>Alice and Wonderland</em> quotes, there are also plenty of <a href="https://www.rd.com/article/funny-inspirational-quotes/" rel="noreferrer noopener noreferrer">inspirational quotes</a> that feel warm-hearted and tender. Carroll's world-building was certainly out of <em>this</em> world—he had a way of taking quirky characters and an outlandish plot, and making it deeply relatable to the human experience.</p>

Inspirational quotes from Alice in Wonderland

31. "Everything's got a moral, if only you can find it." — The Duchess in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

32. "But that's just the trouble with me. I give myself very good advice, but I very seldom follow it." — Alice in Disney's Alice’s in Wonderland

33. "'I can't explain myself , I'm afraid, sir,' said Alice, 'because I'm not myself, you see.'" — Alice in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

34. "How puzzling all these changes are! I'm never sure what I'm going to be, from one minute to another." — Alice in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

35. "Oh, 'tis love, 'tis love, that makes the world go round!" — The Duchess in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

While there are many trippy Alice and Wonderland quotes, there are also plenty of inspirational quotes that feel warm-hearted and tender. Carroll's world-building was certainly out of this world—he had a way of taking quirky characters and an outlandish plot, and making it deeply relatable to the human experience.

More for You

Surprising Skills: 20 Celebrities with Hidden Talents

15 tricks Costco uses to make you buy more

Americans are finally catching on to Costco's tricks — here are 15 to watch out for so you don't get fleeced on your next trip

Wash Your Hands Immediately After Touching These 10 Things

Carnival Cruise Line makes key comments on dress codes

What Retiring to The Villages in Florida Is Really Like

Lady Gaga rocks car part on red carpet to delight of fans: ‘Weird Gaga is back’

Save Your Plastic Water Bottle To Grow An Endless Supply Of Garlic

Donald Trump Sells Private Jet Amid Spiraling Legal Costs

A TSA officer slipping his hand into a purse as it goes through a checkpoint at Miami International Airport. He was charged with grand theft and organized schemes to defraud.

10% of travelers have had their medicines confiscated. Here's how you can avoid it.

What Those Colored Circles on Food Packages Actually Mean

The 18 Best High-Waisted Bikinis To Make You Feel Confident and Chic

Weeds thrive in gravel from seeds dispersed by the wind or animals

'Unlikely' household product removes garden weeds 'better' than white vinegar

Are Retirees Ready for a 21% Cut to Social Security Benefits? Here's Exactly When It Could Happen.

How ‘world-changing’ solar tech could mean the death of batteries

Million Dollar Baby starring Clint Eastwood and Morgan Freeman

“He never says action, and he never says cut”: Morgan Freeman Had to Beg Clint Eastwood to Direct 1 Movie Starring Matt Damon

An airline kicked a family off the plane after they made their own no-peanut announcement when the crew refused to

Debunking 10 myths about strength training

The exercise that can reduce your risk of stroke or heart attack by 40 to 70%

14 Code Words You Never Want to Hear on Cruise Ships

Tech: What The Strange Knob On Your Computer Cable Is For

The Staple Ingredient That'll Keep Squirrels Out Of Your Yard

IMAGES

My favourite book: "alice in wonderland"
Essay on My Favourite Book for School Students & Children in English
my most favourite book of childhood.
Essay on my favourite book in english || My favourite book essay writing
Alice in Wonderland Summary
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland Essay Example

VIDEO

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
Alice in Wonderland
Book: Alice in Wonderland summary
Essay on my favourite book
My personal ranking of Alice (35 versions)
Alice in Wonderland In A World Of My Own

COMMENTS

Essays on Alice in Wonderland
1 page / 558 words. Written by Lewis Carroll in 1865, the novel has sparked much debate and analysis regarding its portrayal of morality and ethics. In this essay, we will delve into the moral issues present in Alice in Wonderland, examining the themes of identity, authority, and reality. Made-to-order...
Alice in Wonderland Book That Should Read Every Child
Download. Essay, Pages 3 (633 words) Views. 26. My favorite book is "Alice in Wonderland" and most of all I was captivated by the magical atmosphere of this story and its strange heroes. This book should be read slowly, thoughtfully, no matter what, without distracting, not missing a single detail, in order to fully understand the hidden ...
Some of my favourite Alice in Wonderland re ...
There are many, many books based on Alice in Wonderland and sadly I haven't read them all. There are many that I want to get my hands on and read but sadly don't have the money or time too. But I have read enough to have a few favourites, so here are three of my favourite books/series based on, inspired and are re-tellings of Alice in ...
Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
The book Alice in Wonderland was first written by Lewis Carroll as a means of entertaining Alice Pleasant Liddell, a little girl he knew (Susina 2005). The book has been studied from a variety of different angles and revealed to contain numerous themes and comments on society. One of the themes that are often traced through the book is its ...
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland Essays and Criticism
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865), Lewis Carroll's masterpiece of children's nonsense fiction, has enjoyed a life rivaled by few books from the nineteenth century, or indeed any earlier period.
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Victorians praised Lewis Carroll's word-play and brilliant use of language. Critics after his death found psychological clues to Carroll's own subconscious in the book's curious dream-structure ...
Alice in Wonderland Essays for College Students
926 words. Alice in Wonderland Movie. On the bank of a tranquil river, Alice (Kathryn Beaumont) grows bored listening to her older sister read aloud from a history book about William I of England. Alice's sister scolds her, gently but firmly, for her lack of attention.
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland Review (My Favorite Book Everrrr)
A beloved classic, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland has continued to delight readers, young and old for over a century. Review: it's a cliché and cheesy and I hate when people say it, but…ALL OF THE STARS. THIS IS MY FAVORITE BOOK. No qualifier. No excuse. No "one of my favorites.". This one is it, y'all.
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland Critical Essays
Analysis. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland presents a world in which everything, including Alice's own body size, is in a state of flux. She is treated rudely, bullied, asked questions that ...
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Cathy Lowne Pat Bauer. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, widely beloved British children's book by Lewis Carroll, published in 1865 and illustrated by John Tenniel. It is one of the best-known and most popular works of English-language fiction, about Alice, a young girl who dreams that she follows a white rabbit down a rabbit hole.
An Analysis of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Many people have seen Alice's Adventures in Wonderland as a prime example of the limit-breaking book from the old tradition illuminating the new one. They also consider it being a tale of the "variations on the debate of gender" and that it's "continually astonishing us with its modernity". From the looks of it, the story about ...
Alice as a Character
Alice is reasonable, well-trained, and polite. From the start, she is a miniature, middle-class Victorian "lady." Considered in this way, she is the perfect foil, or counterpoint, or contrast, for all the unsocial, bad-mannered eccentrics whom she meets in Wonderland. Alice's constant resource and strength is her courage.
A Summary and Analysis of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland: summary. The novel begins with a young girl named Alice, who is bored with a book she is reading outside, following a smartly-dressed rabbit down a rabbit hole. She falls a long way until she finds herself in a room full of locked doors. However, she finds a key, but it's for a door that's too small for her.
Alice's Adventures In Wonderland Essay Topics
Essay Topics. 1. Time is a source of stress in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Choose a character who experiences time-induced stress and discuss how their situation relates to the novel's themes. 2. Find one of the didactic verses that Alice recites incorrectly, and compare and contrast it with its original version.
Interpretive essays
Interpretive essays. A lthough Carroll invented Alice's Adventures in Wonderland for the entertainment of children, many scholars have thought to discover various underlying influences in his work. The books have been explained from all kinds of viewpoints, like drug use, Freudian influences, mathematics, political satire, sex and pedophilia ...
Book review: Alice in Wonderland
REVIEWED BY MOLLY, YR 6, NSW Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, illustrated by Sir John Tenniel, MacMillan Children's Books, ISBN 9781509865727 Molly reviewed her own copy of this book. ... One of my favourite parts in the book would definitely be the tea party with the Mad Hatter, which I would describe as, in the words of ...
Psychological Analysis of Alice in Wonderland
Published: Apr 29, 2022. Lewis Carroll's wondrous story, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, is somewhat familiar with practically anyone. The intricate use of a young girl's, Alice's, dream state and imagination are put together, colliding in the most bizarre yet alluring ways. An almost unclear storyline to many, Alice begins her ...
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland Essay
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, written by an English author in 1865 under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll, contains obscurities that leave people uncertain due to the nonsense. The novel holds many obscurities, such as a disappearing Cheshire Cat, a personified rabbit, and a caterpillar who smokes from a hookah. These characters.
Food references in "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" by Lewis Carroll
Tea, bread and butter. In chapter 7, a modest spread awaits Alice for afternoon tea with the Hatter, the March Hare and the Dormouse. "Alice considered a little, and then said 'The fourth.' 'Two days wrong!' sighed the Hatter. 'I told you butter wouldn't suit the works!' he added looking angrily at the March Hare.
35 Alice in Wonderland Quotes That Will Transport You Through the ...
Book quotes are one of the ways I love to quickly re-immerse myself in the whimsy of my favorite books. To give you a quick Alice fix, I've collected dozens of Alice in Wonderland quotes from the ...

Some of my favourite Alice in Wonderland re-imaginings/re-tellings (books, TV shows and films)

Share this:

Leave a comment Cancel reply

Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll Essay

Works Cited

Alice in Wonderland Essays

books + nefarious plots

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland Review (My Favorite Book Everrrr)

Share this:

plz give me attention Cancel reply

A Summary and Analysis of Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

Discover more from Interesting Literature

Alice's Adventures In Wonderland

Essay Topics

Related Titles

Featured Collections

Interpretive essays

General discussion of the ‘Alice’ books

Discussion of Lewis Carroll, the author, in relation to Alice

What/who influenced Carroll while writing the story

Illustrations

Drugs and hallucinations

Philosophic reasoning

Other subjects

External sources

Book review: Alice in Wonderland

Share this:

Published by Alphabet Soup

Psychological Analysis of Alice in Wonderland

Cite this Essay

Related Essays

Still can’t find what you need?

Related Essays on Alice in Wonderland

Related Topics

Get Your Personalized Essay in 3 Hours or Less!

Foods and Drinks in the Children’s Novel “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” by Lewis Carroll

Orange marmalade

“Drink me”

“Eat me”

Apples (but actually potatoes)

Peppery soup & Turtle soup

Tea, bread and butter

Tulip-roots

Pie-crust and gravy and meat

Share this:

Foods and Drinks in the Book “Pan’s Labyrinth” by Guillermo Del Toro & Cornelia Funke

Food and Drinks in the Book “Coraline” by Neil Gaiman

Foods and Drinks in the TV Show “Gilmore Girls” : The Ultimate Guide to Lorelai and Rory’s Food Moments

Foods and Drinks in the Book “Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm: A New English Version” by Philip Pullman

35 Alice in Wonderland Quotes That Will Transport You Through the Looking Glass

Curiouser and curiouser Alice in Wonderland quotes

Trippy Alice in Wonderland quotes

Funny Alice in Wonderland quotes

Mad Hatter quotes

Alice quotes

Inspirational quotes from Alice in Wonderland

More for You

IMAGES

VIDEO

COMMENTS