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Alice in wonderland analysis
Alice in wonderland analysis essay
Alice in wonderland analysis essay
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Growing up is a necessary part of life no matter if one consciously wants it or not. A child’s body will grow and mature even if the mind doesn’t understand why things are happening and the self-doubt it may bring to one’s identity as one tries to adapt to a new development. In “Alice’s Adventure in Wonderland,” Lewis Carrol portrays this difficulty in Alice’s adventures wandering around her dream world. Alice sits by a riverbank, slowly falling asleep by the book her sister is reading to her. As her consciousness wanes, she spots a talking rabbit and follows him across the field and falling down a very deep hole. When she finally reaches the ground, she has gone from her dream-like state to a fully immersed dream. In the beginning, she is Alice has confidence in her social position, education, and the Victorian virtue of good manners (SparkNotes) therefore she approaches Wonderland and encounters a way of living and reasoning different quite different from her own (Rooy). In a world filled with nonsense, she is like a fish out of water. As Rooy states, this may be a representation of a child struggling to survive in the confusing world of adults. Wonderland is a ridiculous dream world that parodies the real world (LitCharts). Both the real world and Wonderland have misunderstandings, meaningless things, and characters that aren’t always agreeable. Wonderland may take things to an extreme whimsical point, but nonetheless, it shows the same basic characteristics. It is difficult for a child to understand an adult’s world because of abstract ideas such as morals, which may as well be nonsense, as shown by the creatures in Wonderland. For Alice, she finally understands her situation in Wonderland and wakes up because of a new sense of understanding and growth within While Alice had found her dream to be a new experience filled with difficulty, her sister immediately imagines a pleasant dream, possibly because of a sense of nostalgia for the happy days of childhood. “Alice in Wonderland” has been a popular book with the children for over a century, leading to the evidence that children are able to relate to Alice since they are facing the same challenges and issues regarding developing a “reasonable” view of the universe and establishing their own identity (Florman and Kestler). Alice is a character that many people look fondly upon for either being able to understand the difficulty of growing up or reminiscing the memories of
Lewis Carroll demonstrates paradoxes within Alice and Wonderland as Alice is tossed within an entirely different world. Yet one of the greatest paradoxes is the transformation of Alice over the course of the novel as well as the transformation of the duchess. Alice begins as an ignorant child; she has difficulties in morphing to the logic and needs of Wonder...
Alice’s failure to understand the “native” culture, and her insistence on imposing her own norms and values ultimately culminates in a life-threatening situation.” (Binova “Underground Alice:” the politics of wonderland). Alice is the colonised in the situation with the Queen of Hearts. When she is introduced to the Queen her evil nature is revealed as she orders “Off with her head!” (Carroll 96). However, she is contrasted to Alice’s good nature while she shouts “Nonsense!” ( Carrol 96). The theme of chaos and confusion is brought forward as they play croquet all at once with noises all around and even in the court where everyone is expected to be civil. Although the Queen, as a character reinforces adulthood, subversion emerges again by Alice standing up for herself at this time. Nearing the end of her dream, she stands up against the Queen at court but it dream ends without a resolution. Maria Lassen-Seger says in ( “Subversion of Authority”: In “Alice’s Adventures of Wonderland”), “the relationship between the child and the adult is an impossible power relation in which the child is marginalised and considered powerless, thus, the adults suggest in their books what a child ought to be, what values and images it should accept.” The Queen at this point in the dream would have been the
Thus, Alice in Wonderland is a good illustration of a Hero’s Journey. This story allows us to see how Alice overcomes the three main phases, and most of the stages identified by Campbell in her journey-transformation from an undisciplined child to a wise young adult. Throughout the story, Alice overcomes the nonsense of the young and the old before she truly understands what adulthood is all about. All through her adventures in Wonderland, she encounters numerous new situations and meets different archetypes that are necessary for her to be considered a Hero.
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is a story about a little girl who comes into contact with unpredictable, illogical, basically mad world of Wonderland by following the White Rabbit into a huge rabbit – hole. Everything she experiences there challenges her perception and questions common sense. This extraordinary world is inhabited with peculiar, mystical and anthropomorphic creatures that constantly assault Alice which makes her to question her fundamental beliefs and suffer an identity crisis. Nevertheless, as she woke up from “such a curious dream” she could not help but think “as well she might, what a wonderful dream it had been ”.
One of the main purposes for writing Alice in Wonderland was not only to show the difficulties of communication between children and adults. In this story, almost every adult Alice talked to did not understand her. At times she messed up what they were saying completely as well, which many times stick true to real life circumstances. This book shows that kids and adults are on completely separate pages on an everlasting story. Carroll points out that sometimes children, like Alice, have a hard time dealing with the transition from childhood to adulthood, 'growing up.' Alice in Wonderland is just a complicated way of showing this fact. Lewis Carroll's ways with words is confusing, entertaining, serious, and highly unique all at the same time. And it's safe to say that it would be difficult to replicate such and imaginative technique ever again (Long 72).
As a child one of life’s biggest questions is “who am I?” and finding it out is the tricky part. Children often sought out to be who their parents, family members or peers want them to be with little regard or thought for their own personal opinion. The early prepubescent years of life are the most important and fragile years of a child’s life. Alice takes on Wonderland comfortable in her own shoes but is immediately challenged from the start. Not being able to fit into the door that the white rabbit went into nearly drove Alice mad. She was willing to do or take whatever would help her be the size that Wonderland wanted her to be to fit through that door. This is a model representation of a metaphor for fitting to be what society wants you to be. Alice had no clue what the potion or cake was made out of or what it would do to her, but she wanted to be like the others that had fit through the door and find out what was on the other side, much like wanting to know what it is like to see things from a grown up perception. Eventually, after Alice has grown too big due to the cake she cries gigantic tears because she does not know what is happening to her body or if she will ever be the same. Once Alice has drank the potion again and grown too small, she falls right into that puddle of tears which is now as big as an ocean for her, causing Alice to
Although the novel is notorious for its satire and parodies, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland main theme is the transition between childhood and adulthood. Moreover, Alice’s adventures illustrate the perplexing struggle between child and adult mentalities as she explores the curious world of development know as Wonderland. From the beginning in the hallway of doors, Alice stands at an awkward disposition. The hallway contains dozens of doors that are all locked. Alice’s pre-adolescent stage parallels with her position in the hallway. Alice’s position in the hallway represents that she is at a stage stuck between being a child and a young woman. She posses a small golden key to ...
Lewis Carroll's Wonderland is a queer little universe where a not so ordinary girl is faced with the contradicting nature of the fantastic creatures who live there. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is a child's struggle to survive in the condescending world of adults. The conflict between child and adult gives direction to Alice's adventures and controls all the outstanding features of the work- Alice's character, her relationship with other characters, and the dialogue. " Alice in Wonderland is on one hand so nonsensical that children sometimes feel ashamed to have been interested in anything so silly (Masslich 107)."
When she falls in the hole she is confronted with no exit except a tiny door to escape from. She, therefore, shrinks into pocket size only to find that the door was closed, constructing her to grow into an enormous size, larger than what Alice began. The idea was to drink to shrink, allowing her to proceed past the miniature door, however she had to eat a small cake to sprout again to gain access to a key placed on a table as it unlocks the door leading to the garden. At any rate, providing that she stop crying, she would realize what a substantial puddle of tears she’s created while being a colossal giant resulting in being stuck in the same place she’s been, therefore, can not escape into the magnificent garden. Alice, no matter how diligent she tried or wanted, was not capable of admission into the garden correlating that it was very slim. The representation of the garden can be looked upon as childhood during the time period, with this intention, lacking the ability to gain entry to the state of being a child. Thus, the reality of the Victorian era was the removal of entrance into childhood as they comforted an age of the Industrial Revolution. The passageway was infancy to young adulthood with no in between the stages, however that was the typical norm during those
Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland follows the story of young Alice trapped in the world of Wonderland after falling down through a rabbit-hole. The rabbit-hole which is filled with bookshelves, maps, and other objects foreshadows the set of rules, the ones Alice is normally accustomed to, will be defied in Wonderland. This conflict between her world and Wonderland becomes evident shortly after her arrival as evinced by chaos in “Pool of Tears” and Alice brings up the main theme of the book “was I the same when I got up this morning? I almost think I can remember feeling a little different. But if I am not the same, the next question is who am I?” (Carroll 18). After Alice fails to resolve her identity crisis using her friends, Alice says “Who am I, then? Tell me that first, and then, if I like being that person, I’ll come up: if not, I’ll stay down here til I’m somebody else” (Carroll 19). Hence in the beginning, Alice is showing her dependency on others to define her identity. Nevertheless when her name is called as a witness in chapter 12, Alice replies “HERE!” without any signs of hesitation (Carroll 103). Close examination of the plot in Alice in Wonderland reveals that experiential learning involving sizes leads Alice to think logically and rationally. Alice then attempts to explore Wonderland analytically and becomes more independent as the outcome. With these qualities, Alice resolves her identity crisis by recognizing Wonderland is nothing but a dream created by her mind.
...ng. Alice continues the passage by expressing that she doesn’t desire to be a particular size, but that she simply didn’t wish to be changing so often. Alice’s desire to be herself is important to note as it clearly defines the identity crisis Lewis Carroll reveals about children in the Victorian Era as a result of the societal influences forced upon them. Children are fed facts, forced to conform to the elite societal standard, suppress their inner-child as a result, and are left, according to Lewis Carroll, to squander between a split personality. Thus the identity crisis of children during the Victorian Era are a result of these societal influences, and, like Alice, they are left wondering, “ Who in the world am I? Ah, that’s the great puzzle!” (19).
The characters in Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass are more than whimsical ideas brought to life by Lewis Carroll. These characters, ranging from silly to rude, portray the adults in Alice Liddell’s life. The parental figures in Alice’s reality, portrayed in Alice in Wonderland, are viewed as unintellectual figures through their behaviors and their interactions with one another. Alice’s interactions with the characters of Wonderland reflect her struggles with adults in real life. Naturally curious as she is, Alice asks questions to learn from the adults.
Here she finds a strange caterpillar on a mushroom smoking a hookah. It doesn’t even matter that the caterpillar talks and questions Alice about her identity, the way he looks should be enough for Alice and the audience to question their sanity. Upon being asked who she is by the caterpillar, Alice has no idea anymore. She is becoming as mad as she believes the inhabitants of Wonderland to be. The caterpillar seems to be able to read Alice’s thoughts now ‘Just as if she had asked it aloud’ - which leads us to believe that Alice is so confused about her identity that perhaps her thoughts aren’t even hers anymore. By the end of this chapter we again see characters leave Alice in anger as she insults the caterpillar on his height and scares the pigeon who believes her to be a serpent. The caterpillar and pigeon both found Alice to be very strange indeed, yet their surroundings were absolutely normal to them - which again shows that Alice is the only odd thing in Wonderland and is able to upset the
Growing up is a concept feared by many people, especially children. The future is scare because no one knows what will happen. Children are the most afraid of growing up because they are uncertain if they will make the right choices. The decisions one makes in life effects their future. This leads to children having mixed emotions about whether or not they want to become an adult. In the novel, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll uses symbols to show the themes of growing up and uncertainty of the future.
...inal realization that she is growing up and that is normal, therefore, she accepts it. In brief, Alice in Wonderland is a book about growing up, and Alice definitely has grown up since the beginning of her journey and she has entered the adolescence phase when she rebels against everyone. Although she is not able to control herself when she gets angry, in other words she is behaving like a normal adolescent, she has gained a new “power” from this confusing experience: being a person with a voice to say something that matters.