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Literary analysis of alice in wonderland
Literary analysis of alice in wonderland
Literary analysis of alice in wonderland
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Alice of Alice in Wonderland seeks to experience a new path of life in “a world of nonsense.” This idea relates to Neil Gaiman’s Going Wodwo, because both characters leave their ordinary life to gain the experience of “nonsense.” Alice, starting to become bored with her studies, begins to day dream of a world that is precisely the opposite of the time she was living in, the Victorian era. During the journeys of Alice and the Wodwo, both experience three key settings: escape from their world, the search for acceptance in the new world, and the hardships of finding their way home.
Alice had very many high expectations in her mannerisms: the way she spoke, presented herself and especially her body language. She was quickly growing tired of these requirements. She was seeking to escape from her high strung environment and enter her own world by saying,”…if I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense.” In Going Wodwo, the character is “… [searching] for … a spring of sweet water…” implying that the water he was drinking was stale and had no positive taste. The Wodwo's "water" was the element of excitement in his life. He wants to deviate his life by leaving his civilization in exchange for life in the forest. The Wodwo knows he will find this madness in the forest because he says, “True madness takes us or leaves is in the forest.” He soon experiences the nonsense when he says, “Sense left with shoes and house.” Alice and the Wodwo, alike, crave adventure. They seek independence from the societal norms and they do so without a single friend.
Alice’s scene changes from boredom to excitement promptly with the white rabbit as he scrambles to the rabbit hole, because “[he] is late!” Alice is quite confused. She is i...
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...eil. “Going Wodwo.” The Green Man: Tales from the Mythic Forest. Ed. Ellen Datlow & Terri Windling. New York, NY, 2002. Pg. 18-19. Print.
• Jan Susina. "Dramatic Victorians." Children's Literature 21 (1993): 197-201. Project MUSE. Web. 21 Jan. 2011. .
• Lovell-Smith, Rose. "The Animals of Wonderland: Tenniel as Carroll's Reader." Criticism 45.4 (2003): 383-415. Project MUSE. Web. 21 Jan. 2011. .
• Maria Nikolajeva. "Devils, Demons, Familiars, Friends: Toward a Semiotics of Literary Cats." Marvels & Tales 23.2 (2009): 248-267. Project MUSE. Web. 21 Jan. 2011. .
• Sanjay Sircar and Miles Franklin. ""Tea with Alice of Alice in Wonderland": With an Introduction and Cultural Critique by Sanjay Sircar." Children's Literature 22 (1994): 127-138. Project MUSE. Web. 21 Jan. 2011. .
The Norton Anthology of English Literature, Volume 1c. New York: W.W. Norton & Co, 2006. Print. The.
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...
Most people know the name Lewis Carroll, and even more know about the taleof a little girl who fell down a rabbit hole straight into the adventure of a lifetime. But not many people know the name Charles Dodgson, the man behind the pseudonym and the one who constructed this wonderland from a summer time boat ride in 1862. Originally written for three friends, the Liddell sisters, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland has inspired philosophers, artists, writers, theologians, and not to mention the general public. The culture in which this piece of art was written has shaped Alice’s dream-like journey from the first false step into an almost never ending fall to the last storm of cards. Dodgson’s enchanting work illustrates mankind’s childlike spirit that 1880s English society tried so hard to ignore.
Kelly, Richard. Lewis Carroll “Alice” 78-97. U of Tenn. Twayne Publishers, G. K. Hall & Co. Boston, Mass 1977.
Carroll, Lewis. Alice in Wonderland . 3rd. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2013. Print.
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 ”.
The title character, Alice, is a young girl around pre-teen age. In the real world, the adult characters always look down on her because of her complete nonsense. She is considered the average everyday immature child, but when she is placed in the world of "Wonderland," the roles seem to switch. The adult characters within Wonderland are full of the nonsense and Alice is now the mature person. Thus creating the theme of growing up'. "...Alice, along with every other little girl is on an inevitable progress toward adulthood herself"(Heydt 62).
...ich are somewhat symbolic of religion as a whole and finding her own beliefs. For instance, the garden that Alice has trouble accessing represents Eden, the flawless world Adam and Eve lived in before they sinned. She has trouble reaching this garden being Alice isn’t yet ready to go to such a perfect place as she herself isn’t pure of heart and still struggles with understanding what she believes in. Throughout Alice’s journey, however, she begins to learn more regarding herself with each curious encounter in wonderland.
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 ...
The underlying message of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is a rejection of adult authority. The character of Alice is not at all like what you would find in a typical children's book. "The character of Alice herself is a bit puzzling, even to the modern child, because it does not fit a stereotype. How much more unusual she must have seemed to Victorian children, used to girl angels fated for death (in Dickens, Stowe, and others), or to impossibly virtuous little ladies, or to naughty girls who eventually reform in response to heavy adult pressure... But Alice is neither naughty nor overly nice. Her curiosity leads her into her initial adventure and most of the latter ones in the book... (Leach 119)."
SparkNotes Editors. “SparkNote on Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.” SparkNotes.com. SparkNotes LLC. 2005. Web. 30 Oct. 2013.
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.
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. Since they understand the subject at hand well, they do not need to express their thoughts in order for them to understand themselves. However, Alice does not see this internal
Alice tries to come to terms with Wonderland as she grows and figures out more about herself than she ever has before. In both the book and 1951 movie Alice is a young girl, possibly a pre teen, who goes on a journey of a lifetime. I would say that this journey is one that many young adults go on in one way or another and when they come to the end they discover what they are really made of and all of the things that they can accomplish if they really put their minds to it. “One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree. “Which road do I take?”
Alice in Wonderland belongs to the nonsense genre, and even if most of what happens to Alice is quite illogical, the main character is not. “The Alice books are, above all, about growing up” (Kincaid, page 93); indeed, Alice starts her journey as a scared little girl, however, at the end of what we discover to be just a dream, she has entered the adolescence phase with a new way to approach the mentally exhausting and queer Wonderland. It is important to consider the whole story when analyzing the growth of the character, because the meaning of an event or a sentence is more likely to mean what it truly looks like rather than an explanation regarding subconscious and Freudian interpretations. Morton states “that the books should possess any unity of purpose seems on the surface unlikely” (Morton, page 509), but it’s better to consider the disconnected narrative and the main character separately, since the girl doesn’t belong to Wonderland, which is, as Morton says, with no intrinsic unity. Whereas, there are a few key turning points where it is possible to see how Alice is changing, something that is visible throughout her journey. Carroll wants to tell the story of a girl who has to become braver in order to contend with challenges like the pool made by her own tears, or assertive characters, like the Queen.