LEWIS CARROLL'S ALICE IN WONDERLAND
MAKING SENSE OF ALICE
Whilst analysing a play called Frotting Reality I turned to Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland to compare and contrast the stories. I simplified the two stories down into equations and then compared the two. What I found was that Elsa and Alice were very similar characters, as were their journeys. Further I researched into the psychology and philosophy of Carroll's Alice in Wonderland to strengthen what meaning I got out of his novel.
Alice in Wonderland is a child's view of adulthood as she nears it herself. It is a coming of age story translated through the journey young Alice goes on. It takes her away from home and into a world she does not fit into, does not understand and is scared of. 
Wonderland's name gives it connotations of being, well, wonderful, but what it really is, is a confusing and annoying world. It is not beautiful or natural and Alice spends most of her time being treated without respect or manners - it is called Wonderland because it is a
threshold point before adulthood and a place where she can access and observe what is to come:
"Wonderland is a product of culture, not nature...the monarchy, the rule of law, education, grammar and social etiquette...first with a cacus race with wild animals...then the fussy domestic life of a bachelor rabbit (complete with a maid and a gardener). Having discussed growth and reproduction with a caterpillar and pigeon...
...and madness with a brainy disembodied cat, Alice finds herself in the more complex rituals of Wonderland society – first the endlessly rotating Mad Tea Party...
....then the shambolic royal croquet game and then to cap it all, the Mock Turtle and Gryphon's nostalgic, Old Boy's duet about their school days” (Haughton).
....then the shambolic royal croquet game and then to cap it all, the Mock Turtle and Gryphon's nostalgic, Old Boy's duet about their school days” (Haughton).
Alice goes through Wonderland to find meaning and purpose in her life (and it also warns of love to come) and prepares her to establish her own Design for Living outside of the one she already has courtesy of childhood “...what do you suppose is the use of a child without any meaning? Even a joke should have some meaning – and a child's more important than a joke, I hope” (Haughton).
Making Sense of Alice
1/ Down the Rabbit Hole
Alice follows a curious looking rabbit down a rabbit hole, a threshold that takes her to a different world. The rabbit constantly mutters that he is late and looks at his pocket watch. We find out later that he is late to tell the Duchess about a croquet game, and that the rabbit is imprisoned for it later on. However technically the rabbit is never actually late and his time is like time in a bad dream - constantly delayed but persistent. In Wonderland, time doesn't seem to have the same linear existence it does in reality, and characters are constantly moving but not getting anywhere like Gilda in “Design for Living”. There is no time here therefore it is not reality because there can be no death.“We would like there to be life after death, because that alone would allow us to definitively answer the question. But curiosity is no more an arrangement than hope". Those with imagination can imagine another world exists, a wonderland and when they do they are given choices, for example, the blue pill or the red pill?
Alice follows a curious looking rabbit down a rabbit hole, a threshold that takes her to a different world. The rabbit constantly mutters that he is late and looks at his pocket watch. We find out later that he is late to tell the Duchess about a croquet game, and that the rabbit is imprisoned for it later on. However technically the rabbit is never actually late and his time is like time in a bad dream - constantly delayed but persistent. In Wonderland, time doesn't seem to have the same linear existence it does in reality, and characters are constantly moving but not getting anywhere like Gilda in “Design for Living”. There is no time here therefore it is not reality because there can be no death.“We would like there to be life after death, because that alone would allow us to definitively answer the question. But curiosity is no more an arrangement than hope". Those with imagination can imagine another world exists, a wonderland and when they do they are given choices, for example, the blue pill or the red pill?
2/ The Pool of Tears
Alice is dropped into an environment she can't control. Alice eats food and drinks potions (like pills) to get into the fantasy world and the first situation she finds herself in is inside a glass bottle - a perfect world, freedom within constraints but she wants to get out of it. She makes a choice.
Alice is dropped into an environment she can't control. Alice eats food and drinks potions (like pills) to get into the fantasy world and the first situation she finds herself in is inside a glass bottle - a perfect world, freedom within constraints but she wants to get out of it. She makes a choice.
The animals all leave because they don't like Dinah (Alice's cat) which makes Alice low spirited. Dinah is her familiarity from home and she can't understand why Dinah does not fit in with this world. Things that used to be accepted no longer are.
4/ The Rabbit Sends in a Little BillAlice grows to a giant height “When I used to read fairytales, I fancied that kind of thing never happened, and now here I am in the middle of one!...And when I grown up I'll write one – but I'm grown up now...” She does not fit in. Alice then decides to grow to the right size and find the garden after running into trouble at the Rabbit's house.
5/ Advice from a caterpillar
Phallic incident with a caterpillar who questions Alice's identity. Who is she? You never grow old – the caterpillar grows up (changes) but he is still forever young. Alice's perception of what she'll be like when she's grown up is someone completely different to who she is as a child. The caterpillar asks her repeatedly who she is, until eventually Alice is no longer sure she knows the answer.
She talks about reproduction with the pigeon and caterpillar and she discovers she is two people: one virginal and one adult: “I have tasted eggs, certainly” (Carroll).
6/ Pig and Pepper
Alice learns the power of womanhood firstly when she encounters the pigeon and her eggs. The pigeon screams in fright at Alice thinking that Alice is is a serpent (due to her now grown long neck) and is scared that that Alice wants to eat her eggs. Then Alice meets a caterpillar, no doubt another phallic symbol. And then thirdly she encounters the Mad Hatter and his tea party where she realises there is no room for her in an all male world.
Alice shrinks for a second time in size to get into a bachelor's house.“Well, then, the cat went on, “you see a dog growls when it is angry and wags its tail when it's pleased. Now I growl when I'm pleased and wag my tail when I'm angry. Therefore I'm mad” (Carroll). We are all mad - nothing makes sense so Alice gets frustrated and begins to feel the need for language to makes sense of things – she's like a foreigner in a country where she doesn't speak the language.
Alice learns the power of womanhood firstly when she encounters the pigeon and her eggs. The pigeon screams in fright at Alice thinking that Alice is is a serpent (due to her now grown long neck) and is scared that that Alice wants to eat her eggs. Then Alice meets a caterpillar, no doubt another phallic symbol. And then thirdly she encounters the Mad Hatter and his tea party where she realises there is no room for her in an all male world. Alice shrinks for a second time in size to get into a bachelor's house.“Well, then, the cat went on, “you see a dog growls when it is angry and wags its tail when it's pleased. Now I growl when I'm pleased and wag my tail when I'm angry. Therefore I'm mad” (Carroll). We are all mad - nothing makes sense so Alice gets frustrated and begins to feel the need for language to makes sense of things – she's like a foreigner in a country where she doesn't speak the language.
7/ A Mad Tea-Party
“What did they live on?” said Alice, who always took a great interest in questions of eating and drinking” (Carroll). Food keeps you alive but in Wonderland the characters don't need this kind of ritual because they don't need purpose or stability in routine.
“though she looked back once or twice, half hoping that they would call after her...” (Carroll).
Towards the end of the chapter Alice gets frustrated because she can't make them understand her and once she leaves them and goes into the garden, she is appreciated for who she is and the truth about how she is feeling sets her free from Wonderland.
8/ The Queens Croquet-GroundNothing is as it seems - the roses are painted red, the croquet sticks are flamingos, and the Queen publicly orders the beheading of many characters only we find that no one is ever actually killed.
DUCHESS:
"Tis so" said the duchess: “and the moral of that is – oh, tis love, that makes the world go round.
ALICE:
“Somebody said" Alice whispered, “that it's done by everybody minding their own business!"
DUCHESS:
"Ah, well! It means much the same thing!"
9/ The Mock Turtle's Story
Alice learns that her old school lessons can't teach her everything, “Wisdom is not a utopia. No utopia is wise. The world is not to be dreamed but to be transformed...To see things as they are, to know what one wants. Not to delude oneself, not to pretend...To know and to accept. To understand and to transform. To resist and to overcome...We must accept reality as it is, for we cannot transform what we do not accept.”
10/ The Lobster Quadrille
The characters talk about soup again – a dish with many ingredients, like life where too much pepper causes chaos.
11/ Who Stole the Tarts?
The rabbit knows the rules of the court and therefore controls it. We need knowledge in order to differentiate between truth and false. If there is no truth then there are no rules in court, and in Wonderland anything is possible because there is no truth and no knowledge.
12/ Alice's Evidence
Alice decides she wants to go home, much like Dorothy does in The Wizard of Oz. Dorothy also dreams of another land and follows a path to what she hopes will come to an end with an answer; time threatens her in the witches castle; and she meets three characters who symbolise the heart, brains, and courage of a person (love, success and persistence to go on). When she reaches Emerald City she realises that what she thought was real is not.
What allows Alice into Wonderland and not her sister is Alice's curiosity and belief in more than she sees around her.
The Wizard of Oz (1939)
Alice decides she wants to go home, much like Dorothy does in The Wizard of Oz. Dorothy also dreams of another land and follows a path to what she hopes will come to an end with an answer; time threatens her in the witches castle; and she meets three characters who symbolise the heart, brains, and courage of a person (love, success and persistence to go on). When she reaches Emerald City she realises that what she thought was real is not.
What allows Alice into Wonderland and not her sister is Alice's curiosity and belief in more than she sees around her.
The Wizard of Oz (1939)
What the Characters Represent
Dinah
Childhood innocence. An animal that does not desire or need anything other than necessities.
Childhood innocence. An animal that does not desire or need anything other than necessities.
The White Rabbit
Time constraints in a mortal world that will always end in death.
Time constraints in a mortal world that will always end in death.
Caterpillar
Phallic symbol. Being a young girl one day and then transforming into a sexual woman.
Phallic symbol. Being a young girl one day and then transforming into a sexual woman.
Pigeon
Feminine - Eggs and the vagina. The pigeon is scared of 'snakes' – fear of sex.
Feminine - Eggs and the vagina. The pigeon is scared of 'snakes' – fear of sex.
The Cheshire Cat
Discovering something that has and always will be there: a blank canvas.
Discovering something that has and always will be there: a blank canvas.
The Mad Hatter
The part of Alice that wants to be completely and fully understood but never will be. The Hatter is her as a baby where time and language and social expectations did not exist.
The part of Alice that wants to be completely and fully understood but never will be. The Hatter is her as a baby where time and language and social expectations did not exist.
The Queen of Heart
Things are not always as they seem. The external world.
Things are not always as they seem. The external world.
Interesting Quotes
The Rule is Jam Tomorrow, Jam Yesterday But Never Jam Today
The Rule is Jam Tomorrow, Jam Yesterday But Never Jam Today
This quote from the novel is a statement on procrastination: we plan for the future and we think about the past but doing this all the time means we don't allow ourselves any time to live in the present. Mark D White of Alice in Wonderland and Philosophy explains that we “recall that such goods are only seen as good in remembrance or anticipation but never during the actual experience of them.” White is saying that jam (what we really want) is only desirable because of the memory of it and the anticipation of getting it again but not the actual having it. Just like anything we ever lust after, we want it the more we can't have it, but when we do get it, it looses value. Instead of wanting the things that do not exist , we should learn instead to live in the actual time that is happening by wanting what we can have so that we can have jam every day!
If we only ever pay attention to what is right in front of us we will be limited to what we can discover and learn in the world. Curiosity drives Alice down the rabbit hole. “We know that our experiences and perceptions are affected by expectation...emotional, hormones...childhood trauma...St Johns Wort...it’s as if we see perfectly clearly until we dream or drink a mysterious liquid, at which point things suddenly go crazy" (Scott F Harold). But are we crazy and the 'crazy' is normal? How do we trust our perceptions awake or dreaming? We are "never certain which state one is in, and therefore we must be aware at all times of the possibility that we are mad...but maybe drugs don’t lead to realer understanding of reality...that some drugs can sometimes precipitate mysterious experience, and one sees the world as it truly is". Reality is what we make it in the end - I would like to live life in a state of reality (reality being a place where there is time and thus a count down to an inevitable end) with fantasy intersected equally. I believe that whichever reality we choose to live, we should choose it because it gives us peace of mind and most importantly hope.
Creating Other's Wonderlands
Having asked a friend to draw for me their life in pictures I devised a piece of theatre/film from the result. Funnily enough it turned out to closely mirror the same stories in Alice and The Wizard of Oz:
A man in a bar drowning his fears in drink and smoke whilst a busty blonde flirts nearby. He is writing poetry as he keeps thinking he sees the reflection of a woman in the mirror behind the bar, but every time he turns there is no one there. The blonde doesn't give the slightest bit of interest to his poetry and this annoys him but all the same he relishes the company of her. The fire alarm goes off and the sprinkler system goes hay-wire drowning the place in water. Everyone escapes except for Rex who finds himself handcuffed to the bar, thanks to the busty blonde. He struggles to get free as the water rises until finally his hand slips free and he crashes into the mirror behind the bar as the current sweeps him through it and to the other side. On the other side there is sun and he is dry. He spots the girl he saw in the mirror in the distance and calls out to her before chasing after her. When he catches up to the spot she was in he finds some food and suddenly realises that he is starving so he starts to eat when he sees the girl again so he goes after her again. This time when he catches up to the spot she was in, he finds a bed and he suddenly realises that he is extremely tired so he climbs in and goes to sleep. When he wakes up it is night time and the sky is tranquil filled with stars with a beautiful big moon, and as he turns he realises the girl in the mirror is sleeping next to him. He strokes her face and feels peaceful - time is still and nothing stirs except for a faint breeze. As he sits up careful not to wake her he sees something out the corner of his eye and realises it is the mirror again glinting in the moonlight. He stares closer at it and realises that on the other side is a girl who looks exactly like the mirror girl drowning in a room of water. He decides he has to save her and he strokes the mirror girls hair one more time before heading towards the mirror as it engulfs him in a shower of water. Suddenly he is submerged in water and he realizes that he is back in the Bar. He spots the girl he saw drowning and swims to her before pulling her to the surface and safety.
No comments:
Post a Comment