Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the L

By Lewis Carroll

Enriched Classics offer readers accessible editions of great works of literature enhanced by helpful notes and commentary. Each book includes educational tools alongside the text, enabling students and readers alike to gain a deeper and more developed understanding of the writer and their work.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel, Through the Looking-Glass have captured the imaginations of readers since their publications. After Alice follows the frantically delayed White Rabbit down a hole, her adventures in the magical world of Wonderland begin. In Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, she meets a variety of wonderful creatures, including Tweedledee and Tweedledum, the Cheshire Cat, the Caterpillar, the Mad Hatter, and the Queen of Hearts—who, with the help of her enchanted deck of playing cards, tricks Alice into playing a bizarre game of croquet. Her adventures continue in Through the Looking-Glass, which is loosely based on a game of chess and includes Carroll’s famous poem “Jabberwocky.”

Enriched Classics enhance your engagement by introducing and explaining the historical and cultural significance of the work, the author’s personal history, and what impact this book had on subsequent scholarship. Each book includes discussion questions that help clarify and reinforce major themes and reading recommendations for further research.

Read with confidence.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Release date: Jul 21, 2014
• ISBN: 9781451685367

Lewis Carroll

Lewis Carroll (1832-1898) was an English children’s writer. Born in Cheshire to a family of prominent Anglican clergymen, Carroll—the pen name of Charles Dodgson—suffered from a stammer and pulmonary issues from a young age. Confined to his home frequently as a boy, he wrote poems and stories to pass the time, finding publication in local and national magazines by the time he was in his early twenties. After graduating from the University of Oxford in 1854, he took a position as a mathematics lecturer at Christ Church, which he would hold for the next three decades. In 1865, he published Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, masterpiece of children’s literature that earned him a reputation as a leading fantasist of the Victorian era. Followed by Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There (1871), Carroll’s creation has influenced generations of readers, both children and adults alike, and has been adapted countless times for theater, film, and television. Carroll is also known for his nonsense poetry, including The Hunting of the Snark (1876) and “Jabberwocky.”

Book preview

I

DOWN THE RABBIT-HOLE

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 she was considering in her own mind (as well as she could, for the hot day made her feel very sleepy and stupid), whether the pleasure of making a daisy-chain would be worth the trouble of getting up and picking the daisies, when suddenly a white rabbit with pink eyes ran close by her.

There was nothing so very remarkable in that; nor did Alice think it so very much out of the way to hear the Rabbit say to itself Oh dear! Oh dear! I shall be too late! (when she thought it over afterwards, it occurred to her that she ought to have wondered at this, but at the time it all seemed quite natural); but when the Rabbit actually took a watch out of its waistcoat-pocket, and looked at it, and then hurried on, Alice started to her feet, for it flashed across her mind that she had never before seen a rabbit with either a waistcoat-pocket, or a watch to take out of it, and, burning with curiosity, she ran across the field after it, and was just in time to see it pop down a large rabbit-hole under the hedge.

In another moment down went Alice after it, never once considering how in the world she was to get out again.

The rabbit-hole went straight on like a tunnel for some way, and then dipped suddenly down, so suddenly that Alice had not a moment to think about stopping herself before she found herself falling down what seemed to be a very deep well.

Either the well was very deep, or she fell very slowly, for she had plenty of time as she went down to look about her, and to wonder what was going to happen next. First, she tried to look down and make out what she was coming to, but it was too dark to see anything: then she looked at the sides of the well, and noticed that they were filled with cupboards and book-shelves: here and there she saw maps and pictures hung upon pegs. She took down a jar from one of the shelves as she passed: it was labeled 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.

Well! thought Alice to herself. After such a fall as this, I shall think nothing of tumbling down-stairs! How brave they’ll all think me at home! Why, I wouldn’t say anything about it, even if I fell off the top of the house! (Which was very likely true.)

Down, down, down. Would the fall never come to an end? I wonder how many miles I’ve fallen by this time? she said aloud. I must be getting somewhere near the centre of the earth. Let me see: that would be four thousand miles down, I think— (for, you see, Alice had learnt several things of this sort in her lessons in the school-room, and though this was not a very good opportunity for showing off her knowledge, as there was no one to listen to her, still it was good practice to say it over) —yes, that’s about the right distance—but then I wonder what Latitude or Longitude I’ve got to? (Alice had not the slightest idea what Latitude was, or Longitude either, but she thought they were nice grand words to say.)

Presently she began again. "I wonder if I shall fall right through the earth! How funny it’ll seem to come out among the people that walk with their heads downwards! The Antipathies, I think—" (she was rather glad there was no one listening, this time, as it didn’t sound at all the right word) —but I shall have to ask them what the name of the country is, you know. Please, Ma’am, is this New Zealand? Or Australia? (and she tried to curtsey as she spoke—fancy curtseying as you’re falling through the air! Do you think you could manage it?) And what an ignorant little girl she’ll think me for asking! No, it’ll never do to ask: perhaps I shall see it written up somewhere.

Down, down, down. There was nothing else to do, so Alice soon began talking again. Dinah’ll miss me very much to-night, I should think! (Dinah¹ was the cat.) I hope they’ll remember her saucer of milk at tea-time. 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? And here Alice began to get rather sleepy, and went on saying to herself, in a dreamy sort of way, Do cats eat bats? Do cats eat bats? and sometimes Do bats eat cats? for, you see, as she couldn’t answer either question, it didn’t much matter which way she put it. She felt that she was dozing off, and had just begun to dream that she was walking hand in hand with Dinah, and was saying to her very earnestly, Now, Dinah, tell me the truth: did you ever eat a bat?, when suddenly, thump! thump! down she came upon a heap of sticks and dry leaves, and the fall was over.

Alice was not a bit hurt, and she jumped up on to her feet in a moment: she looked up, but it was all dark overhead; before her was another long passage, and the White Rabbit was still in sight, hurrying down it. There was not a moment to be lost: away went Alice like the wind, and was just in time to hear it say, as it turned a corner, Oh my ears and whiskers, how late it’s getting! She was close behind it when she turned the corner, but the Rabbit was no longer to be seen: she found herself in a long, low hall, which was lit up by a row of lamps hanging from the roof.

There were doors all round the hall, but they were all locked; and when Alice had been all the way down one side and up the other, trying every door, she walked sadly down the middle, wondering how she was ever to get out again.

Suddenly she came upon a little three-legged table, all made of solid glass; there was nothing on it but a tiny golden key, and Alice’s first idea was that this might belong to one of the doors of the hall; but alas! either the locks were too large, or the key was too small, but at any rate it would not open any of them. However, on the second time round, she came upon a low curtain she had not noticed before, and behind it was a little door about fifteen inches high: she tried the little golden key in the lock, and to her great delight it fitted!

Alice opened the door and found that it led into a small passage, not much larger than a rat-hole: she knelt down and looked along the passage into the loveliest garden you ever saw. How she longed to get out of that dark hall, and wander about among those beds of bright flowers and those cool fountains, but she could not even get her head through the doorway; "and even if my head would go through, thought poor Alice, it would be of very little use without my shoulders. Oh, how I wish I could shut up like a telescope! I think I could, if I only knew how to begin." For, you see, so many out-of-the-way things had happened lately, that Alice had begun to think that very few things indeed were really impossible.

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.

It was all very well to say Drink me, but the wise little Alice was not going to do that in a hurry. No, I’ll look first, she said, "and see whether it’s marked ‘poison’ or not"; for she had read several nice little stories about children who had got burnt, and eaten up by wild beasts, and other unpleasant things, all because they would not remember the simple rules their friends had taught them: such as, that a red-hot poker will burn you if you hold it too long; and that, if you cut your finger very deeply with a knife, it usually bleeds; and she had never forgotten that, if you drink much from a bottle marked poison, it is almost certain to disagree with you, sooner or later.

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.²

What a curious feeling! said Alice. I must be shutting up like a telescope.

And so it was indeed: she was now only ten inches high, and her face brightened up at the thought that she was now the right size for going through the little door into that lovely garden. First, however, she waited for a few minutes to see if she was going to shrink any further: she felt a little nervous about this; for it might end, you know, said Alice to herself, in my going out altogether, like a candle. I wonder what I should be like then? And she tried to fancy what the flame of a candle looks like after the candle is blown out, for she could not remember ever having seen such a thing.

After a while, finding that nothing more happened, she decided on going into the garden at once; but, alas for poor Alice! when she got to the door, she found she had forgotten the little golden key, and when she went back to the table for it, she found she could not possibly reach it: she could see it quite plainly through the glass, and she tried her best to climb up one of the legs of the table, but it was too slippery; and when she had tired herself out with trying, the poor little thing sat down and cried.

Come, there’s no use in crying like that! said Alice to herself, rather sharply, I advise you to leave off this minute! She generally gave herself very good advice (though she very seldom followed it), and sometimes she scolded herself so severely as to bring tears into her eyes; and once she remembered trying to box her own ears for having cheated herself in a game of croquet she was playing against herself, for this curious child was very fond of pretending to be two people. But it’s no use now, thought poor Alice, "to pretend to be two people! Why, there’s hardly enough of me left to make one respectable person!"

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. Well, I’ll eat it, said Alice, and if it makes me grow larger, I can reach the key; and if it makes me grow smaller, I can creep under the door; so either way I’ll get into the garden, and I don’t care which happens!

She ate a little bit, and said anxiously to herself Which way? Which way? holding her hand on the top of her head to feel which way it was growing, and she was quite surprised to find that she remained the same size: to be sure, this is what generally happens when one eats cake, but Alice had got so much into the way of expecting nothing but out-of-the-way things to happen, that it seemed quite dull and stupid for life to go on in the common way.

So she set to work, and very soon finished off the cake.

II

THE POOL OF TEARS

"CURIOUSER AND CURIOUSER! cried Alice (she was so much surprised, that for the moment she quite forgot how to speak good English). Now I’m opening out like the largest telescope that ever was! Good-bye, feet! (for when she looked down at her feet, they seemed to be almost out of sight, they were getting so far off). Oh, my poor little feet, I wonder who will put on your shoes and stockings for you now, dears? I’m sure I shan’t be able! I shall be a great deal too far off to trouble myself about you: you must manage the best way you can—but I must be kind to them, thought Alice, or perhaps they won’t walk the way I want to go! Let me see. I’ll give them a new pair of boots for Christmas."

And she went on planning to herself how she would manage it. They must go by the carrier, she thought; "and how funny it’ll seem, sending presents to one’s own feet! And how odd the directions will look!

Alice’s Right Foot, Esq.,

Hearthrug,

near the Fender.¹

(with Alice’s love).

Oh dear, what nonsense I’m talking!"

Just at this moment her head struck against the roof of the hall: in fact she was now rather more than nine feet high, and she at once took up the little golden key and hurried off to the garden door.

Poor Alice! It was as much as she could do, lying down on one side, to look through into the garden with one eye; but to get through was more hopeless than ever: she sat down and began to cry again.

You ought to be ashamed of yourself, said Alice, a great girl like you, (she might well say this), to go on crying in this way! Stop this moment, I tell you! But she went on all the same, shedding gallons of tears, until there was a large pool all round her, about four inches deep and reaching half down the hall.

After a time she heard a little pattering of feet in the distance, and she hastily dried her eyes to see what was coming. It was the White Rabbit returning, splendidly dressed, with a pair of white kid-gloves in one hand and a large fan in the other: he came trotting along in a great hurry, muttering to himself as he came, "Oh! the Duchess, the Duchess! Oh! Won’t she be savage if I’ve kept her waiting? Alice felt so desperate that she was ready to ask help of any one: so, when the Rabbit came near her, she began, in a low, timid voice, If you please, Sir——" The Rabbit started violently, dropped the white kid-gloves and the fan, and skurried away into the darkness as hard as he could go.

Alice took up the fan and gloves, and, as the hall was very hot, she kept fanning herself all the time she went on talking. "Dear, dear! How queer everything is to-day! And yesterday things went on just as usual. 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!" And she began thinking over all the children she knew, that were of the same age as herself, to see if she could have been changed for any of them.

I’m sure I’m not Ada, she said, "for her hair goes in such long ringlets, and mine doesn’t go in ringlets at all; and I’m sure I can’t be Mabel, for I know all sorts of things, and she, oh, she knows such a very little! Besides, she’s she, and I’m I, and—oh dear, how puzzling it all is! I’ll try if I know all the things I used to know. Let me see: four times five is twelve, and four times six is thirteen, and four times seven is—oh dear! I shall never get to twenty at that rate! However, the Multiplication-Table doesn’t signify: let’s try Geography. London is the capital of Paris, and Paris is the capital of Rome, and Rome—no, that’s all wrong, I’m certain! I must have been changed for Mabel! I’ll try and say ‘How doth the little—’ " and she crossed her hands on her lap, as if she were saying lessons, and began to repeat it, but her voice sounded hoarse and strange, and the words did not come the same as they used to do:—

"How doth the little crocodile²

Improve his shining tail,

And pour the waters of the Nile

On every golden scale!

"How cheerfully he seems to grin,

How neatly spreads his claws,

And welcomes little fishes in,

With gently smiling jaws!"

I’m sure those are not the right words, said poor Alice, and her eyes filled with tears again as she went on, I must be Mabel after all, and I shall have to go and live in that poky little house, and have next to no toys to play with, and oh, ever so many lessons to learn! No, I’ve made up my mind about it: if I’m Mabel, I’ll stay down here! It’ll be no use their putting their heads down and saying, ‘Come up again, dear!’ I shall only look up and say ‘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 till I’m somebody else’—but, oh dear! cried Alice, with a sudden burst of tears, "I do wish they would put their heads down! I am so very tired of being all alone here!"

As she said this she looked down at her hands, and was surprised to see that she had put on one of the Rabbit’s little white kid-gloves while she was talking. "How can I have done that? she thought. I must be growing small again." She got up and went to the table to measure herself by it, and found that, as nearly as she could guess, she was now about two feet high, and was going on shrinking rapidly: she soon found out that the cause of this was the fan she was holding, and she dropped it hastily, just in time to save herself from shrinking away altogether.

"That was a narrow escape! said Alice, a good deal frightened at the sudden change, but very glad to find herself still in existence. And now for the garden! And she ran with all speed back to the little door; but alas! the little door was shut again, and the little golden key was lying on the glass table as before, and things are worse than ever, thought the poor child, for I never was so small as this before, never! And I declare it’s too bad, that it is!"

As she said these words her foot slipped, and in another moment, splash! she was up to her chin in salt-water. Her first idea was that she had somehow fallen into the sea, and in that case I can go back by railway, she said to herself. (Alice had been to the seaside once in her life, and had come to the general conclusion that, wherever you go to on the English coast, you find a number of bathing-machines³ in the sea, some children digging in the sand with wooden spades, then a row of lodging-houses, and behind them a railway-station.) However, she soon made out that she was in the pool of tears which she had wept when she was nine feet high.

I wish I hadn’t cried so much! said Alice, as she swam about, trying to find her way out. "I shall be punished for it now, I suppose, by being drowned in my own tears! That will be a queer thing, to be sure! However, everything is queer to-day."

Just then

Reviews for Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the L

[kemilyh1988 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Who doesn't love Alice in Wonderland?

[phoenixterran · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There are two well-loved, oft-adapted, and extremely influential novels written by Lewis Carroll, the pseudonym of English author Charles Lutwidge, in 1865 and 1871 respectively. I was initially a little surprised when Seven Seas announced that it would be publishing a newly illustrated omnibus edition of the novels in 2014, especially as the company had moved away from publishing prose works in recent years in order to focus on manga and other comics. However, the novels do nicely complement Seven Seas' releases of the various Alice in the Country of manga. What makes Seven Seas' edition of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass stand out from others are the incredibly cute and charming manga-influenced illustrations by Kriss Sison, an International Manga Award-winning artist from the Philippines. In addition to a gallery of color artwork, hundreds of black-and-white illustrations can be found throughout the volume.Alice was enjoying a leisurely afternoon on a riverbank with her older sister when a very curious thing happened—a rabbit with a pocket watch hurries by talking to itself. When Alice follows after it she tumbles down a rabbit hole to find herself in a very strange place indeed. What else is there to do for an inquisitive and adventurous young girl but to go exploring? And so she does. As Alice wanders about she discovers food and drink that cause her to grow and shrink, animals of all sizes and shapes that can talk, and people who have very peculiar ways of thinking about and approaching life. Eventually she returns home to her sister, but several months later she finds herself once again slipping into a fantastical world when she crawls through the mirror above a fireplace mantel. Of course, Alice immediately sets off exploring, encountering even more strange and wondrous things and meeting all sorts of new and perplexing people.Despite already being familiar with the story of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass (mostly through the seemingly infinite number of adaptations and otherwise Alice-inspired works) and despite having been encouraged for years by devotees of Carroll's writings, I had never actually read the original novels for myself until I picked up Seven Seas' edition. I'm really somewhat astonished that it took me so long to do so and it truly is a shame that I didn't get around to it sooner. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass is absolutely marvelous and an utter joy to read. It's easy to see why the novels have been treasured and continue to be treasured by so many people for well over a century. The books are incredibly imaginative and delightfully clever. Carroll liberally employs puns and other wordplay, turning nonsense into logic and vice versa. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass has been translated into something like seventy different languages; though certainly worthwhile, I can't imagine these interpretations were easy to accomplish due to the novels' linguistic complexities.What particularly impresses me about Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass are the novels' broad appeal. Both children and adults can easily enjoy the works. Younger readers will likely be amused and drawn to their silliness while more mature readers will be able to more fully appreciate the cleverness of Carroll's prose, poetry, and song. I would wholeheartedly encourage just about anyone to read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass. Even without counting the multitude of adapted works, there are a huge number of editions of the original two novels available. There is bound to be a version that will appeal, whether it be Martin Gardner's extensively annotated editions, which reveal references that modern readers are apt to miss, or one of the many illustrated releases. While I may one day move on to The Annotated Alice, I was very pleased with Seven Seas' Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass. Carroll's novels and Sison's illustrations are a delightful combination. I am very glad to have finally read the novels and anticipate reading them again with much enjoyment.Experiments in Manga

[takeitorleaveit_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

so, he liked little girls. a bit quirky but if he didn't, he wouldn't have had no motivation to write this ultimate classic that activates any odd-thinkers thinking capacities and should be made into a musical not another movie for the songs in it are brilliant.

[catherine_gv · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This is my favorite book EVER! Love the stories, love the nonsense, the Cheshire Cat and the Mad Hatter..the tea party scene...the rhymes and the little children songs turned to Lewis Carroll's thinking way. AWE-SOME!! It's my fave ever!

Really! Own them all!!!

[leslitgs · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Avoiding the humdrum happenstance of her quotidian existence, Alice wanders off and finds herself in new worlds of remarkable impossibilities. She goes on many disjointed adventures and meets the most unlikely of creatures and characters. A cheap summation, to be sure, but it's Alice's freaking Adventures in Wonderland. How are you supposed to accurately summarize that chaos? Sheesh. I have honestly never known what to do with these books. Aside from read them, of course. But even in reading them, one not only is transported away from one's base reality [as should occur while reading in the first place], but also from almost all things sensical. Even our protagonist is completely off the beaten path. Alice is seven years old, but she is an overly bright child with a peculiar penchant for daydreams and etiquette. But perhaps both of those relate to the period-based upbringing [which I know little about]. Moving on. While wandering the plotless paths of these texts, I was struck by Caroll's power as an author. Plotless is regularly regarded as a pejorative term; here he has not only managed to carry it off with some style but also to entrance generations with his madness. We practically relish the fairytale chaos. How is it that something so odd and so frequently against our understanding and order be beloved? The easiest answer, I imagine, is escape. Alice's story is to us what Wonderland is to her. Escape. Freedom. She and I are, perchance, not so different then. Tired of being bound within the constrictions of a purportedly ordered life, we take leave of our senses. Now, I am ill-equipped for any quality kind of examination or technical analysis of the text, and have no real interest in picking Alice's story apart for signs of Caroll's depravity. Alice is to me a rest from order, and will forever be so.

[lord_boris-1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Maybe two stars is harsh given that this book must have been ground breaking in its day and for the fact that there is a lot of clever wordplay within it. However, the longer the book went on the more I began to really dislike it. It was one set piece with different characters after another and it got pretty tedious. Ok, it's a children's book but even as a child I was never drawn to this book or the Disney film. This version also contained Through the Looking Glass but although I generally strive to complete books I just couldn't face it when I saw Tweedledee and Tweedledum were to feature in it. Even John Tenniel's illustrations appeared slightly sinister. I was also disappointed to discover that the Dormouse never actually said 'feed your head'.

[stef7sa-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Delicious nonsense. I liked the second part more than the first, with such characters as Tweedledum and Tweedledee and Humpty Dumpty.

[brakketh-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Fantastically surreal and enjoyable.

[wilwarin_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

So brilliantly whimsical - or whimsically brilliant!

[oscarwilde87_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is one of the most well-known books ever written. Even people who have never read the novel have heard of characters such as Humpty Dumpty and Tweedledum and Tweedledee. When Alice falls into a rabbit hole her adventures begin and one is stranger than the other. In Through The Looking-Glass Alice walks through a mirror and finds herself in a live-action chess game. These fantasy stories are not just popular with children, they are also quite well-liked by adults. And there is a reason. The novel and its sequel Through The Looking-Glass play with language in a very intelligent way.'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less.' 'The question is', said Alice, 'whether you can make words mean different things.' (p. 223)This quotation describes quite nicely what I enjoyed most about the novel. Sometimes, words have to be taken quite literally, and then there is always a second layer added to them. This interplay of literal and figurative meaning makes Alice's story work on more than just one level. However, I did not care for the fantasy part as much. While Alice's adventures are sure strange and sometimes funny I rather enjoyed the book for the how than for the what. The way the story is told was much more important for me than the story that is actually told. In the end of the second story, Alice asks herself whether it had all just been her dream or the dream of the Red King, one of the other characters in the novels. In the last line then, the reader seems to be included in the discussion: 'Which do you think it was?' (p. 278). I guess you have to see for yourself. I can recommend this book especially to adult readers interested in linguistics and logic as well as to kids, of course. is very enjoyable, rather short and easily read. On the whole, 3.5 stars.

[laurochka-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Having first read Alice as a child - whilst sick with tonsilitis - I never really fully appreciated it.
There is perhaps some irony in the fact that I enjoyed Alice more as an adult than a child.
Carroll's use of language puns and nonsense is extremely clever and entertaining and definitely my favourite aspect of the book. Exposing the inadequacies and ambiguities of the English language as a means of highlighting the illogical and confusing nature of Wonderland and the land Through the Looking Glass works perfectly. I loves these stories!

[tullius22 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

It's not that I'm not willing to take children's literature seriously-- although it is true that I do not consider "Grimm's Fairy Tales" to be children's literature, but merely the finest book ever written (since Angela's Ashes is actually written *too* well)-- but I'm not sure that this meandering little adventure deserves to be compared to 'Stuart Little'-- or 'Charlotte's Web', if you like-- although I suppose that, in the field of children's literature, age must be equivalent to innocence. Tolstoy, for example, would have made a fine author of children's literature.... or Charlotte Lucas! (Actually Charlotte Lucas might have done a fine job.) But I suppose that I ought to be fair and admit that this 'Alice' of Lewis here is somewhat of an improvement over *that other Lewis*....Although, fine, full disclosure-- it's a little bit difficult for me to take Mr Lewis seriously after knowing that he wanted to use Euclid's original Greek manuscript as a learner's textbook-- and not just that, but as *the only one*!-- which is a stupid idea, and *not just* a stupid idea. It's as pedantic as possible, and it's the sort of thing that makes me wonder how open he really was to 'persuasion'~~ which in turn makes belief in his 'friendly uncle with small girl-child friend' story seem like a rather credulous sort of thing.... He starts to sound more like "Uncle Jack" from "Meet the Fockers" to me. Those little kids, like frightened little hens, can be so.... credulous. Although I know that all that might come off as being unduly in favor of the little goat-children, hahaha, but....Well, I will say that it is mildly less mildly disturbing than your average Tim Burton movie-- ha! ....But. But even though I thought that it was surely better than Tim Burton or C.S. Lewis, but, then, I saw that it was so boring, that it was.... pretty much the same. I mean, Latin grammar and French history? Really? I mean, is this a book for girls, or bearded old men gone cracked and gone off to climbing trees like boys? I mean, I was waiting for him to start going, 'Fifteen birds in five fir trees....'.... but at least *that* was not put out as being for *girls*! Oh! And chess! Yes, sir!Chess and Mr Collins for Alice! .... God, it almost makes me wish that Dvorak-- I mean, if Euclid's buddy can, then why not.... oh no, wait. 'Stabat Mater'. Never mind. Anyway, it's certainly not happy like Mozart or the Hugh Grant film about the pirates. (7/10)

[seriousgrace · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Everyone knows the story of Alice in Wonderland. If they don't remember the duchess with the baby piglet or the gryphon they surely remember the queen who was constantly crying, "off with his head" or the white rabbit with the pocket watch and white gloves who was always late. And who can forget the caterpillar smoking the hookah on the giant mushroom or the episodes of Drink Me, Eat Me? There is no doubt that Lewis Carroll had a strange imagination. In rereading Alice's Adventures in Wonderland I was taken back to a fantastical world where flamingos and hedgehogs were used as croquet pieces, Alice's tears could create a flood, fish wore wigs and Alice grew and shrank so many times I lost count. My favorite scene was the trial and the king who wanted a sentence before the verdict. It's satirical and funny. Perfect for kids and adults.

[psychedelicmicrobus · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A favorite book of mine. I love the silly and the surreal, and this satisfies. It will be a permanent fixture on my shelf for life, and read to my own children someday.

[rickyhaas · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass are filled with unusual and unforgettable characters. I have to admit I was hesitant about reading this because as a child I despised the Disney Film, but I decided to give it a go anyways. I'm certainly glad I did. The books is filled with all sorts of weird situations and it's amusing to watch Alice try to figure how the entire world looks. Also I love that the author often clues you in on Alice's thoughts which are cute and provide a lot of comedy. While I loved this book, I know not everyone will and I suggest when reading it just to have fun and not try to think to hard about what's actually going on. I would recommend this book to both children and adults. Also I loved this edition. It was filled with awesome illustrations and I love all the phrases and character's names written on the front of the book.

[wethewatched · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Alice in Wonderland is a story that I knew but never read. I finally picked up the illustrated version (via Kindle), and it surpassed my expectations -- it's refreshingly absurd and a great escape from the working life.

I wasn't as hooked on Through the Looking-Glass, perhaps due to the abundance of nonsensical poetry. But it's well worth reading too if you can get the two books in a set.

[bryndahlquis · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This is easily one of my favorite books of all time. Alice is so adorable, because she's so little and clueless and imaginative and curious. All the characters are amazing, and I feel like each time I read it, I get a new pun or joke.I know I will read this book over and over again for the rest of my life, and it's definitely one everyone should read at least once.

[jechtshot · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Our dear friend Alice sets out once again on an adventure through Wonderland. However, rather than following a rabbit down a hole this time she travels through a mirror (looking glass) to a chess-like version of this magical realm. We follow Alice across the "squares" as she advances from the land of pawns to that of the queens. I prefer the story of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland slightly to this, but still a very enjoyable and fun read.

[audreyjane_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll is a my absolute favourite book ever. It delights me and reminds me of all the fun I had when I was young. It’s innocent and dark all at the same time. It makes me laugh and think and begin to speak in a very formal way after yet another re-read of this classic. Alice is a typical girl, she can be stubborn and isn’t afraid to pout or throw a tantrum, but she also seems genuinely concerned about these new friends she meets and also the absurdity of this alternate universe she’s plummeted into. I adore the mad hatter and the white rabbit, in fact I love all the characters in this book, even the tyrannical Queen of Hearts. I love that they are all insane. I find that after reading Alice in Wonderland I take more notice of my surroundings, finding things that I would usually dismiss or barely notice to be completely riveting or entertaining. Perhaps every time I read this book, I lose another piece of my sanity. If that’s the case, I’m thinking that crazy people might just be the happiest people alive.

[klefort_2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I absolutely love Lewis Carroll and I would gladly read anything with his pseudonym on it, regardless of length. Alice's Adventures In Wonderland and Through The Looking Glass are both full of creativity and imagination. Even though you can find them in the children's section, I wouldn't recommend it for younger readers because it's not an easy read. It's more suitable, perhaps, for middle-school aged children. At the end of the book, we find out that Alice had been dreaming throughout the entire story. I find it curious that, at times, Alice can not understand the characters that her very own sub-conscience mind has made up. The characters that she meets in Wonderland often speak in riddles that have no answers, as Alice once pointed out. Certainly if Alice made up these characters, she of all people should be able to understand them. Just an interesting thought.

[alanwpowers · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I taught this book in college Freshman Composition 2 off and on over a decade, as the last in a five-book course--sometimes replaced with local memoir, Slocum's Sailing Alone Around the World, or with Saul Bellow's Seize the Day, or occasionally Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer with its myriad insights into education and language. None gave any better insight into language than the brilliant mathematician's Alice. I love the account of Queen Victoria's appreciation, her order to "order whatever this author produces." His next book was a mathematical treatise that befuddled the Queen, where did we get this?

[charlottejones952 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Although I enjoyed this book, I didn't find it as captivating as the first. The plot was a little more well-rounded but at points, some of the conversations and poems went on a bit too much.
I found reading Through the Looking Glass was more enjoyable visually than my experience of the first, but this was due to the wonderful illustrations that really help you to visualise the obsurd scenes.

[lhlogan1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Crazy read. You'll feel all out of sorts, but want to keep reading.

[snukes-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Possibly my favorite book of all time. Before I understood the mind-altering influences that led him to write this, I was captivated by the world of wonder and fantasy he created. It was everything I wished my own adventures could be.

[marcoguarda-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Charles Dodgson taught maths at Christchurch college, Oxford.

Beside knowing well the matter he was teaching, he was aware it's a teacher's duty to present his lessons in an exciting way to keep his pupils interested. Dodgson was eternally on the lookout for wits, mots and wordplay that dealt with maths, logic and the games which have to do with numbers—as cards and chess. The study of general and symbolic logic (syllogism,) united with a love for pure storytelling, are at the basis of many of his works.

Alice in Wonderland and Through The Looking Glass deal with a game of cards and a game of chess, respectively. Especially in the first book, Dodgson uses traditional figures of storytelling, as the shape shifter (who better than the Caterpillar embodies the skills of the shape shifter—he turns from an egg, to a cocoon, to a caterpillar, to a butterfly;) and the trickster (as the Cheshire Cat is, with his puzzling grin and his maddening skill of disappearing, deceiving the eye.)

Nonetheless, both books deal with logic and the elements which are the building blocks of mathematics. Alice confronts perspective; she's either too tall, or too small—establishing perspective when studying a system is often critical in maths. The Hatter is stuck in a time paradox, because his watch stopped at six o'clock—tea time. There are also many hilarious jokes, as in the Mock Turtle chapter, where they have shorter lessons because they less-on. The White Queen in the second book runs so fast because she actually darts from one corner to the other of the chessboard in one move, and promoting a pawn (Alice) to a Queen is a chess move.

Dodgson weaves in his telling the fondness for his little, beloved friends whom he told these tales first; it's no wonder the strong human dimension they contain has survived mere time.

[auntieknickers · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I've read this at least twice, once as a child and once in a children's literature class. I think as a child I found it a bit too scary and maybe that's why I don't recall reading it aloud to my own children. But, it's certainly an important part of our culture.

[rrainer-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Along with Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, I reread this one nearly ever year. I enjoy it a lot, but it will never be quite as beloved as Alice.

[quaintlittlehead · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

SLOW DOWN. This book is full of stories you think you know from the cobbling together of many movie versions and society's collective memories, and it jumps from one bit of nonsense to another, so it's easy, particularly as an adult, to dash through it like a white rabbit. But, though these works were ostensibly written to a young girl and are often treated as children's books (even by Carroll himself in the preface to a second edition of "Through the Looking-Glass," which is included in this volume), they are chock-full of ingenious language that you really need to stop and think about to truly appreciate. Lovely thing that, how the English don't write down to children. I've heard that "Alice" is some sort of allegory for the new mathematical ideas of the time. I don't know whether that's true. But from a linguistic standpoint alone, this book is a treasure trove. The poetry and punnery are second to none, and constructed not just with an eye on artistry, but with a real intent to comment on how language (and by extension society) works.The Barnes and Noble edition of this book is a great buy, featuring the original Tenniel illustrations and a very informative introduction. Unlike other volumes in the series, this one is not overly annotated, nor do the footnotes and endnotes presuppose that the reader must be seven years old. As always with these editions, the end of the book offers up works inspired by what you have just read, along with a variety of critical comments. As a 2004 edition, the former of these things is not up-to-date enough to acknowledge the recent Tim Burton adaptation, and is certainly not an exhaustive list anyway (after all, how could they forget the Star Trek episode "Shore Leave?"), but, as W. H. Auden suggests in the critical comments, Carroll is probably near the top of the list of the culture's "most frequently cited without attribution" authors, so where would one begin?

[silva_44 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

While the book is vastly better than any of the movie versions I've seen, it still fell short of the mark. Perhaps I would have enjoyed it more as a juvenile reader.

[est2lm · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I think most people are familiar with Alice to some degree; as children (and maybe more often as adults) we go through periods of complete and utter boredom. We sit with a vacant expression that provokes the dreaded question -

"Don't you have something to do?"

Or, during a lesson about how 12 times 1 is 12, 12 times 2 is 24, 12 times 3 is 36...

It is so easy to slip into a daydream when one is faced with boredom. For Alice, this daydream is a white rabbit with a pocket-watch, muttering some complete nonsense about how it is late! The next thing Alice knows, she is taken into a series of absurd adventures in a land where she is the most logical person there.

In a way, the Alice books are a parody of those children's stories that are very clearly written to teach a moral lesson to its young readers; Alice already knows what is right and wrong, as demonstrated by the way she handles conflicts with unreasonable characters. She even understands on some level how, as people grow up, they sometimes forget (or neglect) their common sense.

Alice, being a child, struggles with communicating her feelings and often runs into fake words that try to articulate those emotions. It is a very accurate representation, I think, of how children react to their emotions. There is a great deal of crying when they fail to string words together in order to articulate their thoughts or feelings.

This is a book full of wonderful nonsense - riddles not meant to be solved, poetry that sounds gorgeous but doesn't necessarily make sense at first glance, puns on words and names and situations; and despite all the improbable things that happen, it is not impossible to find true meaning in Alice's dreams. I think anyone who had a childhood can find a bit if familiarity and even comfort within the pages of these fantastic tales.