Reading Notes: Alice in Wonderland-Part A

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll (1865)

John Tenniel - Illustration from The Nursery Alice (1890)

Down the Rabbit-Hole: Alice saw a little white rabbit with a waistcoat and decided to follow him down a very long and dark hole. She thought to herself the entire way down. The sides of the hole were stocked with shelves of books and pictures along with even a marmalade jam. She wondered where she might end up at the end of her fall, perhaps Australia. 

Down the Rabbit-Hole (cont.): She thought of how much she missed her cat, and wished that it was there in the hole with her. After a while she grew sleepy and kept repeating things over and over again until she finally landed in a heap of leaves. She could still see the rabbit and decided to keep chasing him, only to find herself in a room with a table of three legs. Sitting on this glass table was a little key. It had to go to one of the doors in the hall, but when she saw a curtain and decided to look behind it, the key fit in that small little door that could only fit a rat. She peered in to see a wonderful garden. She decided to go back to the table, and this time she saw a little bottle that was labeled, "drink me."

Down the Rabbit-Hole (end): Upon drinking the funny liquid in the bottle, Alice began to shrink to a size even smaller than the tiny door. Unfortunately, she had left the key on the top of the table, which was now impossibly out of reach. She tried to give herself a nice little pep talk, which usually worked but this time it didn't. She then caught sight of a small little cake that said "eat me." Of course she did exactly this. She grew and grew until she wasn't even able to speak proper English.

Advice from a Caterpillar: Alice found her way to a caterpillar who stared at her for a very long time until finally asking who she was. Alice was quite confused by the recent series of events that had just happened to her, and in fact had no idea who she was anymore. After some argument, Alice stormed away from him until he shouted for her to come back. She did and he gave her some short advice which made her even more mad (in both ways).

Advice from a Caterpillar (cont.):  Just then Alice told the caterpillar a story that he declared what entirely wrong. he then asked what size she wished to be, to which she replied no particular size but just one that is consistent. After much debate and deliberation, the caterpillar took one final smoke from his hookah before telling her that one side of a mushroom would make her grow and the other side would make her shrink. Of course Alice had to experiment with the mushroom until she was extremely tall.

Advice from a Caterpillar (end): Soon, very tall Alice was run into by a pigeon who was sure that she was a serpent due to the length of her neck. The poor thing had not slept in many days while keeping a lookout for serpents (due to having eggs). After trying to convince the pigeon that she was in fact a girl and wasn't looking for eggs, the pigeon flew off. Alice was finally able to nibble at the mushroom again until she reached her proper height. She continued on until she came across a tiny little house, and so she was forced to eat more of the mushroom to shrink back down again.

Pig and Pepper: Soon she saw a couple of footman who had the faces of fish have an exchange at the door of the house. She head one say to the other that he was invited to play croquette with the Duchess. After this, Alice decided to go ahead and knock on the door, to which one of the footman told her that there was no use of doing. She wanted to know how to get in and after arguing with this creature as well, Alice grew more and more frustrated. So she decided to just march in the door only to find a cook with some overly peppered soup and a duchess nursing a baby. She also saw a cat who smiled much too large to be normal, and so she asked the duchess about the cat. The duchess told her that he was the cheshire cat and called her a pig!

Pig and Pepper (cont.): Alice then realized the duchess was referring to the baby as a pig when they continued conversation about the smiling cat. Suddenly the cook started to throw everything at the duchess and baby. This completely shocked Alice! They seemed to pay absolutely no mind to this, and the duchess even began to sing a rather violent lullaby to the baby as she threw him up in the air and then at Alice. She caught the little pig baby hybrid and tried to tell it how to be a proper baby, but it paid no mind to her.

Pig and Pepper (end): Soon Alice decided that the baby would make a much better pig than child and let it wander off in the forest. She then saw the cheshire cat again in a nearby tree. She and the cat spoke about going places (meaning the act of simply going somewhere other than where you are presently). He then pointed her in the direction of some people in the area who were mad, as he thought everyone there was, including Alice. He asked her to come play croquette with him and the queen before disappearing and reappearing again. He kept doing so until only his large grin remained. She decided to follow along a path until she came to the house of the march hare. She had to use the mushroom to grow a bit, and readied herself to go.