“Begin at the beginning," the King said, very gravely, "and go on till you come to the end: then stop.”
Why Alice In Wonderland?
For lots of reasons.
The original animated feature by Disney, is one of my favorite movies of all time. It captured my imagination as a child, and when I got older and started writing my own stories, I read and reread the book and became fascinated by the creativity and cleverness hidden behind a children's book. The tale is full of absurdity and whimsy, and wonderful gems of wisdom that challenge the way you look at the world.
Alice spends the entire book examining herself and trying to understand who she is, something we can all relate to. Her self inspection may be a result of finding herself changed several times over in a strange land, but we find ourselves changing over the course of our lives and in response to things that happen to us. And the parallels to real life that I see in this book doesn't stop there.
There's a child who tries to reason and understand Wonderland and its inhabitants in a grown-up way, much like we all try to grow up and leave childhood behind as quickly as possible.
There's a rabbit who is driven a little neurotic by time and trying to be punctual, which is reminiscent of everyone rushing to and fro trying to get from one appointment to the next. He doesn't have much time to stop and smell the roses, or to even time to "say 'hello', 'good-bye'!"
There's an army of cards, symbolic of conformity and eager to please their queen, even to the point of altering appearances and changing her white roses to red.
The language in the book is very descriptive and also wildly clever. There is a lot of play on words.
For lots of reasons.
The original animated feature by Disney, is one of my favorite movies of all time. It captured my imagination as a child, and when I got older and started writing my own stories, I read and reread the book and became fascinated by the creativity and cleverness hidden behind a children's book. The tale is full of absurdity and whimsy, and wonderful gems of wisdom that challenge the way you look at the world.
“Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?"
"That depends a good deal on where you want to get to."
"I don't much care where –"
"Then it doesn't matter which way you go.”
Alice spends the entire book examining herself and trying to understand who she is, something we can all relate to. Her self inspection may be a result of finding herself changed several times over in a strange land, but we find ourselves changing over the course of our lives and in response to things that happen to us. And the parallels to real life that I see in this book doesn't stop there.
There's a child who tries to reason and understand Wonderland and its inhabitants in a grown-up way, much like we all try to grow up and leave childhood behind as quickly as possible.
“I'm afraid I can't explain myself, sir. Because I am not myself, you see?”
There's a rabbit who is driven a little neurotic by time and trying to be punctual, which is reminiscent of everyone rushing to and fro trying to get from one appointment to the next. He doesn't have much time to stop and smell the roses, or to even time to "say 'hello', 'good-bye'!"
There's an army of cards, symbolic of conformity and eager to please their queen, even to the point of altering appearances and changing her white roses to red.
The language in the book is very descriptive and also wildly clever. There is a lot of play on words.
“No wise fish would go anywhere without a porpoise.”
Yet there is no waste of expression, every turn of phrase is a treasure of sage advice; memorable lines to apply to the reader's actual life.
I could go on about the characters and symbolism and psychology in the book, but that's not what this blog is for. This blog is just a place for me to express my love of all things Alice In Wonderland and to document all the things I actually own in my collection.
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