This is still a superior work of imagination, and I particularly love the poems, but after giving it to my 6-year old to read, I did come to the conclusion that there is way too much of the "off with her head" stuff. She much preferred the Freddy the Pig books or the first Harry Potter. ( )

Mr. Carroll did a great job with both stories. I greatly enjoy every time I read them. ( )

I decided to read Alice in Wonderland as an attempt to see if Lewis Carroll was high on drugs while he wrote this book. Obviously, he wasn't; that does not, however, devalue the levels of his writing. Carroll's writing is strong, but Alice in Wonderland is just too devoid of substance to be considered literature. ( )

An engaging fantasy that is best read in full because the language is as important as the plot and the poetry. ( )

thoroughly enjoyable, consistently baffling. Carroll relies perhaps too much on the fanciful characters interpreting Alice's idioms literally, but there's lots of genuinely fun stuff here, and almost all the poems work well within the text. I think I liked "Through the Looking Glass" better because it was less random (i.e. themes are consistent thorough, chess and signifiers) and yet more bizarre. ( )

Alice lijkt, in zijn genre, een soort van bakermat te zijn - ik las het boek nooit eerder en toch kende ik reeds elke plotwending - alles(!) wat in deze twee boeken gewend, verteld, verhaald wordt zag ik reeds eerder gewend, verteld en verhaald worden in zovele andere (jeugd)boeken, (teken)films, televisieseries, theatervoorstellingen, dat ware Carroll J.K. Rowling en niet reeds langer dan 70 jaar dood hij wellicht met luciferstokjes een kingsizebed, badkamer, biljarttafel en keuken in de rechtszaal had kunnen maken.

Het duurde één hoofdstuk lang voor ik even schaterde. Maar dat was dan meteen ook de enige schater die ik me getroostte. Glimlachen, dat wel en met groeiende (en dan weer krimpende) belangstelling en ongeduld de aantekeningen opzoeken, die - uitgebreid als ze zijn en daarin getuigend van de enerzijds vertederende en anderzijds angstaanjagende bedrevenheid waarmee de 'carrollianen' zich sinds de publicatie van deze boeken aan het uitpluizen van de betekenis van elk woord, elk beeld hebben gewijd - het Alice-verhaal ook nog een literair(-historisch) perspectief boden.

Zonder die aantekeningen (van Gardner, van Matsier) mist het verhaal vandaag (ook al door de reeds platgetreden verhaallijnen, door onze 21ste-eeuwse gewenning aan nonsens, door het opvoeden van een tweejarige kleuter die net het woordje 'waarom?' (incl. vraagteken - vergeet vooral(!) het vraagteken niet!) heeft ontdekt, ...) eigenlijk alle redenen van bestaan. Als kinderverhaal is het te braaf of de humor te oubollig/subtiel, als verhaal voor volwassenen is het (behalve voor wiskundigen, logici, vertalers en literaire historici) te onbeduidend of welbekend.

Had ik dit 150 jaar geleden gelezen, dan zat ik waarschijnlijk nog steeds na te schudden van het lachen. Of smeet ik het verongelijkt van me af, wijl ik de butler sommeerde om de koets voor te rijden.

http://occamsrazorlibrary.blogspot.co... ( )

This summer I flew seven hours and twenty-seven minutes across the Atlantic Ocean to Oxford, England. I studied at Pembroke College in Oxford University and saw Alice’s door myself in Christ Church Cathedral. Alice was a popular topic in Oxford. All the tourist shops had Alice shirts, Alice totes, Alice pencils and so I deemed it fitting that I read Alice in Wonderland during my month stay away from home.

To my surprise, I like the Disney movie better than Carroll’s written work. The words just seemed like “mumble-jumble”, as my mother would say, and didn’t make any sense. At one point Alice asks herself, “Would a cat eat a bat? Would a cat eat a bat? Would a bat eat a cat?” while tumbling down the infamous rabbit hole, and throughout the book there were instances like this that seemed a little unnecessary. I found that as I was reading Carroll’s unnecessary flow of drug-induced consciousness, my own mind wandered to what I would do the next day, what meal they were serving in the cafeteria and how much was left on my international calling card. To say the least I was extremely disappointed.

I did enjoy some of the stories, particularly the poem about the walrus and the carpenter (which had always been a favorite of mine during my Disney movie watching days), but there were too many little stories jammed together. Too many characters were fighting for attention and page space in the novel and Alice just had too exciting of a dream, especially during Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Through the Looking Class was calmer when it came to plot and every event tied in to the other. I could definitely relate to Carroll’s analogy of the chess board quads. It was an interesting way at looking at the decorative grass squares on campus that were prominent in the Oxford culture (only the Fellows at Oxford could walk on the grass).

Turning the last page, I didn’t understand why Oxford was so enamored with Alice and her adventures, even if it was inspired by the spires of the college. Carroll does have an inventive imagination, but I think it would have been better if he had expanded on just a few ideas instead of jamming them all together into one story. He could have written an entire series instead of two books and maybe spacing out the incidents would have helped them flow, making it easier for the reader to enjoy. I can understand why the Disney experts decided to only take part of the story to make the children’s movie. If they had included everything, it would have been far, far too much. ( )

Strangely enough, despite growing up on L. Frank Baum's Oz novels, I'd never ever read this other early masterpiece of children's fantasy. I'm sorry I missed it as a child; there's a lot to enjoy here, as Lewis Carroll's imagination is prolific and various; I especially enjoyed the mad tea party. Actually, I enjoyed all the bits where Alice runs up against arbitrary social conventions she doesn't understand. Some critics have described the book as showing the madness of childhood, but if you ask me, it shows the madness of adulthood-- Alice has been given all of this education which she's been told will be of use, but absolutely none of it is, and whenever she tries to apply it, she gets laughed at. In the end, all she can do is retreat to the safety of tea parties and older sisters, escaping back into childhood, where everything is still sheltered and logical; in "wonderland", logic is just another form of madness (though one Carroll was an expert in, of course).

Carroll's books are often compared to The Wizard of Oz, and I can see why, as both feature rather determined young female protagonists in strange lands, but that's really where the similarity ends. Oz is portrayed as a real place, with a real geography, and real inhabitants that follow strange, but comprehensible principles. There's no comprehension in Wonderland, however; the logic there is purely one of a dream (as it should be), and it can never be deciphered by the dreamer. They're very different places, with very different approaches to fantasy. And of course, Alice and Dorothy themselves are quite different; Alice has a tendency to disbelieve and argue with everyone she meets, which doesn't get her very far, whereas Dorothy calmly listens to people and then decides to help them (her only malignant action the entire novel is undertaken by accident). Is it noteworthy that Alice, living in the middle classes near Oxford, was probably much more educated than Dorothy, a Kansan farm girl living in the middle of nowhere with her wards? I don't know, and though comparing them seems somewhat facile, I do have to admit that I like Dorothy much better.

I will never tire of this story, even in adulthood! This edition is a great little edition...small and compact to fit in a little purse, yet elegant enough to display in your bookcase. What a great story! ( )

CORRECTION...: The above synopsis remarks that this edition includes the previously missing 'Wasp in a Wig' episode - in fact it doesn't. That chapter (actually only part of chapter) appears in another edition... however this edition includes comprehensive notes second only to Martin Gardner's annotated edition as well as the full text of Carroll's first draft, 'Alice's Adventures Underground'. As such, this is probably the best value edition of these ingenious and priceless works.

Well, what can one say about one's favourite book, read over and over as a very young child, and still profoundly loved. At 5 years of age I called my cat 'Dinah' and nothing anything my family could say to me would convince me that Dinah was a boy. To prove it he lived 19 years as the biggest bully on the block.

It is hard to overestimate what this book meant to me. Together with "Harriet the Spy," it formed my ideas about what it meant to be a child, a girl, and a human being. It developed my love for the English language. Its delight in nonsense points to a reality beyond morality that is not immoral or amoral. At the same time it exposes more completely than any other book the absurdity of the adult world. Alice is the only sensible person alive: everyone else is going through the motions of adulthood, a senseless existence from a child's point of view. Children are helpless: a book like this gives them the resolve they need to survive. Incidentally, much as I love it, the 80s TV movie of Alice in Wonderland massively misses the point in making the whole saga about Alice's desire to be "quite grown up"--given the way the adults around her behave, she'd much more likely want to avoid growing up at all costs. But this is the opposite of Peter Pan's avoidance of growing up. Peter Pan actually acts like many adults. Alice is the only decent soul in all of Wonderland. ( )

With all the talk recently about Tim Burton's upcoming version of Alice in Wonderland for Disney, it got me in the mood to reread Lewis Carroll's original. I have read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland numerous times, but only until recently have I reread Through the Looking Glass, as I found a lovely collected edition at my local Barnes & Noble. This edition is particularly nice as it includes the original illustrations by Sir John Tenniel for both volumes.

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland opens with Alice sitting outside with her sister, doing her lessons. Alice is bored with her lessons, and when she notices a white rabbit run by wearing a waistcoat and looking at watch, which she finds a curious thing, she decides to follow him, where she falls down the rabbit hole and her adventures properly begin.

Wonderland proves to be a nonsensical home to many wondrous characters: the Caterpillar, the Mad Hatter, March Hare and Doormouse and their Tea-Party, the Duchess and her baby and Cook, the Cheshire Cat, the Mock Turtle and the Queen of Hearts and her pack-of-cards court. I won't go into too much detail of the story, as I'm sure most are familiar with the tale, and if you're not, my explaining it won't make much sense until you read it. The book reads very much like a dream, with one scenario leading into another without much in the way of logic.

Through the Looking Glass is the sequel to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, taking place some six months later, even though there is no real reference to the first volume. The only two characters to really carry over from Wonderland are the Mad Hatter and the March Hare (here known as Hatta and Haigha) and even then Alice doesn't seem to recognize them. While Wonderland's court theme was based on a pack of playing cards, the court system in Looking Glass is based on chess, with a Red Queen and White Queen both playing important roles in this volume. Again, the story reads much like a dream, with no real rhyme or reason to the procession of the story.

I love the illustrations by Sir John Tenniel. They are perfectly suited to story, capturing the look and feel of the characters and Wonderland.

In doing some reading about Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, I made some interesting discoveries. I always assumed that both stories were based on Lewis Carroll's stories that he told to Alice Liddell and her sisters, and while this is partly true, as the chess theme from Looking Glass did in fact come from discussions that Carroll had with the Liddell children while he was teaching them chess, the idea of the looking glass came from a discussion that Carroll had with another Alice, his cousin, Alice Raikes.

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland remains one of my favorite books, and I like to wander back into Wonderland every so often, just to remind myself how much I enjoy it. Every time I read it, the Cheshire Cat always sums up the story best for me:

'But I don't want to go among mad people,' Alice remarked.

'Oh, you can't help that,' said the Cat: 'we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.'

'How do you know I'm mad?' said Alice.

'You must be,' said the Cat, 'or you wouldn't have come here.'
This conversation always makes me smile. For me, it is the perfect description and explanation for the story, since in our dreams, aren't we all a little mad? ( )

This book will never grow old. "Through the Looking Glass" captures the imagination of youth perfectly. ( )

Alice sospirò sconfortata. "Penso che potreste utilizzare meglio il vostro tempo" disse "invece di sprecarlo proponendo indovinelli senza soluzione"
"Se tu conoscessi il Tempo bene quanto me" la rimproverò il Cappellaio "non parleresti di sprecarlo, come se fosse una cosa. Perchè non lo è"
"Non capisco" disse Alice.
"Certo che non capisci!" continuò il Cappellaio, scuotendo sdegnosamente la testa "Direi proprio che tu, con il Tempo, non ci hai mai parlato"
"Forse no" replicò cauta Alice "ma so che quando leggo la musica devo battere il tempo"
"Ah! Questo spiega tutto" disse il Cappellaio "il Tempo non sopporta di essere battuto" ( )

A sweet little tale of Alice as she dreams of the wonderful place of Wonderland. Similar to Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, Alice experiences many peculiar things along her journey that leave her questioning more and more and even excited. Great for adults and children. The book does not have quite the same scary bad Queen of Hearts as the movie portrays her, or even the creepy Cheshire Cat, but with a great imagination this book could be any child’s Wonderland. ( )

My first introduction to Alice in Wonderland was seeing the Disney movie when I was little. I remember enjoying it, but at the same time being annoyed by the confusing nature. I read the book a couple years later. At the time I loved the storyline but was thoroughly frustrated by the books' lack of cohesion. I reread Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass recently, and I found them entertaining in an entirely new fashion. If you try to force sensibility into any of the situations, you will miss out on the enjoyability of the random. Both books are the closest to reading a dream I have ever come upon, due to the randomness of the events. It is a fun read for adults and kids alike. ( )

I think that the failure not only of Children's Literature as a whole, but of our very concept of children and the child's mind is that we think it a crime to challenge and confront that mind. Children are first protected from their culture--kept remote and safe--and then they are thrust incongruously into a world that they have been told is unsafe and unsavory; and we expected them not to blanch.

It has been my policy that the best literature for children is not a trifling thing, not a simplification of the adult or a sillier take on the world. Good Children's literature is some of the most difficult literature to write because one must challenge, engage, please, and awe a mind without resorting to archetypes or life experience.

Once a body grows old enough, we are all saddened by the thought of a breakup. We have a set of knowledge and memories. The pain returns to the surface. Children are not born with these understandings, so to make them understand pain, fear, and loss is no trivial thing. The education of children is the transformation of an erratic and hedonistic little beast into a creature with a rational method by which to judge the world.

A child must be taught not to fear monsters but to fear instead electrical outlets, pink slips, poor people, and lack of social acceptance. The former is frightening in and of itself, the latter for complex, internal reasons.

I think the real reason that culture often fears sexuality and violence in children is because they are such natural urges. We fear to trigger them because we cannot control the little beasts. We cannot watch them every minute.

So, the process of Children's Literature is to write something complex and challenging, something that the child can test and turn over in their mind without inadvertently wondering about things like anal sex and drug addiction. Of course, we must remember that none of this stuff will ever be more strange or disturbing to a child than the pure, unadulterated world that we will always have failed to prepare them for.

However, perhaps we can fail a little less and give them Alice. Not all outlets are to be feared, despite what your parents taught you. In fact, some should be prodded with regularity, and if you dare, not a little joy. ( )

Great books read them to your kids or let them read it. You will not be disipointed. ( )

Alice falls into a dreamworld of rhymes, cryptic poetry, and an array of crazy characters. This beautiful story takes the idea of creativity to an extreme, and proves there are no limits to the imagination. This book is great for children and adults of all ages. ( )

This is a purely amazing work of not only children's literature, but adult fiction as well. Every time that I read the novel, I am pulled in by the absolute intelligence that was used to craft these works out of nothing. The inverted logic, the reflections in the mirror, the purity and innocence of Alice; it all makes for an intriguing, and fun, ride through Carroll's world. ( )

This is my favorite story of all-time. Nothing, in my opinion, beats Alice and the adventures she creates in her own mind. The whole experience of reading (and re-reading, and maybe re-reading again...) this book is magical to me. Lewis Carroll's humor and writing style alone is enough to make me want to read more. ( )

In the book, Alice searches for the white rabbit and encounters many interesting characters that help her through the crazed world she is put into. She meets infamous characters from classic novels and new characters she has never seen before. Alice also has many frightening things happen to her. She eats mushrooms and candies that change her size, she almost drowns in her own tears, and she is chased by playing cards that are out to behead her. It is a wonderful tale involving symbolism, intriguing characters, and wonder. ( )

Good grief, this book is WEIRD. Carroll had aura-inducing migraines and probably took LSD to cope with it, which makes for a book... exactly like this one. It is a great read, though, especially for anyone with a love of words. The puns themselves are worth your time, and Alice is a delightful character. It's also an important novel in literary canon, though usually given to too young an audience. Personally, I think a life is unfilled until at least the first stanza of the Jabberwocky is memorized and recited at random. (Fun game: combine drinking and this as a read-aloud!) I'd recommend reading both books combined. For a similar book suited for a younger audience, "The Phantom Tollbooth" is a wonderful novel. ( )

Classic children's tale, and I think still appealing at nearly every age. Alice encounters various absurd creatures and situations and must interact with them normally, in order to find her way. ( )