October 30, 2021 • 50 mins
'Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’ focuses on a Victorian girl’s curiosity about (and frustration with) the absurdities of adulthood and society, often exemplified with food. Anney and Lauren discuss Lewis Carroll’s novels, and are joined by Ben Bowlin, Miranda Hawkins, and Dylan Fagan for a dramatic reading of the chapter ‘A Mad Tea-Party’.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Hello, and welcome to Saber Productive I Heeart Radio. I'm
Annie Reese and I'm Lauren vocal Baum and today we
have an episode for you about Alice in Wonderland. Yes,
and this episode is a long time coming, Oh my goodness. Yeah.
So I think in the summer of we were like,
oh man, it's been a long time since we've done
(00:30):
a a reading on the show and talked about a
work of fiction in that way that has to do
with food. And we were like, oh, Alice in Wonderland,
we should totally do that. We should totally do the
Mad Tea Party reading and talk about the books. And
(00:52):
it's October one now. Yeah, And we started the outline.
We were just I've seen this before. We started the
outline when we had the like you know, impetus when summer.
So like some of this we wrote year over a
year ago at least yep, most of it, I would say.
(01:15):
So it was fun. It was a fun trip down
memory lane, going back and going did I write that?
Did you write that? Who wrote this? It could have
been anybody, Yep, exactly, But it's we love doing these
um as always. We got to work with some of
our fantastic colleagues. Yes, I had a really fun recording
(01:37):
session altogether over but it was so fun. Yeah. This
was the first time since uh Goblin Market that we've
had a chance to all. I mean, I'll be at
a digital room, but I'll sit together in a room
all at the same time and do a full cast recording.
Um so I. As of right now, super producer Andrew
(02:00):
has has not uh contacted us about any pickups. I
feel like I'm going to have some because I was
so delighted by all of y'all's performances that as the narrator,
like I had to pick up where you left off
and sometimes I would still be laughing. Yeah, it was.
(02:20):
It was great. I mean, um, I played Alice and
I just got really into the role. And I got
really annoyed with a certain Ben Bowling who's playing the
Mad Hatter, because he was always like teasing me, pushy,
like wouldn't you just let me be I it? That's great?
(02:46):
Oh yeah yeah, are um so so so right. So,
so we're gonna talk a little bit about about Lewis
Carroll and uh and how the book came about, and
then we're gonna do a reading of the Mad tea
party chapter and then we're going to come back and
discuss a little bit more about the impact of the book,
um and all of that fun stuff and uh, yes,
(03:07):
but but you do have to look forward to um
in our reading, right, Annie Reese as as Alice, ben
Bolin as the Mad Hatter, super producer, Dylan Fagin as
the march Hare and uh not not a saver super
producer but a friend of the show and uh, super
producer around I heart at large, Randa Hawkins as the Dormouse. Um,
(03:32):
and I'm narrating, and we all have we all just
had a real nice time doing it. We did. It
was a real to like, um, everybody brought their a game,
for sure, they did. Yes, so you have that to
look forward to. UM. I will say, for me, I
have read the books, but only like once. Maybe UM version,
(03:56):
the Disney version of Alice and Wonder really scared the
hell out of me, is it? And I rewatched it
for this and I thought it was really funny, laughing
out loud, that's really Oh. I'm so glad. I'm so
glad you rewatched it because I feel like this has
been like a little bit of a shadow over you
for a while like it found you sounded so frightening
as a child, I did it terrified me. That caterpillar
(04:18):
terrified me. The whole oyster thing, Oh my goodness, oh
off with her head the red color freaked me, like
I can still remember. But I did enjoy it rewatching
it and it did make me laugh. Um once, seeing
in particular made me really laugh. But I also when
we did the reading, I dug up this old T
(04:38):
shirt that I won that has the Mad Hatter on it.
I believe it was from Mellow Mushroom. Oh my goodness,
but I want it for for an acting role I
did in a vampire horror short called Insatiable, which I
think I've talked about before, but it's one of my
best trophies. Yes, and I love the sculpture in Central Park.
(05:01):
The sculpture. Yeah, I I I probably read the books.
I've probably read the books. Um, I would say upwards
of a dozen times, probably more like two dozen plus
times over the course of my life. I was really
into them as a kid. Um. They were pretty formative
(05:24):
for me in terms of like of like humor and surrealism,
um and uh in language. So yeah. Also yeah, so
I was I reread them again, like a year ago
when we first started talking about this, and the first
book talks so much about food, like all of the food,
all the time. UM. So I am so glad that
(05:47):
we're getting to do this one as a as a
food fairy tale. It's not exactly a fairy tale, but
it's pretty close. It's pretty close. It's within within within
the genre, I would say. So it's got a lot
of similar Yeah. Yeah, well, I guess that brings us
to our question. Sure, Alice in Wonderland, what is it? Well? Um,
(06:17):
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass and
What Alice Found There are two short children's novels about
a girl named Alice who has some real wacky adventures
um which may or may not be dreams um, involving
fantastic anthropomorphic animals and snarky plants and strange royals, game
(06:39):
of chest the size of a whole kingdom uh, and
food and drink that are not always what they seem.
They were written by pen name Lewis Carroll, which is
the most widely known pseudonym for Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, who
published Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Eat sixty five when
(07:01):
he was thirty three years old. Dodgson was born in
eighteen thirty two, the third of eleven children of his
mother Francis Jane Lutwidge, and his father Charles Dodgson, UM,
who was the archdeacon of a small parish of Darrisbury,
which is a village near Liverpool in northern England. And
Uh Dodgson started writing as a child. At the age
(07:24):
of thirteen he put out a family magazine. And family
magazines are this fascinating bit of Victorian middle class ephemera. Um.
They were generally these these handwritten and hand illustrated booklets
or periodicals created by well off kids and young adults
to entertain themselves and their siblings. And so even at
(07:44):
that age he was writing a lot and would produce
just a bunch of magazines like this over the next
few years, with stuff like poetry about the frustrating restrictions
and expectations of society. There were some biological essays about
fairies in their very very Lewis Carrolly kind of stuff. UM.
(08:05):
A teacher of his one Mr Tate, apparently once told
Dodgson's father that he was given to quote creativity in
replacing the inflections of nouns and verbs as detailed in
our grammars um, which apparently Mr Tate assured the father
that that Dodgson would outgrow m I. I don't think no,
(08:31):
I don't think that's what happened neither. He would go
to school at Christ Church, Oxford UM, and in eighteen
fifty one he had the opportunity to visit the first
World's Fair in London UM called the Great Exhibition. It
was this international celebration of industry and science and art
and design. Around the same time he became deeply interested
(08:53):
in photography. He had received a Master of Arts in
eighteen fifty seven and become a member of the clergy
in eighteen sixty one, a deacon UM, and made his
living lecturing UM, tutoring and writing UM, both in literature
and mathematics. He would write eleven books on mathematics over
the course of his career, starting in eighteen sixty He
never became a priest, which was unusual for that that
(09:16):
that place and time and career path UM. He apparently
petitioned the Dean to remain a deacon. Historians think that
he didn't agree with with some of the church doctrine
at the time, although he was himself deeply religious. Um,
he was just a bit more progressive, perhaps than than
the church was. Like. He really liked going to the
theater sandalusius um and uh, and he embraced some like
(09:43):
broader ideas of salvation than we're really being preached at
the time. As a human person, he said to have
been self effacing. Um. He had a stutter and was
deaf in one ear and had this persistent difficulty with
lung capacity from having had whooping cough as a teen.
But his story and seemed to think that he was
um like private more than particularly shy. Uh. He never married,
(10:05):
which was required of clergy at christ Church at the time,
and he did not like publishing under his own name,
even as a kid in family magazines. He used pseudonyms. Um.
The first publication under Lewis Carroll was in eighteen fifty six,
attached to a dramatic poem, and supposedly he got the
name by translating his name's um Lutwidge and Charles into
(10:30):
Latin and then back into English. Uh. Interesting, Yeah, Lutwidge
Charles Lewis Carroll. Yeah, m okay, well, I too wanted
to publish under a pen name, and it was well,
I had August Wind my fan fiction name, of course,
(10:52):
of course, but then I wanted to go with plumb Pickens.
And I don't know why what I thought I could
pull off with plum Pickens, but me neither. I mean,
I find it delightful, though I feel like it's a
very plump Pickens sounds like a children's auf there, which
(11:15):
you know, it's fine, but that wasn't what I was
intending to write. So uh huh, yeah, like that's a
very like like like like like Lemony Snicket, kind of
along those lines. Yeah. Well, I'm trying to remember my friend.
My friend had a similar pen name. We were all
like fruit based. Um. But yeah, mine with plump Pickens
(11:38):
not as official sounding as Lewis Carol. You know, it
depends on what kind of office you're running for. I
suppose that's true. Um, well, Lauren, what about the plot
of these books? Is there is there a plot? Um?
(12:05):
I guess, I guess um in in the first book,
Alice in Wonderland or Alice's Adventures in Wonderland more properly.
You're dealing with the main character, Alice, who is a
young girl who falls down a rabbit hole and finds
a bunch of weird stuff. There's this garden that she
(12:27):
wants to get into, and eventually she gets into it,
and then she doesn't get beheaded, and then it might
have all been a dream spoilers, Um, okay. And then
in the second book, uh, she's hanging out with her
(12:48):
cat and decides to climb through a mirror and then
she plays like a really big game of chess and
becomes a queen. And then it might have been a dream.
But was it her dream or was it the cat's
(13:09):
dream twists? I'm into that. Yeah, the cat in question,
Dinah just does not respond to this line of questioning,
so suspicious perhaps picking up what you're putting down. If
if this doesn't sound like it makes a lot of sense,
(13:32):
it doesn't, that's not really the point. Um, be go
out and read them or find a filmic translation of them,
or yeah, they're they're they're fun. Um, they are They're
meant to be fun, Which is kind of, or was
at the time, kind of a departure from a lot
(13:55):
of children's literature like most kids books at the time,
I'm we're instructive, not fun, right, and this was one
of the early breaks in that, right. So but um,
but we're going to get into all of that, um,
how the book itself came about, and how it was
received after we read a little bit of the book
(14:19):
for you. Yes, yes, yes, yes, But before we get
into that, which I'm telling you it's going to be great,
we're gonna get into a quick break for a word
from our sponsor, and we're back. Thank you, sponsored, Yes,
(14:40):
thank you, And we are back with our reading of
the Mad Tea Party, chapter from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.
There was a table set out under a tree in
front of the house, and the march Hare and the
Hatter we're having tea at it. A dormouse was sitting
(15:01):
between them, fast asleep, and the other two were using
it as a cushion, resting their elbows on it and
talking over its head. Very uncomfortable for the dormouse, thought Alice.
Only as it's asleep, I suppose it doesn't mind. The
table was a large one, but the three were all
crowded together at one corner of it. No room, No room,
(15:23):
they cried out when they saw Alice coming. There's plenty
of room, said Alice indignantly, and she sat down in
a large armchair at one end of the table. Have
some wine, the march hare said, in an encouraging tone.
Alice looked all around the table, but there was nothing
on it. But t I don't see any wine, she remarked.
(15:44):
There isn't any, said the march Hare. And it wasn't
very civil of you to offer it, said Alice angrily.
It wasn't very civil of you to sit down without
being invited, said the march Hare. I didn't know it
was your table, said Alice. It's slate for a great
many more than three. Your hair wants cotton, said the hatter.
(16:07):
He had been looking at Alice for some time with
great curiosity, and this was his first speech. You should
learn not to make personal remarks, Alice said, with some severity.
It's very rude. The hatter opened his eyes very wide
on hearing this, but all he said was why he's
a raving like a writing desk. Come we shall have
(16:29):
some fun now, thought Alice. I'm glad they've begun asking riddles.
I believe I can guess that, She added aloud. Do
you mean you think you can find out the answer
to it, said the march Hare. Exactly so, said Alice.
Then you should say what you mean. The march Hare
went on, I do, Alice hastily replied, at least at
(16:53):
least I mean what I say. That's the same thing,
you know, not the same thing a bit. You might
just as well say that I see what I eat
is the same thing as I eat what I see.
You might just as well say, added the march Hare,
that I like what I get is the same thing
as I get what I like. You might as well,
(17:15):
jess say, added the dormouse, who seemed to be talking
in his sleep. As I breathe when I sleep is
the same thing as I sleep when I breathe where
it is the same thing with you, said the hatter.
And here the conversation dropped, and the party sat silent
for a minute while Alice thought over all she could
remember about ravens and writing desks, which wasn't much. The
(17:40):
hatter was the first to break the silence. What day
of the month is it? He said, turning to Alice.
He had taken his watch out of his pocket and
was looking at it uneasily, shaking it every now and
then and holding it to his ear. Alice considered a
little and then said, the fourth to day's wrong, sighed
(18:02):
the hatter. I told you, but a footn't suit the works,
he added, looking angrily at the march Hare. It was
the best butter in The march Hare meekly replied, yes,
but some crumbs must have got in his well. The
hatter grumbled, you shouldn't have put it in. He's the
bread knife, and the march Hare took the watch and
(18:25):
looked at it gloomily. Then he dipped it into his
cup of tea and looked at it again. But he
could think of nothing better to say than his first remark.
It was the best butter, you know. Alice had been
looking over his shoulder with some curiosity. What a funny watch,
she remarked. It tells the day of the month and
doesn't tell what a clock it is. Of why I
(18:46):
showed it, and muttered, the hatter, does your watch tell
you what year it is? Of course not, Alice replied
very readily, But that's because it stays the same year
for such a long time together, which is just the
case with mine, said the hatter. Alice felt dreadfully puzzled.
The hatter's remarks seemed to have no sort of meaning
(19:08):
in it, and yet it was certainly English. I don't
quite understand you, she said, as politely as she could. Well,
the dormouse is asleep again, said the hatter, and he
poured a little hot tea upon its nose. The dormouse
shook its head impatiently and said, without opening its eyes.
(19:28):
Of course, of course, just what I was going to
remark myself. Have you guessed the riddle yet, the hatter said,
turning to Alice again, No, I give it up. Alice replied,
what's the answer? I haven't the slightest idea, said the hatter,
Nor I said the march hare. Alice sighed wearily. I
(19:52):
think you might do something better with the time, she said,
then wasting it in asking riddles that have no answers.
If you knew time as well as I do, said
the hatter, you wouldn't talk about wasting it. It's him.
I don't know what you mean, said Alice. No, of
(20:13):
course you don't, And the hatter said, tossing his head contemptuously,
I daresay you've never even spoke to time. Perhaps not,
Alice cautiously replied, but I know I have to beat
time when I learned music that accounts for it. He
won't stand beating. Now. If you were only kept on
(20:35):
good terms with him, he'd do almost anything you liked
with the clock. For instance, suppose it were nine o'clock
in the morning, just time to begin lessons. You'd only
have to whisper a hint to time, and round goes
the clock in its weekly half past one time. For detta,
I only wish it was the March Hare, said to
(20:57):
itself in a whisper. That would be grand, certainly, said
Alice thoughtfully. But then I shouldn't be hungry for it,
you know, not at first, perhaps, said the hatter. But
you could keep it to half past one as long
as you liked. Is that the way you manage? Alice asked.
(21:20):
The hatter shook his head mournfully. Not I, he replied.
We quarreled last March, just before he went mad, you know,
pointing with his teaspoon. At the March Hare. It was
at the great concert given by the Queen of Hearts,
and I had to sing Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Bat. How
(21:40):
I hondle where you are at? You know the song?
Perhaps I've heard something like it, said Alice. It goes on,
you know, in this way, harp above the world, you
fly like a tea tray hidden the sky. A twinkle twinkle.
(22:01):
Here the dormouse shook itself and began singing in its sleep,
tinkle twinkle, twinkle twinkle, and went on so long that
they had to pinch it to make it stop. Well,
I'd hardly finished the first verse when the queen jumped
up and bawled out hate, murdering the time off with
(22:22):
his head. How dreadfully savage, exclaimed Alice. And ever since that,
the hatter went on in a mournful tone. You won't
do a thing, I asked. He's always six o'clock. Now.
A bright idea came into Alice's head. Is that the
reason so many tea things are put out here? She asked? Yes,
(22:45):
that's it, said the hatter, with a sigh. It's always
tea time. And if we've no time to wash the
things between whiles, then you keep moving round, I suppose,
I said Alice. He exactly so, said the hatter. As
the things get used up. But what happens when you
(23:07):
come to the beginning again. Alice ventured to ask, so
suppose we changed the subject, and the march hare interrupted, yawning,
I'm getting tired of this. I vote the young lady
tells us a story. I'm afraid I don't know one,
said Alice, rather alarmed at the proposals. They both cried, wait,
(23:36):
and they pinched it on both sides. Once the dormouse
slowly opened his eyes. I wasn't asleep, he said, in
a hoarse, feeble voice. I heard every word you fellows
were saying. Tell us a story, said the march hare. Yes,
please do, pleaded Alice. And be quick about it, added
(23:59):
the hatter. You want to be asleep again before it's done.
Once upon a time there were three little sisters, and
the dormouse began in a great hurry. And their names
were Elsie, Lacy, and Tillie, and they lived at the
bottom of a well. What did they live on, said Alice,
who always took a great interest in questions of eating
(24:21):
and drinking. He lived on treacle, said the dormouse. After
thinking a minute or two. They couldn't have done that,
you know, Alice gently remarked, they'd have been ill, So
they were, said the dormouse, very ill. Alice tried to
fancy to herself what such an extraordinary ways of living
(24:42):
would be like, but it puzzled her too much, so
she went on, but why did they live at the
bottom of a well? Take some more tea? The march
hare said to Alice very earnestly, I've had nothing yet.
Alice replied in an offended tone. So I can't take more?
Or you mean you can't take less, said the hatter.
(25:05):
It's very easy to take more than nothing. Nobody asked
your opinion, And who's making your personal remarks now, the
hatter asked, triumphantly. Alice did not quite know what to
say to this, so she helped herself to some tea
and bread and butter, and then turned to the dormouse
and repeated her question, why did they live at the
(25:28):
bottom of a well? The dormouse again took a minute
or two to think about it, and then said it
was a treacle. Well, there's no such thing. Alice was
beginning very angrily, but the hatter and the march hare
went shoo, and the dormouse sulkily remarked, if you can't
(25:51):
be civil, you'd better finish the story for yourself. No,
please go on, Alice said, very humbly. I won't interrupt again.
I daresay there may be one one indeed, said the
dormouse indignantly. However, he consented to go on. And so
these three little sisters they were learning to draw. You
(26:11):
know what did they draw? Said Alice? Quite forgetting her promise? Treacle,
said the dormouse, without considering it at all this time,
I hunt a clean cup, interrupted the hatter. Let's all
move one place. On. He moved on as he spoke,
and the dormouse followed him. The march hare moved into
(26:33):
the dormouse's place, and Alice rather unwillingly took the place
of the march hare. The hatter was the only one
who got any advantage from the change, and Alice was
a good deal worse off than before, as the march
hare had just upset the milk drug onto his plate.
Alice did not wish to offend the dormouse again, so
she began very cautiously. But I don't understand where did
(26:56):
they draw the treacle from. You can all water out
of a what a well? Said the hatter. So I
should think you could draw a treacle out of a treacle. Well, huh, stupid,
But they were in the well, Alice said to the dormouse,
not choosing to notice this last remark. Of course they were,
(27:20):
said the dormouse. Well in this answer so confused poor
Alice that she let the dormouse go on for some
time without interrupting it. They were learning to draw. The
dormouse went on, yawning and rubbing its eyes, for it
was getting very sleepy, and they drew all manner of things,
everything that begins with an M. Why with an M,
(27:43):
said Alice? Why not, said the march hare. Alice was silent.
The dormouse had closed its eyes by this time and
was going off into a doze a but on being
pinched by the hatter, it woke up again with a
little shriek, and went on that begins with an EM,
such as mouse traps in the moon, and memory and muchness.
(28:06):
You know, you say things are much of a muchness?
Did you ever see such a thing as a drawing
of a muchness? Really? Now you ask me, said Alice,
very much confused. I don't think. Then you shouldn't talk,
he said the hatter. This piece of rudeness was more
than Alice could bare. She got up in great disgust
(28:28):
and walked off. The dormounts fell asleep instantly, and neither
of the others took the least notice of her going,
though she looked back once or twice, half hoping they
would call after her. The last time she saw them,
they were trying to put the dormouse into the tea
puffed at any rate, I'll never go there again, said
Alice as she picked her way through the wood. It's
the stupidest tea party I ever was at in all
(28:51):
my life. Just as she said this, she noticed that
one of the trees had a door leading right into it.
That's very curious, she thought, But everything was curious today.
I think I may as well go in at once,
and in she went. That brings us to the end
(29:15):
of our reading. Um, we hope that you enjoyed it
as much as we enjoyed doing it, which was a lot.
Even though I'm like again getting a little annoyed. I've
been bowland slash amount of her. I like this. I
like this beef. I know I'm well. I was in
my role and he was in his. We did our parts.
(29:37):
We did our parts. But this is what the price
of art is. I think it'll be fine. I think
it'll be fine. Um. But we did want to, yeah,
discuss the book and the impact that it had. But
first we are going to get into one more quick
break for a word from our sponsor m h and
(30:08):
we're back. Thank you sponsor, Yes, thank you. All right,
so let's let's talk about the history of how these
books came to be and their impact. Now that we've
heard kind of a sample sheriff of what they sounded like. Um,
so the Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glasses
based on Alice Hargreaves formally Alice Liddell. Her father was
(30:31):
a classical scholar and in eighteen fifty six he was
appointed dean at Oxford, so he and his family moved
into christ Church. There they met and befriended Dodgson slash
Newis Carroll. The children liked him because of the strange,
whimsical stories he told. One day in eighteen sixty two, Dodgson,
along with a friend of his, took three of the
(30:52):
Ladell girls. Um they were ten Lidell children out in
a rowboat for a picnic. And Dodgeon told the stories
along the way, and apparently one of these original stories
survived in the first book as the Caucus race Um
on the Ocean of Tears that that Alice cries Um.
The sisters appeared as as characters too, as birds. Dodgson
(31:18):
spun himself in as the Dodo and the sort of
protagonist was Alice Yes, and one of the girls, ten
year old Alice, and that one was so delighted by
the adventures of a girl named Alice down the rabbit
Hole she asked Dodgson to write them down, and Dodgeon
gave her a handwritten, hand illustrated copy of Alice's Adventures
(31:41):
Underground as a Christmas gift in eighteen sixty four. Now
the Littels and Dodgeon had for the most part parted
ways by eighteen sixty three. Historians aren't sure the exact cause,
and one of Dodgson's disintants cut out the page of
his diary that might have explained why so much of
this story. I'm like this sounds fictional, right um. Some
(32:06):
speculate that Mrs Liddell was uncomfortable with Dodgson's relationship with Alice.
Because this took place during the Victorian era, it's hard
to adequately know the motivations, thoughts, and beliefs of those involved.
It's just like different standards. Yeah. There there's been a
lot of speculation and and research into all of this,
(32:28):
and uh, you know, the facts that we know are
that Dodgson had a close friendship with Alice, and that
also he took artistic nude photographs of children who were
not his children. Um, and that certainly would not fly today. No, no, no, um.
(32:52):
But right, like like post the era of psychoanalysis, post
like Freudian thought, really difficult to go back and apply
modern standards to what was going on in the Victorian era. Um.
So yeah, yep, yep um. But anyway, Doshon went on
(33:14):
to beef up this story into Alice's Adventures in Wonderland,
in part thanks to the urging of an author friend
of his, George McDonald, and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland came
out in eighteen sixty five under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll,
with illustrations by John Tenniel. Tenniel, at the time was
a prolific cartoonist for the magazine punch and also did
(33:35):
a lot of book illustrations. UM. He was commissioned by
Dodgson to create forty two illustrations for the first Alice book,
starting in eighteen sixty four. He was about twelve years
older than Dodgson. UM And apparently they were both so
similarly particular and like fastidious that their working relationship was
pretty strained. UM. Of the forty two first drafts that
(33:58):
Tenniel turned in, Dodgson liked one one one, Humpty dumpty.
Everything else he was like maybe not yeah, yeah, and
uh a quick quick note about those illustrations. And and
(34:18):
I'm sure that you've seen them before. They are also
low key what um. The Disney character designs were based on.
Tenniel drew from memory, not from models, which made his
style really distinct um from the pre Raphaelites of his
contemporary era, who were really into life modeling. UM. And
(34:43):
and I think I think that that kind of cartoony
from memory style added a lot to the fantastical or
surreal quality of his illustrations for Alice. UM. Dodgson once said, Mr.
Tenniel is the only artist who has drawn or me
who resolutely refused to use a model and declared he
(35:04):
no more needed one than I should need a multiplication
table to work a mathematical problem. Wow, I like imagining
this argument. Yeah goodness, um. Teniel, for his part, dubbed
Dodgson quote impossible. And after these two books were over,
(35:27):
he never took another illustration project again. Oh wow he um.
He was knighted though for his work both in Punch
magazine and on the Alice books. He lived to the
age of nineteen fourteen. Something like that. Yeah, yeah for him. Yeah,
(35:50):
I mean I went through all that stress and still yeah,
and a long life of it. Yeah, or despite it,
I guess. Uh. So these books, like you said, Lauren,
they did break new ground in several ways. Perhaps one
of the most significant is that it was written as
entertainment for children, just entertainment, not to teach them, which
(36:14):
was kind of a rarity at the time. But yeah,
it was kind of right, right, part of this movement
that we've talked about before in discussing Hansel and Gretel
and the brothers Grim of right making books for kids
enjoyable what um, and I think that this is really
related to both industrialization and romanticism. Which were in turn
(36:37):
putting kids into these new harsh forms of labor and
also then enshrining them as innocence. Uh. Dodgson once wrote
of children in a letter, their innocent unconsciousness is very
beautiful and gives one a feeling of reverence as at
the presence of something sacred. Yeah, uh m hm um.
(37:03):
And And the first book was well received, and it
sold really well. And in eighteen sixty six Doshon wrote
to the publisher Alexander McMillan that he had an idea
for a sequel. In eighteen seventy one, Through the looking
Glass and what Alice found there came out the first
letters of one of the poems, and through the looking
(37:23):
Glass spill out the real Alice's full name, Alice Pleasants Liddell. Ah. Yeah,
that's the last poem in the book. It's sort of
a sort of a dedication post publishing, Dodgson said of Ladell,
without whose infant patronage, I might possibly never have written
at all. He's also maintained the fictional Alice was never
meant to be the real Alice, per se like based
(37:46):
on the real Alice. Yeah. Columbia University awarded Alice the
Real one UM an honorary degree for quote awaking with
her girlhood's charms, the ingenious fancy of a mathematician familiar
with imaginary quantities, stirring him to reveal his complete understanding
of the heart of a child in nineteen thirty two.
(38:08):
Too much excitement. People were very excited about this. She
died two years later. After her husband's death in nineteen
um and a need of money, she had auctioned off
the original manuscript. Action gave her an equivalent of twenty
thousand dollars. Yes, nowadays it's in the British Museum. Though okay,
(38:31):
I tried this is like another I almost went into
this whole rabbit hole, which hau that's where um so
all of this after Alice almost married Prince Leopold, Queen
Victoria's youngest son. However, the queen insisted that Leopold married royalty.
Alice went on to marry a rich cricket player, but
(38:53):
the couple named one of their sons Leopold. Prince Leopold
named his daughter Alicaul. However, Alice's sons, Leopold and Allen,
were both killed during World War Two, leading her with
only one surviving child, Carol, I'm telling you this is
like a picture, right, yes, yeah uh. An interesting interesting
(39:21):
note that I found was that Dodgson, I guess not
surprising given the type of personality that it sounds like
he was, but he maintained editorial control over the Alice
books through his deal with the publisher, in which he
paid the upfront costs, including this one time that Tennell
came back after an initial printing and was like, these
(39:43):
these printings of my illustrations are are crap. I don't
want it, And Dodgson was like, Okay, heck, we can
reprint at my own personal cost. Um. But yeah, so
so he earned ten percent commission on the sales, but
but maintained really strict editorial can roll Um sales were good.
By two they had sold well over a hundred thousand
(40:05):
copies UM. He would publish some three hundred plus written
works during his life, and a bunch of puzzles and
games as well. UM and invented a number of small
contraptions and would die in at the age of sixty
five m from pneumonia um uh, complications brought on by
(40:26):
a bout of influenza mm hmm um. But his work
did have a huge lasting cultural impact. Oh my goodness. Yes. Yes,
They've been published in at least sixty two languages, and
they've never been out of print since they were first printed.
The Alice Books. Yeah. Um. According to Oxford, the Alice
(40:49):
Books and along with another book that he wrote, The
Hunting of the Snark, are the most quoted works in
the English language after Shakespeare in the Bible. Wow. Yeah, yeah.
Is this where Jafferwockie comes from? Right, yeah, yeah, let's
(41:10):
see it. Yep. And then that other thing, the time
has gone, the Walter says told I always get stuck
in my head, the Walters in the Carpenter, Oh it was.
It was such a struggle trying to figure out what
to what to do for this reading. Yeah. Yeah, that
would have been dark. I mean it is dark. Yeah,
I would have been a dark very appropriate for for
(41:33):
the Halloween season. But that's true, that's true. If you
don't know what we're talking about. That is essentially like
a walrush tricking oysters into letting him eat all of them. Yeah. Well,
and the carpenter helps the wall. We're saying, the carpenter
both you know, it's yeah, I mean it's a it's
a chipper poem right up until the oyster right death,
(41:57):
right up until then though, Um, and then Yeah, there's
just been so many things inspired by these stories. Um,
there's been stage plays. The Disney movie came out in
nineteen fifty one, and I believe like in a brief
reading of that history, UM, I think it was Disney
himself was like, you know, this is my kids kids
(42:18):
in his orbit loved it. We need to get it made.
And it's kind of back and forth about getting it made,
but he was like, Nope, needs to happen. Um. Tim
Burton took a swing at making film adaptations in the
first and then sequel in Um, apparently there's an animated
spin off about the Cheshire Cat in the works for Disney. Plus, Uh,
(42:40):
you got the Mad Party teacup Ride kind of infamation. Um,
the Jefferson Airplane song White Rabbit, which just featured in
the new Matrix trailer. Yep, yep. The video games, Um,
you've got Kingdom Hearts, where you can go to Wonderland
(43:01):
as one of the worlds that you can visit. And
then there's Alice Madness Returns. If you're looking for something
much creepier. Yeah, yeah, in which a disturbed older Alice
returns to the terrifying dreamscape. Yes or is it? Or
is it? Yes? Yeah? But then again like sayings like
following their white rabbit and going down the rabbit hole,
(43:23):
which did appear in the matrix. Um, you've got Mad
Hatter bought in Futurama. Yeah, there's a goodness. Um the
recent classic that we did about about food in special
effects with with a guest star v Kelly. V and
(43:44):
I are talking at one point about a set that
we were both on, and that set was for a
series of short films or a short series I don't
know called um called Ask Hatter and Hair, in which
the Mad Hatter and the march Hair give advice to people. Oh,
(44:09):
it's just me getting mad at the mad Hatter. That's
what it would be if I was involved. I am
not going to say that anyone should take their advice, um,
but but it's very entertaining advice. Nonetheless, Ask Katarine Hair.
You can look for it on YouTube. It's real weird.
(44:31):
It's real weird, and I do not apologize for my
part in it. Um and uh yeah, and you know,
like it's these stories are iconic and and and Dodgson
himself has entered pop consciousness um as in for example,
this this character Um in the books and Show the Magicians.
(44:52):
That's sort of a hybrid of Lewis Carroll and C. S.
Lewis Um. So yeah yeah, And then like briefly discussion
of themes. I think the big one is identity. Uh yeah.
Alie spends a lot of time trying to figure out
who she is and who she thinks she will be
(45:14):
when she grows up. There's a lot of like discussion
around sort of what Ddshon was writing when he was
doing those family Victorian magazines of like all these rules
and kind of chafing at them and not really getting them,
but also wanting to be like an adult. Yeah yeah,
and um and and right and and and manners and
and all of all of those right right restrictions that,
(45:36):
especially during the Victorian era where we're very prevalent and
um and and food is actually a really great way
of demonstrating a lot of those So yes, yes, um
and speaking of I hadn't really thought about it this way,
but I did read some people thought like maybe the
growing and shrinking from mushrooms were like it was bread
(45:59):
food could be interpreted as puberty and literally growing up. Um. Yes,
but uh. Some do interpret some of these themes of
identity and changing as being related to drug use, the
eating of mushrooms, the drinking of potions. Most researchers or
historians don't think the work was fueled by drugs, rather
(46:22):
that readers and viewers of the Disney film during the
nineteen seventies kind of impose these psychedelic themes and interpretations
as a reflection of the time that they were in. Yes.
In nineteen fifty five, and English psychiatrist named John Todd
discovered a rare neurological disease that causes hallucinations, particularly around
the size of things that historians believe Dodgson might have
(46:46):
had UM, which would explain those recurrent themes. Todd called
the disorder Alice and Wonderland syndrome a k a. Todd syndrome.
And yeah, it's it's it's so interesting, you know. We
we we choose these readings for these episodes, at least
partially based on the fact that the works are in
(47:08):
the public domain, which means that they are not recent um,
which which means that we are talking about cultures that
are that are fairly far removed from ours today. And
it's always so interesting to me as as a writer
and reader myself, thinking about how works become so widespread,
(47:33):
so enduring, lee popular, and uh Dodgson himself apparently did
some thinking about that. Um. He he once wrote not
about about Alice in particular, but about, um, the Hunting
of the Snark, which was right this this this epic
ridiculous poem um that he got some criticism for because
(47:56):
people were like, this is nonsense? Is it anything nonsense?
And he was kind of like, words mean more than
we mean to express when we use them, So a
whole book ought to mean a great deal more than
the writer meant. Oh that is interesting, which I think
(48:17):
is just a great dodge a but but be um, yeah,
just a just a really good sentiment about about the
works that we create and um how much um the
reader is a part of those works or the listener
or you know, whatever whatever human who is interacting with
(48:38):
it after the creator has done with it. Yeah. No,
I think that's that's really fascinating. And uh, you know,
you can't not bring your own experiences and um, thoughts
to something that you're interacting with in that way. And
a lot of times I'm someone who is really interested
(49:00):
as as a person who does right or does like
creative things like when someone interprets something I did completely
differently like oh yeah, right right, interesting, or I love
when like there's a like a bad ending for something
that's a whole tangent. I could go on, but like
fans will be like, well, I think it actually meant this,
(49:21):
and as a creator, I would probably be like, yes, interesting,
that other better thing that you thought of is definitely
what it was meant to be. It's just h yeah,
I love it, um, and I love doing these episodes.
So I hope we get to do another one and
(49:42):
not like a year. Yes, sooner, sooner than that, um,
for sure. Yes and listeners, UM, you all have been
so great with sending recommendations that are yes in the
public domain and maybe we haven't heard of or if
you I mean, something we have heard of, so please
keep those suggestions coming. What should be our next food
(50:04):
fairy tale reading? You can email us at Hello at
saborpod dot com. We are also on social media and
you can get in touch with us there. We are
on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram at savor pod and we
do hope to hear from you. Savor is a production
of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from my heart Radio,
you can visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
(50:25):
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Thanks as
always to our super producers Dylan Fagan and Andrew Howard.
Thanks to you for listening, and we hope that lots
more good things are coming your way.
Hello, and welcome to Saber Productive I Heeart Radio. I'm
Annie Reese and I'm Lauren vocal Baum and today we
have an episode for you about Alice in Wonderland. Yes,
and this episode is a long time coming, Oh my goodness. Yeah.
So I think in the summer of we were like,
oh man, it's been a long time since we've done
(00:30):
a a reading on the show and talked about a
work of fiction in that way that has to do
with food. And we were like, oh, Alice in Wonderland,
we should totally do that. We should totally do the
Mad Tea Party reading and talk about the books. And
(00:52):
it's October one now. Yeah, And we started the outline.
We were just I've seen this before. We started the
outline when we had the like you know, impetus when summer.
So like some of this we wrote year over a
year ago at least yep, most of it, I would say.
(01:15):
So it was fun. It was a fun trip down
memory lane, going back and going did I write that?
Did you write that? Who wrote this? It could have
been anybody, Yep, exactly, But it's we love doing these
um as always. We got to work with some of
our fantastic colleagues. Yes, I had a really fun recording
(01:37):
session altogether over but it was so fun. Yeah. This
was the first time since uh Goblin Market that we've
had a chance to all. I mean, I'll be at
a digital room, but I'll sit together in a room
all at the same time and do a full cast recording.
Um so I. As of right now, super producer Andrew
(02:00):
has has not uh contacted us about any pickups. I
feel like I'm going to have some because I was
so delighted by all of y'all's performances that as the narrator,
like I had to pick up where you left off
and sometimes I would still be laughing. Yeah, it was.
(02:20):
It was great. I mean, um, I played Alice and
I just got really into the role. And I got
really annoyed with a certain Ben Bowling who's playing the
Mad Hatter, because he was always like teasing me, pushy,
like wouldn't you just let me be I it? That's great?
(02:46):
Oh yeah yeah, are um so so so right. So,
so we're gonna talk a little bit about about Lewis
Carroll and uh and how the book came about, and
then we're gonna do a reading of the Mad tea
party chapter and then we're going to come back and
discuss a little bit more about the impact of the book,
um and all of that fun stuff and uh, yes,
(03:07):
but but you do have to look forward to um
in our reading, right, Annie Reese as as Alice, ben
Bolin as the Mad Hatter, super producer, Dylan Fagin as
the march Hare and uh not not a saver super
producer but a friend of the show and uh, super
producer around I heart at large, Randa Hawkins as the Dormouse. Um,
(03:32):
and I'm narrating, and we all have we all just
had a real nice time doing it. We did. It
was a real to like, um, everybody brought their a game,
for sure, they did. Yes, so you have that to
look forward to. UM. I will say, for me, I
have read the books, but only like once. Maybe UM version,
(03:56):
the Disney version of Alice and Wonder really scared the
hell out of me, is it? And I rewatched it
for this and I thought it was really funny, laughing
out loud, that's really Oh. I'm so glad. I'm so
glad you rewatched it because I feel like this has
been like a little bit of a shadow over you
for a while like it found you sounded so frightening
as a child, I did it terrified me. That caterpillar
(04:18):
terrified me. The whole oyster thing, Oh my goodness, oh
off with her head the red color freaked me, like
I can still remember. But I did enjoy it rewatching
it and it did make me laugh. Um once, seeing
in particular made me really laugh. But I also when
we did the reading, I dug up this old T
(04:38):
shirt that I won that has the Mad Hatter on it.
I believe it was from Mellow Mushroom. Oh my goodness,
but I want it for for an acting role I
did in a vampire horror short called Insatiable, which I
think I've talked about before, but it's one of my
best trophies. Yes, and I love the sculpture in Central Park.
(05:01):
The sculpture. Yeah, I I I probably read the books.
I've probably read the books. Um, I would say upwards
of a dozen times, probably more like two dozen plus
times over the course of my life. I was really
into them as a kid. Um. They were pretty formative
(05:24):
for me in terms of like of like humor and surrealism,
um and uh in language. So yeah. Also yeah, so
I was I reread them again, like a year ago
when we first started talking about this, and the first
book talks so much about food, like all of the food,
all the time. UM. So I am so glad that
(05:47):
we're getting to do this one as a as a
food fairy tale. It's not exactly a fairy tale, but
it's pretty close. It's pretty close. It's within within within
the genre, I would say. So it's got a lot
of similar Yeah. Yeah, well, I guess that brings us
to our question. Sure, Alice in Wonderland, what is it? Well? Um,
(06:17):
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass and
What Alice Found There are two short children's novels about
a girl named Alice who has some real wacky adventures
um which may or may not be dreams um, involving
fantastic anthropomorphic animals and snarky plants and strange royals, game
(06:39):
of chest the size of a whole kingdom uh, and
food and drink that are not always what they seem.
They were written by pen name Lewis Carroll, which is
the most widely known pseudonym for Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, who
published Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Eat sixty five when
(07:01):
he was thirty three years old. Dodgson was born in
eighteen thirty two, the third of eleven children of his
mother Francis Jane Lutwidge, and his father Charles Dodgson, UM,
who was the archdeacon of a small parish of Darrisbury,
which is a village near Liverpool in northern England. And
Uh Dodgson started writing as a child. At the age
(07:24):
of thirteen he put out a family magazine. And family
magazines are this fascinating bit of Victorian middle class ephemera. Um.
They were generally these these handwritten and hand illustrated booklets
or periodicals created by well off kids and young adults
to entertain themselves and their siblings. And so even at
(07:44):
that age he was writing a lot and would produce
just a bunch of magazines like this over the next
few years, with stuff like poetry about the frustrating restrictions
and expectations of society. There were some biological essays about
fairies in their very very Lewis Carrolly kind of stuff. UM.
(08:05):
A teacher of his one Mr Tate, apparently once told
Dodgson's father that he was given to quote creativity in
replacing the inflections of nouns and verbs as detailed in
our grammars um, which apparently Mr Tate assured the father
that that Dodgson would outgrow m I. I don't think no,
(08:31):
I don't think that's what happened neither. He would go
to school at Christ Church, Oxford UM, and in eighteen
fifty one he had the opportunity to visit the first
World's Fair in London UM called the Great Exhibition. It
was this international celebration of industry and science and art
and design. Around the same time he became deeply interested
(08:53):
in photography. He had received a Master of Arts in
eighteen fifty seven and become a member of the clergy
in eighteen sixty one, a deacon UM, and made his
living lecturing UM, tutoring and writing UM, both in literature
and mathematics. He would write eleven books on mathematics over
the course of his career, starting in eighteen sixty He
never became a priest, which was unusual for that that
(09:16):
that place and time and career path UM. He apparently
petitioned the Dean to remain a deacon. Historians think that
he didn't agree with with some of the church doctrine
at the time, although he was himself deeply religious. Um,
he was just a bit more progressive, perhaps than than
the church was. Like. He really liked going to the
theater sandalusius um and uh, and he embraced some like
(09:43):
broader ideas of salvation than we're really being preached at
the time. As a human person, he said to have
been self effacing. Um. He had a stutter and was
deaf in one ear and had this persistent difficulty with
lung capacity from having had whooping cough as a teen.
But his story and seemed to think that he was
um like private more than particularly shy. Uh. He never married,
(10:05):
which was required of clergy at christ Church at the time,
and he did not like publishing under his own name,
even as a kid in family magazines. He used pseudonyms. Um.
The first publication under Lewis Carroll was in eighteen fifty six,
attached to a dramatic poem, and supposedly he got the
name by translating his name's um Lutwidge and Charles into
(10:30):
Latin and then back into English. Uh. Interesting, Yeah, Lutwidge
Charles Lewis Carroll. Yeah, m okay, well, I too wanted
to publish under a pen name, and it was well,
I had August Wind my fan fiction name, of course,
(10:52):
of course, but then I wanted to go with plumb Pickens.
And I don't know why what I thought I could
pull off with plum Pickens, but me neither. I mean,
I find it delightful, though I feel like it's a
very plump Pickens sounds like a children's auf there, which
(11:15):
you know, it's fine, but that wasn't what I was
intending to write. So uh huh, yeah, like that's a
very like like like like like Lemony Snicket, kind of
along those lines. Yeah. Well, I'm trying to remember my friend.
My friend had a similar pen name. We were all
like fruit based. Um. But yeah, mine with plump Pickens
(11:38):
not as official sounding as Lewis Carol. You know, it
depends on what kind of office you're running for. I
suppose that's true. Um, well, Lauren, what about the plot
of these books? Is there is there a plot? Um?
(12:05):
I guess, I guess um in in the first book,
Alice in Wonderland or Alice's Adventures in Wonderland more properly.
You're dealing with the main character, Alice, who is a
young girl who falls down a rabbit hole and finds
a bunch of weird stuff. There's this garden that she
(12:27):
wants to get into, and eventually she gets into it,
and then she doesn't get beheaded, and then it might
have all been a dream spoilers, Um, okay. And then
in the second book, uh, she's hanging out with her
(12:48):
cat and decides to climb through a mirror and then
she plays like a really big game of chess and
becomes a queen. And then it might have been a dream.
But was it her dream or was it the cat's
(13:09):
dream twists? I'm into that. Yeah, the cat in question,
Dinah just does not respond to this line of questioning,
so suspicious perhaps picking up what you're putting down. If
if this doesn't sound like it makes a lot of sense,
(13:32):
it doesn't, that's not really the point. Um, be go
out and read them or find a filmic translation of them,
or yeah, they're they're they're fun. Um, they are They're
meant to be fun, Which is kind of, or was
at the time, kind of a departure from a lot
(13:55):
of children's literature like most kids books at the time,
I'm we're instructive, not fun, right, and this was one
of the early breaks in that, right. So but um,
but we're going to get into all of that, um,
how the book itself came about, and how it was
received after we read a little bit of the book
(14:19):
for you. Yes, yes, yes, yes, But before we get
into that, which I'm telling you it's going to be great,
we're gonna get into a quick break for a word
from our sponsor, and we're back. Thank you, sponsored, Yes,
(14:40):
thank you, And we are back with our reading of
the Mad Tea Party, chapter from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.
There was a table set out under a tree in
front of the house, and the march Hare and the
Hatter we're having tea at it. A dormouse was sitting
(15:01):
between them, fast asleep, and the other two were using
it as a cushion, resting their elbows on it and
talking over its head. Very uncomfortable for the dormouse, thought Alice.
Only as it's asleep, I suppose it doesn't mind. The
table was a large one, but the three were all
crowded together at one corner of it. No room, No room,
(15:23):
they cried out when they saw Alice coming. There's plenty
of room, said Alice indignantly, and she sat down in
a large armchair at one end of the table. Have
some wine, the march hare said, in an encouraging tone.
Alice looked all around the table, but there was nothing
on it. But t I don't see any wine, she remarked.
(15:44):
There isn't any, said the march Hare. And it wasn't
very civil of you to offer it, said Alice angrily.
It wasn't very civil of you to sit down without
being invited, said the march Hare. I didn't know it
was your table, said Alice. It's slate for a great
many more than three. Your hair wants cotton, said the hatter.
(16:07):
He had been looking at Alice for some time with
great curiosity, and this was his first speech. You should
learn not to make personal remarks, Alice said, with some severity.
It's very rude. The hatter opened his eyes very wide
on hearing this, but all he said was why he's
a raving like a writing desk. Come we shall have
(16:29):
some fun now, thought Alice. I'm glad they've begun asking riddles.
I believe I can guess that, She added aloud. Do
you mean you think you can find out the answer
to it, said the march Hare. Exactly so, said Alice.
Then you should say what you mean. The march Hare
went on, I do, Alice hastily replied, at least at
(16:53):
least I mean what I say. That's the same thing,
you know, not the same thing a bit. You might
just as well say that I see what I eat
is the same thing as I eat what I see.
You might just as well say, added the march Hare,
that I like what I get is the same thing
as I get what I like. You might as well,
(17:15):
jess say, added the dormouse, who seemed to be talking
in his sleep. As I breathe when I sleep is
the same thing as I sleep when I breathe where
it is the same thing with you, said the hatter.
And here the conversation dropped, and the party sat silent
for a minute while Alice thought over all she could
remember about ravens and writing desks, which wasn't much. The
(17:40):
hatter was the first to break the silence. What day
of the month is it? He said, turning to Alice.
He had taken his watch out of his pocket and
was looking at it uneasily, shaking it every now and
then and holding it to his ear. Alice considered a
little and then said, the fourth to day's wrong, sighed
(18:02):
the hatter. I told you, but a footn't suit the works,
he added, looking angrily at the march Hare. It was
the best butter in The march Hare meekly replied, yes,
but some crumbs must have got in his well. The
hatter grumbled, you shouldn't have put it in. He's the
bread knife, and the march Hare took the watch and
(18:25):
looked at it gloomily. Then he dipped it into his
cup of tea and looked at it again. But he
could think of nothing better to say than his first remark.
It was the best butter, you know. Alice had been
looking over his shoulder with some curiosity. What a funny watch,
she remarked. It tells the day of the month and
doesn't tell what a clock it is. Of why I
(18:46):
showed it, and muttered, the hatter, does your watch tell
you what year it is? Of course not, Alice replied
very readily, But that's because it stays the same year
for such a long time together, which is just the
case with mine, said the hatter. Alice felt dreadfully puzzled.
The hatter's remarks seemed to have no sort of meaning
(19:08):
in it, and yet it was certainly English. I don't
quite understand you, she said, as politely as she could. Well,
the dormouse is asleep again, said the hatter, and he
poured a little hot tea upon its nose. The dormouse
shook its head impatiently and said, without opening its eyes.
(19:28):
Of course, of course, just what I was going to
remark myself. Have you guessed the riddle yet, the hatter said,
turning to Alice again, No, I give it up. Alice replied,
what's the answer? I haven't the slightest idea, said the hatter,
Nor I said the march hare. Alice sighed wearily. I
(19:52):
think you might do something better with the time, she said,
then wasting it in asking riddles that have no answers.
If you knew time as well as I do, said
the hatter, you wouldn't talk about wasting it. It's him.
I don't know what you mean, said Alice. No, of
(20:13):
course you don't, And the hatter said, tossing his head contemptuously,
I daresay you've never even spoke to time. Perhaps not,
Alice cautiously replied, but I know I have to beat
time when I learned music that accounts for it. He
won't stand beating. Now. If you were only kept on
(20:35):
good terms with him, he'd do almost anything you liked
with the clock. For instance, suppose it were nine o'clock
in the morning, just time to begin lessons. You'd only
have to whisper a hint to time, and round goes
the clock in its weekly half past one time. For detta,
I only wish it was the March Hare, said to
(20:57):
itself in a whisper. That would be grand, certainly, said
Alice thoughtfully. But then I shouldn't be hungry for it,
you know, not at first, perhaps, said the hatter. But
you could keep it to half past one as long
as you liked. Is that the way you manage? Alice asked.
(21:20):
The hatter shook his head mournfully. Not I, he replied.
We quarreled last March, just before he went mad, you know,
pointing with his teaspoon. At the March Hare. It was
at the great concert given by the Queen of Hearts,
and I had to sing Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Bat. How
(21:40):
I hondle where you are at? You know the song?
Perhaps I've heard something like it, said Alice. It goes on,
you know, in this way, harp above the world, you
fly like a tea tray hidden the sky. A twinkle twinkle.
(22:01):
Here the dormouse shook itself and began singing in its sleep,
tinkle twinkle, twinkle twinkle, and went on so long that
they had to pinch it to make it stop. Well,
I'd hardly finished the first verse when the queen jumped
up and bawled out hate, murdering the time off with
(22:22):
his head. How dreadfully savage, exclaimed Alice. And ever since that,
the hatter went on in a mournful tone. You won't
do a thing, I asked. He's always six o'clock. Now.
A bright idea came into Alice's head. Is that the
reason so many tea things are put out here? She asked? Yes,
(22:45):
that's it, said the hatter, with a sigh. It's always
tea time. And if we've no time to wash the
things between whiles, then you keep moving round, I suppose,
I said Alice. He exactly so, said the hatter. As
the things get used up. But what happens when you
(23:07):
come to the beginning again. Alice ventured to ask, so
suppose we changed the subject, and the march hare interrupted, yawning,
I'm getting tired of this. I vote the young lady
tells us a story. I'm afraid I don't know one,
said Alice, rather alarmed at the proposals. They both cried, wait,
(23:36):
and they pinched it on both sides. Once the dormouse
slowly opened his eyes. I wasn't asleep, he said, in
a hoarse, feeble voice. I heard every word you fellows
were saying. Tell us a story, said the march hare. Yes,
please do, pleaded Alice. And be quick about it, added
(23:59):
the hatter. You want to be asleep again before it's done.
Once upon a time there were three little sisters, and
the dormouse began in a great hurry. And their names
were Elsie, Lacy, and Tillie, and they lived at the
bottom of a well. What did they live on, said Alice,
who always took a great interest in questions of eating
(24:21):
and drinking. He lived on treacle, said the dormouse. After
thinking a minute or two. They couldn't have done that,
you know, Alice gently remarked, they'd have been ill, So
they were, said the dormouse, very ill. Alice tried to
fancy to herself what such an extraordinary ways of living
(24:42):
would be like, but it puzzled her too much, so
she went on, but why did they live at the
bottom of a well? Take some more tea? The march
hare said to Alice very earnestly, I've had nothing yet.
Alice replied in an offended tone. So I can't take more?
Or you mean you can't take less, said the hatter.
(25:05):
It's very easy to take more than nothing. Nobody asked
your opinion, And who's making your personal remarks now, the
hatter asked, triumphantly. Alice did not quite know what to
say to this, so she helped herself to some tea
and bread and butter, and then turned to the dormouse
and repeated her question, why did they live at the
(25:28):
bottom of a well? The dormouse again took a minute
or two to think about it, and then said it
was a treacle. Well, there's no such thing. Alice was
beginning very angrily, but the hatter and the march hare
went shoo, and the dormouse sulkily remarked, if you can't
(25:51):
be civil, you'd better finish the story for yourself. No,
please go on, Alice said, very humbly. I won't interrupt again.
I daresay there may be one one indeed, said the
dormouse indignantly. However, he consented to go on. And so
these three little sisters they were learning to draw. You
(26:11):
know what did they draw? Said Alice? Quite forgetting her promise? Treacle,
said the dormouse, without considering it at all this time,
I hunt a clean cup, interrupted the hatter. Let's all
move one place. On. He moved on as he spoke,
and the dormouse followed him. The march hare moved into
(26:33):
the dormouse's place, and Alice rather unwillingly took the place
of the march hare. The hatter was the only one
who got any advantage from the change, and Alice was
a good deal worse off than before, as the march
hare had just upset the milk drug onto his plate.
Alice did not wish to offend the dormouse again, so
she began very cautiously. But I don't understand where did
(26:56):
they draw the treacle from. You can all water out
of a what a well? Said the hatter. So I
should think you could draw a treacle out of a treacle. Well, huh, stupid,
But they were in the well, Alice said to the dormouse,
not choosing to notice this last remark. Of course they were,
(27:20):
said the dormouse. Well in this answer so confused poor
Alice that she let the dormouse go on for some
time without interrupting it. They were learning to draw. The
dormouse went on, yawning and rubbing its eyes, for it
was getting very sleepy, and they drew all manner of things,
everything that begins with an M. Why with an M,
(27:43):
said Alice? Why not, said the march hare. Alice was silent.
The dormouse had closed its eyes by this time and
was going off into a doze a but on being
pinched by the hatter, it woke up again with a
little shriek, and went on that begins with an EM,
such as mouse traps in the moon, and memory and muchness.
(28:06):
You know, you say things are much of a muchness?
Did you ever see such a thing as a drawing
of a muchness? Really? Now you ask me, said Alice,
very much confused. I don't think. Then you shouldn't talk,
he said the hatter. This piece of rudeness was more
than Alice could bare. She got up in great disgust
(28:28):
and walked off. The dormounts fell asleep instantly, and neither
of the others took the least notice of her going,
though she looked back once or twice, half hoping they
would call after her. The last time she saw them,
they were trying to put the dormouse into the tea
puffed at any rate, I'll never go there again, said
Alice as she picked her way through the wood. It's
the stupidest tea party I ever was at in all
(28:51):
my life. Just as she said this, she noticed that
one of the trees had a door leading right into it.
That's very curious, she thought, But everything was curious today.
I think I may as well go in at once,
and in she went. That brings us to the end
(29:15):
of our reading. Um, we hope that you enjoyed it
as much as we enjoyed doing it, which was a lot.
Even though I'm like again getting a little annoyed. I've
been bowland slash amount of her. I like this. I
like this beef. I know I'm well. I was in
my role and he was in his. We did our parts.
(29:37):
We did our parts. But this is what the price
of art is. I think it'll be fine. I think
it'll be fine. Um. But we did want to, yeah,
discuss the book and the impact that it had. But
first we are going to get into one more quick
break for a word from our sponsor m h and
(30:08):
we're back. Thank you sponsor, Yes, thank you. All right,
so let's let's talk about the history of how these
books came to be and their impact. Now that we've
heard kind of a sample sheriff of what they sounded like. Um,
so the Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glasses
based on Alice Hargreaves formally Alice Liddell. Her father was
(30:31):
a classical scholar and in eighteen fifty six he was
appointed dean at Oxford, so he and his family moved
into christ Church. There they met and befriended Dodgson slash
Newis Carroll. The children liked him because of the strange,
whimsical stories he told. One day in eighteen sixty two, Dodgson,
along with a friend of his, took three of the
(30:52):
Ladell girls. Um they were ten Lidell children out in
a rowboat for a picnic. And Dodgeon told the stories
along the way, and apparently one of these original stories
survived in the first book as the Caucus race Um
on the Ocean of Tears that that Alice cries Um.
The sisters appeared as as characters too, as birds. Dodgson
(31:18):
spun himself in as the Dodo and the sort of
protagonist was Alice Yes, and one of the girls, ten
year old Alice, and that one was so delighted by
the adventures of a girl named Alice down the rabbit
Hole she asked Dodgson to write them down, and Dodgeon
gave her a handwritten, hand illustrated copy of Alice's Adventures
(31:41):
Underground as a Christmas gift in eighteen sixty four. Now
the Littels and Dodgeon had for the most part parted
ways by eighteen sixty three. Historians aren't sure the exact cause,
and one of Dodgson's disintants cut out the page of
his diary that might have explained why so much of
this story. I'm like this sounds fictional, right um. Some
(32:06):
speculate that Mrs Liddell was uncomfortable with Dodgson's relationship with Alice.
Because this took place during the Victorian era, it's hard
to adequately know the motivations, thoughts, and beliefs of those involved.
It's just like different standards. Yeah. There there's been a
lot of speculation and and research into all of this,
(32:28):
and uh, you know, the facts that we know are
that Dodgson had a close friendship with Alice, and that
also he took artistic nude photographs of children who were
not his children. Um, and that certainly would not fly today. No, no, no, um.
(32:52):
But right, like like post the era of psychoanalysis, post
like Freudian thought, really difficult to go back and apply
modern standards to what was going on in the Victorian era. Um.
So yeah, yep, yep um. But anyway, Doshon went on
(33:14):
to beef up this story into Alice's Adventures in Wonderland,
in part thanks to the urging of an author friend
of his, George McDonald, and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland came
out in eighteen sixty five under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll,
with illustrations by John Tenniel. Tenniel, at the time was
a prolific cartoonist for the magazine punch and also did
(33:35):
a lot of book illustrations. UM. He was commissioned by
Dodgson to create forty two illustrations for the first Alice book,
starting in eighteen sixty four. He was about twelve years
older than Dodgson. UM And apparently they were both so
similarly particular and like fastidious that their working relationship was
pretty strained. UM. Of the forty two first drafts that
(33:58):
Tenniel turned in, Dodgson liked one one one, Humpty dumpty.
Everything else he was like maybe not yeah, yeah, and
uh a quick quick note about those illustrations. And and
(34:18):
I'm sure that you've seen them before. They are also
low key what um. The Disney character designs were based on.
Tenniel drew from memory, not from models, which made his
style really distinct um from the pre Raphaelites of his
contemporary era, who were really into life modeling. UM. And
(34:43):
and I think I think that that kind of cartoony
from memory style added a lot to the fantastical or
surreal quality of his illustrations for Alice. UM. Dodgson once said, Mr.
Tenniel is the only artist who has drawn or me
who resolutely refused to use a model and declared he
(35:04):
no more needed one than I should need a multiplication
table to work a mathematical problem. Wow, I like imagining
this argument. Yeah goodness, um. Teniel, for his part, dubbed
Dodgson quote impossible. And after these two books were over,
(35:27):
he never took another illustration project again. Oh wow he um.
He was knighted though for his work both in Punch
magazine and on the Alice books. He lived to the
age of nineteen fourteen. Something like that. Yeah, yeah for him. Yeah,
(35:50):
I mean I went through all that stress and still yeah,
and a long life of it. Yeah, or despite it,
I guess. Uh. So these books, like you said, Lauren,
they did break new ground in several ways. Perhaps one
of the most significant is that it was written as
entertainment for children, just entertainment, not to teach them, which
(36:14):
was kind of a rarity at the time. But yeah,
it was kind of right, right, part of this movement
that we've talked about before in discussing Hansel and Gretel
and the brothers Grim of right making books for kids
enjoyable what um, and I think that this is really
related to both industrialization and romanticism. Which were in turn
(36:37):
putting kids into these new harsh forms of labor and
also then enshrining them as innocence. Uh. Dodgson once wrote
of children in a letter, their innocent unconsciousness is very
beautiful and gives one a feeling of reverence as at
the presence of something sacred. Yeah, uh m hm um.
(37:03):
And And the first book was well received, and it
sold really well. And in eighteen sixty six Doshon wrote
to the publisher Alexander McMillan that he had an idea
for a sequel. In eighteen seventy one, Through the looking
Glass and what Alice found there came out the first
letters of one of the poems, and through the looking
(37:23):
Glass spill out the real Alice's full name, Alice Pleasants Liddell. Ah. Yeah,
that's the last poem in the book. It's sort of
a sort of a dedication post publishing, Dodgson said of Ladell,
without whose infant patronage, I might possibly never have written
at all. He's also maintained the fictional Alice was never
meant to be the real Alice, per se like based
(37:46):
on the real Alice. Yeah. Columbia University awarded Alice the
Real one UM an honorary degree for quote awaking with
her girlhood's charms, the ingenious fancy of a mathematician familiar
with imaginary quantities, stirring him to reveal his complete understanding
of the heart of a child in nineteen thirty two.
(38:08):
Too much excitement. People were very excited about this. She
died two years later. After her husband's death in nineteen
um and a need of money, she had auctioned off
the original manuscript. Action gave her an equivalent of twenty
thousand dollars. Yes, nowadays it's in the British Museum. Though okay,
(38:31):
I tried this is like another I almost went into
this whole rabbit hole, which hau that's where um so
all of this after Alice almost married Prince Leopold, Queen
Victoria's youngest son. However, the queen insisted that Leopold married royalty.
Alice went on to marry a rich cricket player, but
(38:53):
the couple named one of their sons Leopold. Prince Leopold
named his daughter Alicaul. However, Alice's sons, Leopold and Allen,
were both killed during World War Two, leading her with
only one surviving child, Carol, I'm telling you this is
like a picture, right, yes, yeah uh. An interesting interesting
(39:21):
note that I found was that Dodgson, I guess not
surprising given the type of personality that it sounds like
he was, but he maintained editorial control over the Alice
books through his deal with the publisher, in which he
paid the upfront costs, including this one time that Tennell
came back after an initial printing and was like, these
(39:43):
these printings of my illustrations are are crap. I don't
want it, And Dodgson was like, Okay, heck, we can
reprint at my own personal cost. Um. But yeah, so
so he earned ten percent commission on the sales, but
but maintained really strict editorial can roll Um sales were good.
By two they had sold well over a hundred thousand
(40:05):
copies UM. He would publish some three hundred plus written
works during his life, and a bunch of puzzles and
games as well. UM and invented a number of small
contraptions and would die in at the age of sixty
five m from pneumonia um uh, complications brought on by
(40:26):
a bout of influenza mm hmm um. But his work
did have a huge lasting cultural impact. Oh my goodness. Yes. Yes,
They've been published in at least sixty two languages, and
they've never been out of print since they were first printed.
The Alice Books. Yeah. Um. According to Oxford, the Alice
(40:49):
Books and along with another book that he wrote, The
Hunting of the Snark, are the most quoted works in
the English language after Shakespeare in the Bible. Wow. Yeah, yeah.
Is this where Jafferwockie comes from? Right, yeah, yeah, let's
(41:10):
see it. Yep. And then that other thing, the time
has gone, the Walter says told I always get stuck
in my head, the Walters in the Carpenter, Oh it was.
It was such a struggle trying to figure out what
to what to do for this reading. Yeah. Yeah, that
would have been dark. I mean it is dark. Yeah,
I would have been a dark very appropriate for for
(41:33):
the Halloween season. But that's true, that's true. If you
don't know what we're talking about. That is essentially like
a walrush tricking oysters into letting him eat all of them. Yeah. Well,
and the carpenter helps the wall. We're saying, the carpenter
both you know, it's yeah, I mean it's a it's
a chipper poem right up until the oyster right death,
(41:57):
right up until then though, Um, and then Yeah, there's
just been so many things inspired by these stories. Um,
there's been stage plays. The Disney movie came out in
nineteen fifty one, and I believe like in a brief
reading of that history, UM, I think it was Disney
himself was like, you know, this is my kids kids
(42:18):
in his orbit loved it. We need to get it made.
And it's kind of back and forth about getting it made,
but he was like, Nope, needs to happen. Um. Tim
Burton took a swing at making film adaptations in the
first and then sequel in Um, apparently there's an animated
spin off about the Cheshire Cat in the works for Disney. Plus, Uh,
(42:40):
you got the Mad Party teacup Ride kind of infamation. Um,
the Jefferson Airplane song White Rabbit, which just featured in
the new Matrix trailer. Yep, yep. The video games, Um,
you've got Kingdom Hearts, where you can go to Wonderland
(43:01):
as one of the worlds that you can visit. And
then there's Alice Madness Returns. If you're looking for something
much creepier. Yeah, yeah, in which a disturbed older Alice
returns to the terrifying dreamscape. Yes or is it? Or
is it? Yes? Yeah? But then again like sayings like
following their white rabbit and going down the rabbit hole,
(43:23):
which did appear in the matrix. Um, you've got Mad
Hatter bought in Futurama. Yeah, there's a goodness. Um the
recent classic that we did about about food in special
effects with with a guest star v Kelly. V and
(43:44):
I are talking at one point about a set that
we were both on, and that set was for a
series of short films or a short series I don't
know called um called Ask Hatter and Hair, in which
the Mad Hatter and the march Hair give advice to people. Oh,
(44:09):
it's just me getting mad at the mad Hatter. That's
what it would be if I was involved. I am
not going to say that anyone should take their advice, um,
but but it's very entertaining advice. Nonetheless, Ask Katarine Hair.
You can look for it on YouTube. It's real weird.
(44:31):
It's real weird, and I do not apologize for my
part in it. Um and uh yeah, and you know,
like it's these stories are iconic and and and Dodgson
himself has entered pop consciousness um as in for example,
this this character Um in the books and Show the Magicians.
(44:52):
That's sort of a hybrid of Lewis Carroll and C. S.
Lewis Um. So yeah yeah, And then like briefly discussion
of themes. I think the big one is identity. Uh yeah.
Alie spends a lot of time trying to figure out
who she is and who she thinks she will be
(45:14):
when she grows up. There's a lot of like discussion
around sort of what Ddshon was writing when he was
doing those family Victorian magazines of like all these rules
and kind of chafing at them and not really getting them,
but also wanting to be like an adult. Yeah yeah,
and um and and right and and and manners and
and all of all of those right right restrictions that,
(45:36):
especially during the Victorian era where we're very prevalent and
um and and food is actually a really great way
of demonstrating a lot of those So yes, yes, um
and speaking of I hadn't really thought about it this way,
but I did read some people thought like maybe the
growing and shrinking from mushrooms were like it was bread
(45:59):
food could be interpreted as puberty and literally growing up. Um. Yes,
but uh. Some do interpret some of these themes of
identity and changing as being related to drug use, the
eating of mushrooms, the drinking of potions. Most researchers or
historians don't think the work was fueled by drugs, rather
(46:22):
that readers and viewers of the Disney film during the
nineteen seventies kind of impose these psychedelic themes and interpretations
as a reflection of the time that they were in. Yes.
In nineteen fifty five, and English psychiatrist named John Todd
discovered a rare neurological disease that causes hallucinations, particularly around
the size of things that historians believe Dodgson might have
(46:46):
had UM, which would explain those recurrent themes. Todd called
the disorder Alice and Wonderland syndrome a k a. Todd syndrome.
And yeah, it's it's it's so interesting, you know. We
we we choose these readings for these episodes, at least
partially based on the fact that the works are in
(47:08):
the public domain, which means that they are not recent um,
which which means that we are talking about cultures that
are that are fairly far removed from ours today. And
it's always so interesting to me as as a writer
and reader myself, thinking about how works become so widespread,
(47:33):
so enduring, lee popular, and uh Dodgson himself apparently did
some thinking about that. Um. He he once wrote not
about about Alice in particular, but about, um, the Hunting
of the Snark, which was right this this this epic
ridiculous poem um that he got some criticism for because
(47:56):
people were like, this is nonsense? Is it anything nonsense?
And he was kind of like, words mean more than
we mean to express when we use them, So a
whole book ought to mean a great deal more than
the writer meant. Oh that is interesting, which I think
(48:17):
is just a great dodge a but but be um, yeah,
just a just a really good sentiment about about the
works that we create and um how much um the
reader is a part of those works or the listener
or you know, whatever whatever human who is interacting with
(48:38):
it after the creator has done with it. Yeah. No,
I think that's that's really fascinating. And uh, you know,
you can't not bring your own experiences and um, thoughts
to something that you're interacting with in that way. And
a lot of times I'm someone who is really interested
(49:00):
as as a person who does right or does like
creative things like when someone interprets something I did completely
differently like oh yeah, right right, interesting, or I love
when like there's a like a bad ending for something
that's a whole tangent. I could go on, but like
fans will be like, well, I think it actually meant this,
(49:21):
and as a creator, I would probably be like, yes, interesting,
that other better thing that you thought of is definitely
what it was meant to be. It's just h yeah,
I love it, um, and I love doing these episodes.
So I hope we get to do another one and
(49:42):
not like a year. Yes, sooner, sooner than that, um,
for sure. Yes and listeners, UM, you all have been
so great with sending recommendations that are yes in the
public domain and maybe we haven't heard of or if
you I mean, something we have heard of, so please
keep those suggestions coming. What should be our next food
(50:04):
fairy tale reading? You can email us at Hello at
saborpod dot com. We are also on social media and
you can get in touch with us there. We are
on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram at savor pod and we
do hope to hear from you. Savor is a production
of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from my heart Radio,
you can visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
(50:25):
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Thanks as
always to our super producers Dylan Fagan and Andrew Howard.
Thanks to you for listening, and we hope that lots
more good things are coming your way.
Savor News
Hosts And Creators
Anney Reese
Lauren Vogelbaum
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.