Alice in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, or better known as Lewis Carroll, wrote many stories including Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Lewis Carroll was just a pen name for Charles Dodgson. He was born in 1832 and died from pneumonia in 1898. 

While Charles was attending school at Oxford University, he became good friends with the grand dean’s three daughters. Their names were Edith, Lorina and Alice Liddell. He would tell them many stories to pass the time. It was there when Charles told the girls about a girl in a fantasy world. Alice Liddell fell in love with this story, and she pestered Charles more than once to write it down for her. According to Ozzy Mirza, “it would take Lewis a good 24 months (2 years) to put the story down on paper and gift it to Alice. It was the year 1864 and the 26^th day of November when the hand written version of the fairytale landed in Alice’s hands.” (Mirza, 2011). This is how the famous story got to today.

A year later, it was published to the world. It was a success to many children. According to Andrea Campbell, “One reviewer attributed the success of these works to the fact that, unlike most children’s book of the era, they had no moral and did not explain anything. Most books of that period were written to teach children how to behave, to obey rules and to do as they were told.” (Campbell, 2015). After the success of the first book, Charles wrote a second, Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There, which was published in 1871.

Today, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland has many movie adaptations and even three Disney movies based on Charles writings of Alice. According to Campbell, “This young man’s writing became as world-famous and has received as many viewings as the Bible and Shakespeare.” (Campbell, 2015). This is huge for a book written to please a little girl named Alice.

References

Carroll, Lewis, 1832-1898. (2000). Alice’s adventures in Wonderland. Peterborough, Ont. :Broadview Press,

Campbell, A. (2015, April 30). Who Was Lewis Carroll and Why Did He Write Alice in Wonderland? Retrieved from https://www.brighthubeducation.com/homework-help-literature/128935-lewis-carroll-and-alice-in-wonderland/.

Mirza, O. (2011, November 16). Why did Lewis Carroll Write Alice in Wonderland? Retrieved from http://www.writeawriting.com/write/why-lewis-carroll-write-alice-in-wonderland/.