King Arthur Movie Tristan

title: Through the Looking Glass


author: Lewis Carroll

genre: classic/fantasy/childrens

published: 1871

source: http://www.americanliterature.com/

first line: One thing was certain, that the WHITE kitten had had nothing to do with it:--it was the black kitten's fault entirely.

rated: 4 out of 5 stars










I recently read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and it became an instant favorite. After being a bit biased against Carrol, he won me over with his fun and bizarre classic, so I decided to read Through the Looking Glass, which is the sequel to Alice's Adventures.




This story opens with Alice speaking to her cat Dinah and her kittens. She holds up one of the kittens to the mirror, so it can see the looking glass world where everything is the opposite, even the letters in books are backwards.

Oh, Kitty! how nice it would be if we could only get through into Looking- glass House! I'm sure it's got, oh! such beautiful things in it! Let's pretend there's a way of getting through into it, somehow, Kitty. Let's pretend the glass has got all soft like gauze, so that we can get through. Why, it's turning into a sort of mist now, I declare! It'll be easy enough to get through--' She was up on the chimney-piece while she said this, though she hardly knew how she had got there. And certainly the glass WAS beginning to melt away, just like a bright silvery mist.

Alice herself passes through the looking glass, into this other world. She is in her house, yet things are not the same. She decides to investigate this mirror world and have an adventure before going back through the looking glass and going back home.
Through the looking glass everything is backwards, time itself runs backwards and if Alice wants to get someplace, she has to move in the opposite direction to reach it.
When she leaves her house, she comes upon a sunny garden.

The countryside is set up in squares like a giant chessboard and as Alice explores it, she comes across some curious characters. Talking chess pieces, talking flowers, The Red Queen and Tweedledum and Tweedledee, a knitting sheep and Humpty Dumpty are a few of the characters she meets.








Where Alice in Wonderland is based on a deck of cards, Through the Looking Glass is modeled after a game of chess. Lewis Carroll's fantastic imagination is evident throughout, and I wish I had read these as a child. I'll be sharing both Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass with my daughter.

'And you do Addition?' the White Queen asked. 'What's one and one and one and one and one and one and one and one and one and one?'


'I don't know,' said Alice. 'I lost count.'


'She can't do Addition,' the Red Queen interrupted. 'Can you do Subtraction? Take nine from eight.'


'Nine from eight I can't, you know,' Alice replied very readily: 'but--'


'She can't do Subtraction,' said the White Queen. 'Can you do Division? Divide a loaf by a knife--what's the answer to that?'

This has been a part of Once Upon a Time

title: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland


author: Lewis Carroll


genre: classic/fantasy/childrens


published: 1865


source: DailyLit



first line: Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, `and what is the use of a book,' thought Alice `without pictures or conversation?'



rated: 4 out of 5 stars












I don't know what took me so long to read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. I think it's because I'm not a big fan of Disney's animated Alice, and that kind of put me off from reading the actual story.
I also have to admit the unsavory rumors about Lewis Carroll also steered me away from reading this one.




I put that aside and decided to finally read this classic. I found Alice's Adventures in Wonderland a delight. As soon as Alice falls down the rabbit hole, I found myself swept into Carroll's lyrical and strange storytelling and didn't stop reading until the end.


Alice herself is the one who captivates the reader.

For, you see, so many out-of-the-way things had happened lately, that Alice had begun to think that very few things indeed were really impossible.

After falling down the rabbit hole, Alice encounters some strange characters, the Chesire Cat, the Queen of Hearts and the Mad Hatter among them. The encounters Alice has with these characters are funny and strange and I enjoyed the silliness of the story. Interestingly enough, this genre is referred to as literary nonsense.

Lewis Carroll was a mathematician and that is evident as you read this story.

Let me see: four times five is twelve, and four times six is thirteen, and four times seven is - oh dear! I shall never get to twenty at that rate!

My favorite chapter was 5, Advice from a Caterpillar.


I found it amusing that Alice comes upon a caterpillar sitting on a mushroom, smoking a hookah no less.

The Caterpillar and Alice looked at each other for some time in silence: at last the Caterpillar took the hookah out of its mouth, and addressed her in a languid, sleepy voice.

'Who are you?' said the Caterpillar.

I read this one online, but I'll definitely be grabbing a copy to add to my book collection. I know this one is best read with the illustrations included.

I almost wish I hadn't gone down that rabbit-hole--and yet--and yet--it's rather curious, you know, this sort of life! I do wonder what CAN have happened to me! When I used to read fairy-tales, I fancied that kind of thing never happened, and now here I am in the middle of one! There ought to be a book written about me, that there ought!

Read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland online free from DailyLit or at americanliterature.com.







This has been a part of Once Upon a Time