Льюис Кэрролл – Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (страница 2)
Themes of the Book
It is perhaps inevitable that people have read between the lines a great deal with
Dodgson doesn’t seem to have harboured any desire to pass comment on Victorian society. Although it is known that many of his literary characters were based on the personalities of his friends, it seems that this was merely an aid to character creation and development rather than any intention to parody them in any way. He was a humanist at heart, so he used his friends because he enjoyed and celebrated their idiosyncrasies and foibles.
It was this encapsulation of the human condition that seems to have made his work so popular, because the characters are in fact familiar stereotypes, so that readers can recognise traits in themselves and in the people they know. What is more, they are ubiquitous traits, so that they exist in people the world over. For example; Alice is the attractively inquisitive and naïve girl, the white rabbit is the neurotic clerk, the caterpillar can be seen as the laid back artist, and so on.
Table of Contents
CHAPTER 1 Down the Rabbit-Hole
CHAPTER 3 A Caucus-Race and a Long Tale
CHAPTER 4 The Rabbit Sends in a Little Bill
CHAPTER 5 Advice from a Caterpillar
CHAPTER 8 The Queen’s Croquet-Ground
CHAPTER 9 The Mock Turtle’s Story
CHAPTER 10 The Lobster Quadrille
CHAPTER 11 Who Stole the Tarts?
Classic Literature: Words and Phrases
All in the golden afternoon
Full leisurely we glide;
For both our oars, with little skill,
By little arms are plied,
While little hands make vain pretence
Our wanderings to guide.
Ah, cruel Three! In such an hour,
Beneath such dreamy weather,
To beg a tale of breath too weak
To stir the tiniest feather!
Yet what can one poor voice avail
Against three tongues together?
Imperious Prima flashes forth
Her edict ‘to begin it’ –
In gentler tone Secunda hopes
‘There will be nonsense in it!’ –
While Tertia interrupts the tale
Not
Anon, to sudden silence won,
In fancy they pursue
The dream-child moving through a land
Of wonders wild and new,
In friendly chat with bird or beast –
And half believe it true.
And ever, as the story drained
The wells of fancy dry,
And faintly strove that weary one
To put the subject by,
‘The rest next time –’ ‘It
The happy voices cry.
Thus grew the tale of Wonderland:
Thus slowly, one by one,
Its quaint events were hammered out –
And now the tale is done,
And home we steer, a merry crew,