Lewis Carroll Essays - Alice In Wonderland, , Term Papers

Lewis Carroll Lewis Carroll is the penname of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson was born on January 27, 1832, in Daresbury England. He was the oldest boy in a family of eleven children of Reverend Charles Dodgson and his wife, Francis Jane Lutwidge. Carroll was relatively pleasant in his childhood, full of ideas and hobbies that contributed to his future creative works. His playmates were mostly his brothers and sisters. He really only played with his sister and never much his brothers though. He took care of his younger sisters most of his younger life and many think thats where he developed his great imagination. He did have a stammer but it is suggested it may have arisen from his parents, when they tried to make him right handed, this may have caused him to think that something was wrong with him, therefore hurting his self-confidence. Carroll was very shy when he spoke to adults, so his speech became difficult to understand. This might have contributed to him being able to communicate with children so well, because he found it easier to become friends with them. Carrolls father had been a big impact on his life, he passed away when Carroll was 36 years old, which he said was the saddest thing of his life. His father was an honorable minister of Christ Church, this mounted Carrolls religious devotion. Lewis Carrolls mother was the essence of the Victorian gentlewoman, and loveable and loved but he mostly talked about his father rather than his mother. Lewis Carroll grew up with an extraordinary education and he was very successful with many publications. He began his education at Richmond Grammar School and then attended Rugby until 1849. In 1851 Carroll matriculated at Christ Church, Oxford. Carroll followed the path of his father by deciding to attend Christ Church, but differently, he did not go on to marry or become a practicing minister. He spent at total of 47 years there, from being a student, to receiving bachelor and masters of art degrees to mathematical professor. Even after he retired as a math professor, he became a curator of the Senior Common Room for 10 years (DLB v.18 46). Rather unlike Carrolls literary works such as Alice, Carroll published mathematical and symbolical texts, which include The Game of Logic (1886) and Symbolic Logic, Parts 1 2 (1886, 1887). Along with mathematical and literary works, Carroll also published his photograph compilation in Lewis Carroll, Photographer (1849) that shows his superiorit y in another area (45). Before photography became one of his interests, Carroll drew many pictures that he tried to publish. But his drawings were not up to par in order to be accepted for publication. He excelled much more in photography and had been described as the best photographer of children in the nineteenth century (Pudney 54). His most influential focus of child photography was Alice Liddell. Carroll was taking photographs of the Christ Church Cathedral from the deanery of the college when he encountered Alice Liddell and her two sisters, the daughters of the Dean, Henry George Liddell (DLB v.18 47-48). From that day on Carroll had a close relationship with the three daughters. The relationship Carroll was beginning to establish with the Liddell daughters did not please Mrs. Liddell very much. She was rather suspicious of his motives for associating with her children (DLB v.163 61). Despite her feelings, Carroll was still permitted to escort the girls on day trips, which they enjoyed (62). During the afternoon of July 4, 1862, the story, which would become known as Alices Adventures in Wonderland, was told for the first time (63). Carroll created this fascinating story to entertain the Liddell girls, Lorina, Alice, and Edith throughout a boat ride on the river Isis. From all three girls came the plead, Tel l us a story and from there is history. After the boat ride, he met with Liddells daughters for walks and croquet and heard them sign Beautiful Star, which entered the book as the Mock Turtles song on Beautiful Soup. Alice enjoyed the story Carroll created so much that she coerced him to record the tale on paper. And so Carroll began to write. By February 10, 1963,