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Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass

by Lewis Carroll

This volume collects Lewis Carroll's two linked fantasies about a curious young girl named Alice. In the first, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" (1865), Alice follows a waistcoated White Rabbit down a rabbit-hole into a… more

First published 1865 · 192 pages · English

29 quotes ★ 4.06 (619,295) Classics

Quotes from the Book

She generally gave herself very good advice, (though she very seldom followed it).
If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is, because everything would be what it isn't. And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn't be. And what it wouldn't be, it would. You see?
I wonder if the snow loves the trees and fields, that it kisses them so gently? And then it covers them up snug, you know, with a white quilt; and perhaps it says, "Go to sleep, darlings, till the summer comes again.
I know who I WAS when I got up this morning, but I think I must have been changed several times since then
Why it's simply impassible! Alice: Why, don't you mean impossible? Door: No, I do mean impassible. (chuckles) Nothing's impossible!
No, no! The adventures first, explanations take such a dreadful time.
Do you know, I always thought unicorns were fabulous monsters, too? I never saw one alive before!" Well, now that we have seen each other," said the unicorn, "if you'll believe in me, I'll believe in you.
Contrariwise,' continued Tweedledee, 'if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic.
I can't explain myself, I'm afraid, sir,' said Alice, 'Because I'm not myself you see.
The time has come," the walrus said, "to talk of many things: Of shoes and ships - and sealing wax - of cabbages and kings
And how do you know that you're mad? "To begin with," said the Cat, "a dog's not mad. You grant that?" I suppose so, said Alice. "Well then," the Cat went on, "you see a dog growls when it's angry, and wags it's tail when it's pleased. Now I growl when I'm pleased, and wag my tail when I'm angry. Therefore I'm mad.
I knew who I was this morning, but I've changed a few times since then.
Where should I go?" -Alice. "That depends on where you want to end up." - The Cheshire Cat.
Tut, tut, child!" said the Duchess. "Everything's got a moral, if only you can find it.
It's a poor sort of memory that only works backwards,' says the White Queen to Alice.
Alice had got so much into the way of expecting nothing but out-of-the-way things to happen, that it seemed quite dull and stupid for life to go on in the common way.
I give myself very good advice, but I very seldom follow it.
I could tell you my adventures—beginning from this morning,” said Alice a little timidly; “but it’s no use going back to yesterday, because I was a different person then.
‎You're not the same as you were before," he said. You were much more... muchier... you've lost your muchness.
Take care of the sense and the sounds will take care of themselves.
And how many hours a day did you do lessons?' said Alice, in a hurry to change the subject. Ten hours the first day,' said the Mock Turtle: 'nine the next, and so on.' What a curious plan!' exclaimed Alice. That's the reason they're called lessons,' the Gryphon remarked: 'because they lessen from day to day.
Cheshire Puss,' she began, rather timidly, as she did not at all know whether it would like the name: however, it only grinned a little wider. 'Come, it's pleased so far,' thought Alice, and she went on. 'Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?' 'That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,' said the Cat. 'I don't much care where—' said Alice. 'Then it doesn't matter which way you go,' said the Cat. '—so long as I get SOMEWHERE,' Alice added as an explanation. 'Oh, you're sure to do that,' said the Cat, 'if you only walk long enough.
She who saves a single soul, saves the universe.
Curiouser and curiouser!” Cried Alice (she was so much surprised, that for the moment she quite forgot how to speak good English).
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.
Do you suppose she's a wildflower?
Everything's got a moral, if only you can find it
Come back!" the Caterpillar called after her. "I've something important to say." This sounded promising, certainly. Alice turned and came back again. "Keep your temper," said the Caterpillar.
She tried to fancy what the flame of a candle is like after the candle is blown out, for she could not remember ever having seen such a thing.

Did you know?

  • "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" grew out of a story Carroll improvised for the young Alice Liddell and her sisters during a boat trip on the Thames.
  • John Tenniel illustrated both books, and his objection to the print quality led Carroll to pay for the entire first Macmillan printing to be redone.
  • Carroll's real name was Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, an Oxford mathematics lecturer.
  • The nonsense poem "Jabberwocky" appears in "Through the Looking-Glass."
  • "Through the Looking-Glass" is structured around a game of chess, with Alice progressing across the board from pawn to queen.
  • The books have been translated into well over a hundred languages and have never gone out of print.

About Lewis Carroll

Lewis Carroll was the pen name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832-1898), an English mathematician, logician, and photographer who lectured at Christ Church, Oxford. He is best remembered for the Alice books and for nonsense verse such as "Jabberwocky."

More about the author →

About the book

This volume collects Lewis Carroll's two linked fantasies about a curious young girl named Alice. In the first, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" (1865), Alice follows a waistcoated White Rabbit down a rabbit-hole into a nonsensical world where she grows and shrinks, attends a mad tea party, and confronts the tyrannical Queen of Hearts before waking to find it was a dream. Its 1871 sequel, "Through the Looking-Glass," sends Alice through a mirror into a landscape organized like a chessboard, where she meets the Red and White Queens, Tweedledum and Tweedledee, Humpty Dumpty, and the gentle White Knight as she advances from pawn to queen.

Both books delight in language and logic turned upside down: puns, riddles, invented words, and rules that behave like games. Carroll, whose real name was the Oxford mathematician Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, builds each tale around a formal conceit, playing cards in the first and chess in the second, while exploring identity, transformation, and the strange seriousness of childhood. John Tenniel's wood-engraved illustrations, part of both first editions, became inseparable from the stories.

The Alice books helped free children's literature from the heavily moralizing tradition that preceded them, prizing imagination and absurdity for their own sake. They have never gone out of print, have been translated into scores of languages, and have inspired countless stage, film, and other adaptations, cementing their place among the most influential works of English fantasy.

Key characters

  • AliceCurious young girl who journeys through Wonderland and the looking-glass world
  • White RabbitHurried, waistcoated rabbit whose flight lures Alice down the rabbit-hole
  • Cheshire CatGrinning cat who appears and vanishes, offering cryptic advice
  • Mad HatterHost, with the March Hare and Dormouse, of the endless tea party
  • Queen of HeartsTyrannical card-queen given to shouting "Off with their heads!"
  • Red QueenStern chess queen who sets the rules of the looking-glass world
  • Humpty DumptyOpinionated egg who lectures Alice on the meaning of words

Book details

First published
1865
Length
192 pages
Reading time
5 hours
Goodreads rating
4.06 (619k ratings)
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 conversations?"”

Series & reading order

  1. 1 Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
  2. 2 Through the Looking-Glass

Movie & TV adaptations

  • IMDb
    Alice in Wonderland (Disney animated film) 1951

    Animated feature combining elements of both Alice books

  • IMDb
    Alice in Wonderland (Tim Burton film) 2010

    Live-action fantasy loosely based on the Alice stories

If you liked this, read…

  1. 1
    The Wonderful Wizard of OzAnother classic tale of a girl swept into a fantastical dream-world
  2. 2
    Peter PanA whimsical Edwardian fantasy about childhood and imagination
  3. 3
    The Phantom TollboothA modern nonsense-logic journey full of wordplay in Carroll's spirit

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