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12/13 “Everything was happening so oddly that she didn’t feel a bit surprised at finding the Red Queen and the White Queen sitting close to her, one on each side: she would have liked very much to ask them how they came there, but she feared it would not be quite civil. However, there would be no harm, she thought, in asking if the game was over. ‘Please, would you tell me—‘ she began, looking timidly at the Red Queen. “‘Speak when you’re spoken to!’ the Queen sharply interrupted her. “‘But if everybody obeyed that rule,’ said Alice, who was always ready for a little argument, ‘and if you only spoke when you were spoken to, and the other person always waited for you to begin, you see nobody would ever say anything, so that—‘ “‘Ridiculous!’ cried the Queen. ‘Why, don’t you see, child—‘ here she broke off with a frown, and, after thinking for a minute, suddenly changed the subject of the conversation.” Alice wears a crown, but is still treated like a child in Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There (1871), by Lewis Carroll. After seeing the White Knight off, “A very few steps brought her to the edge of the brook. ‘The Eighth Square at last!’ she cried as she bounded over and threw herself down to rest on a lawn as soft as moss, with little flower-beds dotted all about it here and there. ‘Oh, how glad I am to get here! And what is this on my head?’ she exclaimed in a tone of dismay, as she put her hands up to something very heavy, that fitted tight round her head. “‘But how can it have got there without my knowing it?’ she said to herself, as she lifted it off, and set it on her lap to make out what it could possibly be. “It was a golden crown.” Alice gains a crown by surviving until she reaches the other end of the board, in the same way that a child reaches chronological adulthood simply reaching a certain age, and so it’s fitting that this happens when Alice is by herself in a wild setting, on a lawn carpeted with moss and flowers. Whilst in solitude, she begins to comport herself as she believes a queen should, getting up rather than lolling on the grass. But the other queens aren’t about to admit her to their rank so automatically. Alice finds herself squeezed between them (which will happen again later), and no sooner does she meet them, than they begin speaking nonsense. This can only remind me of the Jabberwock, with its “claws that catch”, that “burbled as it came”. The Red and White Queens are mirrored in the woodcut engravings by Barry Moser illustrating the 1983 Pennyroyal edition. Their initial exchange is more like something we’d see in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland than Through the Looking-Glass. The Red Queen says something illogical, Alice points out that it doesn’t make sense—and after thinking it over, the Red Queen is chagrined to realize Alice is right, but too proud to admit it. Changing the subject, she explains, “‘What do you mean by “If I really am a Queen”? What right have you to call yourself so? You ca’n’t be a Queen, you know, till you’ve passed the proper examination. And the sooner we begin it, the better.’” This is another looking-glass reversal: coronation before assumption of the role. In the British monarchy, the coronation takes place months after the king or queen takes office on the predecessor’s death. Unsympathetic as she is, the Red Queen is telling the truth, as we will see, and it’s interesting to see what marks Alice’s passage into queenship, that cognate for adulthood. For now, however, the Red Queen and her dimmer accomplice try a different tack, one Humpty Dumpty has already shown effective against Alice: turning everything into a disingenuous quibble. “‘I only said “if”!’ poor Alice pleaded in a piteous tone. “The two Queens looked at each other, and the Red Queen remarked, with a little shudder, ‘She says she only said “if”—‘ “‘But she said a great deal more than that!’ the White Queen moaned, wringing her hands. ‘Oh, ever so much more than that!’ “‘So you did, you know,’ the Red Queen said to Alice. ‘Always speak the truth—think before you speak—and write it down afterwards.’ “‘I’m sure I didn’t mean—‘ Alice was beginning, but the Red Queen interrupted. “‘That’s just what I complain of! You should have meant! What do you suppose is the use of a child without any meaning? Even a joke should have some meaning—and a child’s more important than a joke, I hope. You couldn't deny that, even if you tried with both hands.’ “‘I don’t deny things with my hands,’ Alice objected. “‘Nobody said you did,’ said the Red Queen. ‘I said you couldn’t if you tried.’ “‘She's in that state of mind,’ said the White Queen, ‘that she wants to deny something—only she doesn’t know what to deny!’ “‘A nasty, vicious temper,’ the Red Queen remarked; and then there was an uncomfortable silence for a minute or two.” One unpleasant exchange! Honestly, I’m not sure the White Queen even understands what is going on—but the Red Queen certainly does, given how she smarted from getting caught being unreasonable earlier. By forming a majority if two to one, and backing each other up (reminiscent of the “One, two! One, two!” in “Jabberwocky”), they make Alice, an uncommonly bright seven-and-a-half year old, look like a dummy. And it is then that they tritely inform Alice, by talking as if she’s not there, that there’s to be a dinner party in her honor. “The Red Queen broke the silence by saying to the White Queen, ‘I invite you to Alice’s dinner-party this afternoon.’ “The White Queen smiled feebly, and said ‘And I invite you.’ “‘I didn’t know I was to have a party at all,’ said Alice; ‘but if there is to be one, I think I ought to invite the guests.’ “‘We gave you the opportunity of doing it,’ the Red Queen remarked: ‘but I daresay you've not had many lessons in manners yet?’” Was Alice supposed to have decided on the invites when the Red Queen promised her “and in the Eighth Square we shall be Queens together, and it’s all feasting and fun!” at the beginning of her adventure? Alice insightfully replies, “‘Manners are not taught in lessons,’ said Alice. ‘Lessons teach you to do sums, and things of that sort.’” Carroll soon confirms that Alice is right. While there is an “examination”, it is a test of character rather than knowledge. As the dialogue goes on, Alice keeps getting formally shamed as if she were dimwitted, but it’s important to notice what a pathetic figure the White Queen is cutting. She asks, “‘Can you do Division? Divide a loaf by a knife—what’s the answer to that?" “‘I suppose—‘ Alice was beginning, but the Red Queen answered for her. ’Bread-and-butter, of course.’” While the Red Queen supplies the answer here, this recalls when Alice first met the White Queen: she “kept repeating something in a whisper tp herself that sounded like ‘Bread-and-butter, bread-and-butter”. This seems like a reference to Thackeray’s poem “Sorrows of Werther”, a popular satire on Goethe’s The Sorrows of Young Werther (which also shows up in the Anne books), in which Werther’s love interest, on seeing he’s committed suicide because he can’t have her, “Went on cutting bread and butter.” Just so, the White Queen is oblivious to what’s going on around her, and to how her statements of her ignorance are likely to be received. For instance: “‘Can you do sums?’ Alice said, turning suddenly on the White Queen, for she didn't like being found fault with so much. “The Queen gasped and shut her eyes. ‘I can do Addition,’ she said, ‘if you give me time—but I ca’n’t do Substraction under any circumstances!’ “‘Of course you know your ABC?’ said the Red Queen. “‘To be sure I do,’ said Alice. “‘So do I,’ the White Queen whispered. ‘We’ll often say it over together, dear. And I’ll tell you a secret—I can read words of one letter! Isn’t that grand? However, don’t be discouraged. You’ll come to it in time.’” Is the Red Queen joining in on teasing the White Queen? Perhaps she’s more eager to brag she’s the brains of the operation than to go on belittling Alice. After a few more lines of nonsense, they get onto the cause of lightning, which sends the White Queen on a tangent. “‘Which reminds me—‘ the White Queen said, looking down and nervously clasping and unclasping her hands, ‘we had such a thunderstorm last Tuesday—I mean one of the last set of Tuesdays, you know.’ “Alice was puzzled. ‘In our country,’ she remarked, ‘there’s only one day at a time.’ “The Red Queen said ‘That’s a poor thin way of doing things. Now here, we mostly have days and nights two or three at a time, and sometimes in the winter we take as many as five nights together—for warmth, you know.’” “‘Are five nights warmer than one night, then?’ Alice ventured to ask. “‘Five times as warm, of course.’ “‘But they should be five times as cold, by the same rule—‘ “‘Just so!’ cried the Red Queen. ‘Five times as warm, and five times as cold—just as I’m five times as rich as you are, and five times as clever!’ “Alice sighed and gave it up. ‘It’s exactly like a riddle with no answer!’ she thought.” Which Notes author James R. Kincaid thinks recalls the Mad Hatter’s riddle from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Oh, but there is an answer, Jim! As I noticed in the Tweedles’ poem “The Walrus and the Carpenter”, the imagery, days and nights mostly two or three at a time, and as many as five nights together in winter, sounds nonsensical to English ears—but likewise suggests the midnight sun and polar night experienced in the upper reaches of Scandinavia. Then the White Queen says something truly curious. Apparently referring to the thunderstorm again, she says, “‘Humpty Dumpty saw it too,’ the White Queen went on in a low voice, more as if she were talking to herself. ‘He came to the door with a corkscrew in his hand—‘ “‘What for?’ said the Red Queen. “‘He said he would come in,’ the White Queen went on, ‘because he was looking for a hippopotamus. Now, as it happened, there wasn’t such a thing in the house, that morning.’ “‘Is there generally?’ Alice asked in an astonished tone. “‘Well, only on Thursdays,’ said the Queen. “‘I know what he came for,’ said Alice: ‘he wanted to punish the fish, because—‘ Alice recognizes this as the story Humpty told in his inconclusive poem. Evidently, his intention with the fish was much the same as the Walrus and Carpenter’s with the oysters: the speaker in his poem said, “I took a kettle large and new, Fit for the deed I had to do. “My heart went hop, my heart went thump: I filled the kettle at the pump.” The speaker was probably going to cook and eat the fish, perhaps transporting them home first: but by the poem’s abrupt end, corkscrew in hand, he had not gotten past the locked door. Alice seems to have surmised as much. Despite the poem ending in the middle, she was ready to complete the statement: “I know what he came for. He wanted to punish the fish, because—“ they refused to get eaten, like the more compliant oysters. So now, we learn this really happened. Humpty came to the door while the White Queen was within. He never said what he wished of the fish in the poem, which they refused… but here, the White Queen says he was looking for a hippopotamus! What, did he fill the pail so he could give its sides a wash? Strikes me as unlikely. Thankfully for the fish, Humpty was unaware that there was only a hippopotamus about on Thursdays, and it was a Tuesday, so his excuse failed, and he apparently never got in. But, interrupting Alice, “Here the White Queen began again. ‘It was such a thunderstorm, you ca’n’t think!’ (‘She never could, you know,’ said the Red Queen.) ‘And part of the roof came off, and ever so much thunder got in—and it went rolling round the room in great lumps—and knocking over the tables and things—till I was so frightened, I couldn’t remember my own name!’” Which reminds me of something from Humpty’s poem, plus something Alice thought as she listened. Originally, the speaker was going to wake the sleeping fishes through an intermediary. “‘I said it very loud and clear: I went and shouted in his ear.’ “Humpty Dumpty raised his voice almost to a scream as he repeated this verse, and Alice thought with a shudder, ‘I wouldn’t have been the messenger for anything!’ “‘But he was very stiff and proud: He said 'You needn’t shout so loud!’” At which point the speaker, Humpty himself, goes to wake the fishes himself. When he was refused entry, did he raise his voice to a scream? The White Queen thought the sound that took the roof off was the thunder, but this sounds a lot like the old “I’ll huff, and I’ll puff, and I’ll blow your house down!” The Queen may have been confused. Humpty, who tries to present himself as cool and urbane, had shown so much temper just recounting the story. How mad would he have been at the time? Inadvertently, the White Queen saved the fish by refusing the egghead entry. I don’t think Alice realizes this, but she has come to see that the White Queen as good for all her befuddlement, and so she takes pity on her, and doesn’t press her on something that could cause offense. “Alice thought to herself, ‘I never should try to remember my name in the middle of an accident! Where would be the use of it?’ But she did not say this aloud, for fear of hurting the poor Queen’s feelings.” And it is then that we get the chess notation, “*W9: White Pawn becomes Queen.” Alice becoming a true Queen doesn’t happen because the Red Queen, or anyone else, decides it. It happens through the maturity of her behavior: she bears patiently with the White Queen, rather than press her on priorities in a moment of panic. By the same standard, the Red Queen fails as a Queen, as an adult. When the White Queen said, “‘It was such a thunderstorm, you ca’n’t think!’”, she got in a jab, “(‘She never could, you know,’ said the Red Queen,” just as Alice was about to hold off on hounding the slower-minded interlocuter. In the dialogue, the Red Queen (automatically?) recognizes Alice’s changed state, and perhaps takes a cue from her now peer. “‘Your Majesty must excuse her,’ the Red Queen said to Alice, taking one of the White Queen’s hands in her own, and gently stroking it: she means well, but she ca’n’t help saying foolish things, as a general rule.’” I cannot help thinking, the gatekeeper was never so worthy a royal, never so much a proper woman, as Alice was long before she found a golden crown upon her head. There is but one more episode to cover: Alice’s coronation dinner! How will Alice acquit herself, when someone she trusted tries to guilt and humiliate her? Expect an object lesson, for those girls who today dream of being princesses and queens, while looking forward to reaching adulthood themselves! #LewisCarroll #BarryMoser #ThroughTheLookingGlass #AliceInWonderland #PennyroyalPress #Pennyroyal #woodcutting #woodcut #engraving #illustration #art #HumptyDumpty #maturity #womanhood #adulthood #dreams #fantasy #childrensliterature #childrensbooks #literature #books

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