Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass Language and Communication Quotes Page 1
Citations follow this format: (Book.Chapter.Paragraph)
| Quote #1 "Would it be of any use, now," thought Alice, "to speak to this mouse? Everything is so out-of-the-way down here, that I should think it very likely it can talk: at any rate, there's no harm in trying." So she began: "O Mouse, do you know the way out of this pool? I am very tired of swimming about here, O Mouse!" (Alice thought this must be the right way of speaking to a mouse: she had never done such a thing before, but she remembered having seen, in her brother's Latin Grammar, "A mouse – of a mouse – to a mouse – a mouse – O mouse!") (Wonderland 2.15) |
Alice's humorous misapplication of her brother's Latin textbook is the first indication that the ways of communicating she's learned in school aren't going to be much help to her in Wonderland – although they are good for a laugh.
| Quote #2 "In that case," said the Dodo solemnly, rising to its feet, "I move that the meeting adjourn, for the immediate adoption of more energetic remedies – " |
The Eaglet objects to making language too complicated; there's no need, after all, to put obstacles in the way of understanding one another. The Dodo, Lewis Carroll's own self-parody (a play on the way he would stutter his real name "Do-Do-Dodgson"), likes using flowery language and fancy words, but this really isn't necessary for his audience of child readers.
| Quote #3 "You are not attending!" said the Mouse to Alice, severely. "What are you thinking of?" |
Before the "Who's on First?" sketch, there were the Alice books. In each line, a new misinterpretation (usually totally illogical) interferes with the communication between characters. Alice's confusion of the homophones "tale" / "tail" and "knot" / "not" is behind this comedic exchange. (Take a look at Chapter 3 to see the Mouse's "tale" pictured as a concrete poem "tail.")
