1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910136126803321

Autore

Beer Gillian

Titolo

Alice in space : the sideways Victorian world of Lewis Carroll / / Gillian Beer

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Chicago, IL : , : University of Chicago Press, , [2016]

©2016

ISBN

0-226-40479-X

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (307 pages) : illustrations

Collana

Carpenter lectures

Classificazione

HL 2395

Disciplina

823.8

Soggetti

Fantasy fiction, English - Criticism and interpretation

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- 1.Alice in time -- 2. “the faculty of invention”: games, play, and maths -- 3. Puns, punch, and parody -- 4. the dialogues of Alice: pretending to be two people -- 5. Are you animal — vegetable — or mineral?: Alice’s identity -- 6. “must a name mean something” Alice asked doubtfully -- 7. Dreaming and justice -- 8. Growing and eating -- Epilogue -- Notes -- Selected bibliography -- Index

Sommario/riassunto

In Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass, Lewis Carroll created fantastic worlds that continue to delight and trouble readers of all ages today. Few consider, however, that Carroll conceived his Alice books during the 1860s, a moment of intense intellectual upheaval, as new scientific, linguistic, educational, and mathematical ideas flourished around him and far beyond. Alice in Space reveals the contexts within which the Alice books first lived, bringing back the zest to jokes lost over time and poignancy to hidden references. Gillian Beer explores Carroll’s work through the speculative gaze of Alice, for whom no authority is unquestioned and everything can speak. Parody and Punch, evolutionary debates, philosophical dialogues, educational works for children, math and logic, manners and rituals, dream theory and childhood studies—all fueled the fireworks. While much has been written about Carroll’s biography and his influence on children’s literature, Beer convincingly shows him at play in the spaces of Victorian cultural and intellectual life, drawing on



then-current controversies, reading prodigiously across many fields, and writing on multiple levels to please both children and adults in different ways. With a welcome combination of learning and lightness, Beer reminds us that Carroll’s books are essentially about curiosity, its risks and pleasures. Along the way, Alice in Space shares Alice’s exceptional ability to spark curiosity in us, too.