Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll

Can we have POSSIBLY picked a better time to read this book? I think not. Having recently read The Looking Glass Wars and then just having finished up Seeing Redd, I was anxious to read the "original tale" of Alice. Or Alyss. Whichever you prefer. Quite frankly, I now prefer Alyss. Which is probably why purists wouldn't enjoy Beddor creeping in and taking over Carroll's original story.

I've read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland several times previously but this time I found it to be quite the annoying tale. Before, when reading, I saw it as nonsensical humor. I never understood why Carroll carried on the "conversations" in the book in the manner that he did. Exactly why did he choose to go about not making any sense?

However, this time I see sense in it, which is what I find so disturbing. He's describing people and he does it very well. Maybe it's just me and the world I'm currently living in but it seems like I can say one thing and people like to take it and twist it into something I would never have said at all. It's viewed in a somewhat humourous light to play the old slumber party game "telephone" all the time. In every conversation. And that's what Alice is like. You say one thing, I hear another and I see how funny I can make it sound all together. Which might be funny once or twice but by the end of the game, and in life in general, it gets old really, really fast. I frequently feel like Alice:

Alice said nothing; she had sat down again with her face in her hands, wondering if anything would ever happen in a natural way again. (p. 158)

Or here:

"But I don't want to go among mad people," Alice remarked. "Oh, you can't help that," said the cat: "We're all mad here." (p. 90)

Now I don't mind quirky but quirky can be overdone and when its unending, its unnerving. I saw myself in several characters this time. I've never identified anything in the book with human traits but they are everywhere. In almost every line you will find something. I was surprised by it all and would really rather not read it again as a result. (Although I think I'm still quite fond of the Disney cartoon version and with the story in general -- as long as I don't have to delve too deeply into it.)

Looking at it from the fiction point of view, and tying it in with the recent Looking Glass Wars craze, I would say Beddor did a really good job of explaining himself in the first book and played off of Carroll very well. Actually, if you think about it, Beddor did to Carroll what Carroll did to all of us. Think about that for a second.

He got what he deserved!