RA Crossroads: Alice in Wonderland

Featuring Jasper Fforde, Raven Gregory & Melanie Benjamin

By Neal Wyatt -- Library Journal, 3/4/2010

There is a reason, other than it is a great line, that an epigraph taken from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland prefaces all RA Crossroad columns. Lewis Carroll’s book serves as an example of how different threads of exploration can be woven together into fancy. I think of RA as a continual voyage to wonderland, where advisors weave collections into imaginative adventures for readers.

Tim Burton’s long-awaited Alice in Wonderland opens tomorrow and with it a chance to revisit a beloved character. Mad for the books, I have been saving up for some time for this opportunity to share. There are a lot of choices, as the Alice story has been adapted endlessly, so I am limiting my picks to fun, important works that have helped shape Alice as we know it. With a list like this, it is best, as the King tells Alice, to "Begin at the beginning and go on till you come to the end: then stop."

Begin:

Carroll, Lewis (text) & John Tenniel (illus). Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland: The Definitive Illustrated Edition. HarperCollins. 1992. 208p. ISBN 978-0-688-11087-1. pap. $16.99.
Featuring illustrations made from the original woodblock engravings of Tenniel, this is the version to read. Long thought lost, this edition rescues Tenniel’s artwork from the oft-seen indistinct and muddy prints most commonly used and showcases his fine lines and eye for detail. This is the version Carroll wanted. Carroll would also have wanted readers to follow Alice in Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There (ISBN 978-0-14-143976-1), the novel that introduced "The Walrus and the Carpenter" and the unbirthday concept. 

Read-Alikes:

Fforde, Jasper. The Big Over Easy. Penguin. 2006. 400p. ISBN 978-0-14-303723-1. pap. $14.
Being rather singular, the Alice story is not so easy to match to other titles. Driving considerations include the language and flight of fancy, the wit, and character creation. Fforde immediately leaps to mind. While his Thursday Next books are sublime, his Nursery Crime books nicely fit the bill. Start with this first entry in the series, which sets up the premise as readers meet Jack Spratt of the Nursery Crime Division and his partner, Sgt. Mary Mary (yes, she is contrary), who are charged with finding the murderer of Humpty Dumpty. Turns out Humpty was a bad egg, a con man caught in a web of bad deals. Jack, still upset over his failure to convict the murderers of the Big Bad Wolf, must console himself with tracking down Humpty’s killer in this send-up of hard-boiled procedurals. Whimsical, overflowing with puns and plays on texts, this series offers fans of Alice similar pleasures.

Lear, Edward. The Complete Verse and Other Nonsense. Penguin. 2002. 624p. ISBN 978-0-14-200227-8. pap. $20.
The nonsense and language play of Lear here might please Alice fans who find the Walrus and the Carpenter and the Jabberwocky appealing. Lear published his nonsense rhymes before Carroll, but both are Victorians and share a strikingly similar sensibility. Lear’s verse is shorter but holds the rhythm and flights of fancy of Carroll, and, like Carroll, his verse can turn melancholy as much as silly and is extravagant and imaginatively fanciful. Dip into "The Duck and the Kangaroo" and the "Jumblies" for an example.

Read-Arounds:

Gregory, Raven. Return to Wonderland. Zenescope. 2009. 186p. ISBN 978-0-9817550-5-2. pap. $19.99.
Fittingly, the Alice story has served as great literary inspiration. Graphic novelists have taken the text, mixed in new images, and created new works. Gregory's graphic novel series is dark, sexed-up, and horror-filled. In this story, Alice is all grown up, with a family of her own, but haunted by her memories of Wonderland, she is driven mad. Her daughter, Calie, dealing with a life shadowed by mental illness, makes her own trip into Wonderland and discovers for herself what has tormented her mother.

Talbot, Bryan. Alice in Sunderland. Dark Horse. 2007. 328p. ISBN 978-1-59307-673-3. $29.95.
Here we get graphic "entertainment," a wild ride into the world of Lewis Carroll and his wonderland. Framed by the story of Sunderland, England (the hometown of Talbot and a city Carroll frequented), Talbot takes readers on an adventure of his own, highlighting the locale and a run of other images, ideas, and sidelines but also weaving in a rich and lovingly illustrated (pen-and-ink, graphic collage, riffs on Hergé, and the banned EC horror comics) story of Carroll, Alice, and the land that just might have inspired the novel. Reading it and sinking into the images, you just know Carroll would be pleased.

Beddor, Frank. The Looking Glass War. Speak. 2007. 400p. ISBN 978-0-14-240941-1. pap. $8.99.
Illustrations are not the only ways Alice has been imagined. Many authors have taken inspiration from the lexicon and characters of Carroll, not the least of whom is Beddor. This book and its continuations, though designed for teens, make great next reading for Alice fans willing to enter a reframed Wonderland, one where Alyss is heir to the throne of Wonderland and escapes assassination by traveling to Victorian England. There she meets Charles Dodgson and persuades him to tell her story. As the novel unfolds, Alyss is threatened in England while war breaks out in Wonderland, and readers get to meet royal bodyguard Hatter Madigan and the assassin cat with nine lives. Beddor’s imagination is not sufficiently soothed with text. He has also inspired a graphic novel series, of which Hatter M (ISBN 978-0-9818737-0-1) is the first, as well as created The Looking Glass Wars Soundtrack, which makes the idea of Vooks seem almost inevitable.

Noon, Jeff. Automated Alice. Transworld. 2000. 256p. ISBN 978-0-552-99905-2. pap. $24.95.
Given the wordplay, puzzles, and rich space for invention inside the Alice tale, it is no surprise that postmodernists have taken turns with the story, Noon being a notable example. Here, Alice heads into the future to find a world full of puns, math puzzles, and robots. Caught up in a murder investigation, she must find a way back to her home time and place before the evil Civil Serpents set her up. Illustrated in a manner evocative of Tenniel and using a style of wordplay that sharply evokes Carroll, Noon’s book is a cult favorite.

Alice Redux: New Stories of Alice, Lewis, and Wonderland. Paycock Pr. 2005. 338p. ed. by Richard Peabody. ISBN 978-0-931181-22-1. pap. $15.95.
Readers who enjoy Noon will love this collection of stories that features many of today’s best postmodern writers, including Robert Coover and Angela Carter. It’s a subversive and fantastic remix of the Alice story, both within Wonderland and in history. One of the best, by Lorraine Schein, features a travel agency and the characters of Alice, Wendy, and Dorothy.

Benjamin, Melanie. Alice I Have Been. Delacorte. 2010. 368p. ISBN 978-0-385-34413-5. $25.
In this debut novel, the real-life Alice and real-life Charles Dodgson are knit back into fiction as Benjamin uses historical research to tell the story of Alice, her friend Charles, and the relationship that inspired his work. Alice, born into privilege, is forced to sever her ties to Charles when her family grows concerned about his attentions. The trauma of the loss of that friendship spirals in Alice’s life as the story focuses on three stages of her development, ranging from young girl to dowager. Written with a deft and poetic hand, this version of Alice is far, far away from Wonderland. Audio fans should note that Samantha Eggar reads it wonderfully for Random House Audio.

Bolster, Stephanie. White Stone: The Alice Poems. Vehicule Pr. 1998. 96p. ISBN 978-1-55065-099-0. pap. $12.
As poetic as Carroll was, he inspired other poets. This collection explores the real-life Alice (subject to Dodgson’s camera and black cape) before they turn to Alice of Wonderland and reimagine her elsewhere, with Persephone in the Underworld, with Elvis in Memphis and at the Tate Gallery, and with Christopher Robin. The poems are tender, graceful, and strong, garnering for Bolster the 1998 Governor General’s Literary Award for Poetry.

Leach, Karoline. In the Shadow of the Dreamchild. Peter Owen. 2009. 358p. ISBN 978-0-7206-1318-6. pap. $29.95.
If by now you want to know more about Dodgson, consider this groundbreaking book. Leach contends that the uneasy view of Dodgson’s relationship with Alice (and other children) is pure biographer-created myth and sets out to show how that myth came into being. It is a fascinating story, deeply researched, and puts forth a fresh take on Dodgson and his connection to Alice’s family. Beyond Leach’s intriguing premise about biography, the author’s manner of explanation and the way she constructs this work make it compulsively readable as well.

Carroll, Lewis with annotations & notes by Martin Gardner & John Tenniel (illus.). The Annotated Alice: The Definitive Edition. Norton. 1999. 352p. ISBN 978-0-393-04847-6. $29.95.
Finally, the Alice story is certainly one that could use a guide, and no one has offered a better gazetteer than Gardner. He lovingly provides readers with a gloss of the Alice story, complete with what can best be described as footnotes on steroids. Almost every line of the story is augmented with Gardner’s research, opinion, and asides, and this creates a dual text to read along with the classic. Readers who have trouble with some of the book’s inside jokes or oblique references now have a guiding hand to explain them. Gardner is so obviously, and joyfully, entranced by the story that readers soon become sucked into the minutia of the backstory as well.

Listen-Alikes: 

Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. BBC Audiobooks America. 2006. ISBN 978-0-7927-3984-5. $39.95.
For audio fans, the best edition is BBC Audiobooks America’s, narrated by Alan Bennett. Bennett narrates this must-listen experience with an amazingly dexterous voice, inhabiting the creatures and characters of the novels. He gamely jumps into the joy of the story, keeping the pace and rhythm on track and taking listeners deep into the heart of Wonderland. His voice is amazing as it doles out the puns and riddles and just miraculous as it slides from Alice to the Cheshire Cat to the Dormouse to the Queen. Stories that are well known often have a hard time breaking out of the mold of expectations, but Bennett delivers such a fresh and wonderful take on Carroll’s story that he crafts a new version, the standard that all listeners will keep in their heads for years to come.

The Big Over Easy. BBC Audiobooks America. 2005. ISBN 978-0-7927-3701-8. $94.95.
Simon Prebble reads Fforde’s novel in his usual, brilliant way. His delivery is spot-on, deadpan with just a touch of wild glee as he slips from voice to voice, racing to keep up with Fforde’s zany pace. The many characters each get their own moment and singular voice, and listeners who never thought of what Mrs. Hubbard might sound like will be fully convinced that Prebble got it right. His British accent—calm, clear, and soothing—lends a steadying force to the narrative that nicely balances the lunacy. His reading tackles the text, full of palindromes and anagrams, with a skill that will leave you laughing  out loud. Prebble also reads the next in the Nursery Crimes series, The Fourth Bear. 

Watch-Alikes:

Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland. Image Entertainment. 2001. $24.99.
Filmed in 1982, this Broadway production features an all-star cast including Richard Burton, Maureen Stapleton, and Nathan Lane. Based on the 1932 production, this telling of the Alice stories is very close to the books and includes amazing sets and costumes that look like Tenniel’s illustrations. For fans of the Alice stories, it is hard to find a version that more closely cleaves to character and plot.

Alice in Wonderland. Disney Home Video. 2004. $29.99.
For fancy, the 1951 Disney movie sets the standard and has supplied the voice of Alice, the Mad Hatter, and the Caterpillar for decades. This is the movie that those who have not read the Carroll texts think of as the Alice story, and Disney’s imaginative play has come to stand for much of what we think of as Alice’s landscape—surreal, a bit dark, and lyrical.

Alice in Wonderland. Sony Pictures. 2006. $12.99.
While it is certain that the 2010 Tim Burton adaptation is going to be visually amazing, how can you beat a version with Ringo Starr as the Mock Turtle and Telly Savalas as the Cheshire Cat? The 1985 classic TV miniseries also featured Sammy Davis Jr. as the Caterpillar and thrilled fans with its detail, huge cast, and inventive settings. 

Now, as the King suggests, I will stop.