tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1946722630962887786.post5307717830602672125..comments2014-10-22T10:16:18.842-07:00Comments on Archfriend: Explanation of the Jabberwocky (2nd draft - re-blocked).Archfriendhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16427916684246054084noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1946722630962887786.post-86895931499895297772010-11-10T02:29:46.721-08:002010-11-10T02:29:46.721-08:00Alice begins her adventure by playing with her cat...<b>Alice begins her adventure by playing with her cat, Dinah, and her two kittens, Kitty and Snowdrop. She begins to daydream and later elaborates an entire world behind the looking-glass, which on its surface we may see a normal reflection, but on the other side it may look totally different. It is safe to say that Alice has now fallen asleep and began dreaming, for she has found herself climbing up the mantle-piece and crawled through to the other side. In the real world this is impossible because a mirror is simply a reflective piece of glass that bounces light exactly in the opposite direction. Dream-logic works differently, a dream wants you to always make you think that you're currently not dreaming, and since light does not exist in a dream, the other side of a mirror is really another room which is a reverse facsimile of every object that is in your current room! It is a trick!<br /><br />When Alice arrives on the other side of the Looking Glass, she plays around with some of the chess-pieces and then she discovers a book lying on a table. At first she believes it's in some foreign language she can't read, but happens upon a page where the text is printed backwards. She realizes it is a Looking Glass book and she must hold it up to the glass to make the words appear the right way again, and behold the entire poem is now revealed. It is a poem titled JABBERWOCKY. One thing you notice when you first see the text printed reverse, is that you only have the first verse and the title. According to a letter Lewis Carrol wrote to his publisher in January 1868, he may have implied that he wanted the entire poem to be printed in reverse. His publisher responded that it was definitely possible but would cost 'a great deal'. The result of showing only the first stanza probably works better for the story (maybe related to the 'accidental discovery' I related earlier) for as we have all probably experienced in dreams the difficulty in reading any text. It is my interpretation that Alice, once holding the book up to the glass, was really only reading and re-reading the one stanza however the words kept changing and by the end of it she could not comprehend any of its gibberish vocabulary but regards it as 'very pretty' in any case.<br /><br />In actual study of the poem, in the words that we can properly interpret, there lies a story about a boy who slays some kind of a beast called the 'Jabberwock' and triumphantly returns home with its head. The story conflicts with the provided illustration where John Tenniel has clearly represented a young girl (much resembling Alice from behind) in anticipation of swinging her sword. I believe it is here that some confusion begins within the many adapted works of this story, but the truth is simple. Carroll originally intended this image as the frontispiece but upon suggestion that it is 'too terrible a monster, and likely to alarm nervous and imaginative children', he had second thoughts and transferred it to its rightful place next to the poem, replacing the frontispiece with a much more serene image of Alice and the White Knight. Obviously it would have been much to bothersome, even to think about, changing the Alice-looking figure in the Jabberwocky image into a boy as the original poem describes, so it has been left as it is, ready to be thoroughly looked into with much deeper interpretation and creative sparks that formulate whole new sub-plots that give the Jabberwocky an opportunity to become an actual character (always as a villain) in the 'mythical' world of Alice.<br /><br />Let's explore how some films have done so...</b>Archfriendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16427916684246054084noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1946722630962887786.post-48503364401268967282010-11-10T02:29:21.749-08:002010-11-10T02:29:21.749-08:00THE JABBERWOCKY
It must be assumed that any film-...<b>THE JABBERWOCKY<br /><br />It must be assumed that any film-maker or studio who is adapting a highly-regarded classical work must have done their research or hired an assistant to do research or has sought advice from an expert who is researched on the original source material. In the case of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland it is not very difficult as modern editions have come with annotations with thorough explanations and histories of the text, much like the reading of Shakespeare, the original story has been so repeatedly celebrated it is a wonder any one still believes it was invented by Walt Disney (I may resent saying that).<br /><br />Thus, as I witness the multiple interpretations of the Alice story it is my understanding that the film-makers have acknowledged the information readily available yet still choose to create their own new spin in order to keep a fresh perspective or maintain a unique vision. This can happen as a creative 'spark' which, in their minds, has been accidentally discovered to enhance their material in many ways such as a great metaphor for the whole piece, and so the idea is happily kept. This is not always so bad, however my only other conclusion is that they just did not do the research.<br /><br />To begin, I will recap on the story of the Jabberwocky, taking all my information only from what has been provided by the annotations within Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There. Plus some common-sense knowledge about dreams.</b>Archfriendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16427916684246054084noreply@blogger.com