January 27th Mad Hatter Tea Party Day/Rabbit Hole Day

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, who wrote Alice's Adventures in Wonderland under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll, was born on this date in 1832. Here are some things you may not know about the "Alice" stories:

Lewis Carroll

1. The story was born on a five mile rowing trip up the Isis along with Rev. Robinson Duckworth and the three daughters of Henry Liddell, one of whom was called Alice. Alice in particular loved the story so much that she asked Carroll to write it down for her. Three years later he gave her the full written version for Christmas. At this point he was already preparing to publish it.
2. Characters in the story are said to be caricatures of people the children would have known - Dodgson himself is the Dodo (because he stuttered and his name came out sometimes as Dodo-Dodgson), the Duck is Duckworth, the Mad Hatter a local shopkeeper, and the Mock Turtle the children's art teacher.
3. It has been suggested political figures were also used - that Bill the Lizard was a play on Benjamin Disraeli, and that the Queen of Hearts represented Queen Victoria!
4. Some scholars have suggested that there are references to the story relating to the lessons the girls would have been taking - mathematics, French, Latin and history (the playing cards painting the white roses red, for example, is an allusion to the Wars of the Roses).
5. In the English version, Alice thinks the mouse may be French and speaks to it in French. In the French translation, she speaks to the mouse in Italian.
6. The traditional illustration of Alice with long blonde hair is not a representation of Alice Liddell, who had short, dark hair.
7. The Hatter is never referred to in the books as "The Mad Hatter". The phrase "mad as a hatter" already existed (because hat makers worked with mercury, and often suffered from mercury poisoning, which caused neurological damage). The Cheshire Cat does, however, comment that the Hatter and the March Hare are "both mad".
8. The ticket in the Hatter's hat reads 10/6 which refers to the cost of the hat - ten shillings and six pence in old money, the equivalent of 52.5p today.
9. The Cheshire Cat may have been based on a gargoyle or church carving that he came across in his travels. The phrase "grinning like a Cheshire cat" did not originate with Carroll, but is thought to come from the fact that there are a lot of dairy farms in Cheshire and therefore a lot of milk and cream - so the cats there have plenty to smile about!
10. Charles Dodgson was an inventor as well as a writer. One of his inventions was an aid to writing, called a nyctograph, which used a card grid and symbols to allow note-taking in the dark, so he could record any ideas that came to him in the middle of the night without getting out of bed.