Crawling Out of the Rabbit Hole

Brittany Liebenow

Class Entry

7 March 2010

Crawling Out of the Rabbit Hole

I think Friday’s class was one of the best we’ve had so far. I’m also fairly sure that most of the class is going to blog about that class. Not only do I appreciate green tea, the tea you gave us happens to be my favorite brand. I know its not real green tea, but it certainly does taste good. I like the plum flavor the best myself.
Anyhow, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll is quite a book in my opinion. From the single chapter we read in class, I can tell this novel has humor, wit, and literary merit. So one question arises from these observations: why can’t we read it in class? I believe it would make for some fine allusions.
The novel would also correspond perfectly with the books we are reading now. The comparisons we could make among The Great Gatsby, As I Lay Dying, and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland are essentially infinite.
As I Lay Dying and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland surprisingly have a lot in common. They are both narratives and show only the perceptions of the particular narrator. The biggest difference in the overall narrative styles would be that As I Lay Dying has multiple narrators that switch off with each chapter. The altered sense of reality is also another similarity between the two novels. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland obviously has more explicit examples of altered senses of reality considering the novel is a story about an alternate reality. As I Lay Dying, however hard Faulkner tried to make the novel truer to reality, make us feel as if we are swimming through a stream of fantasy and fiction attempting to spin the lies into something that actually happened in the novel. Alice does seem to be considerably more educated, if not just more intelligent, than Faulkner’s dimwitted characters.
The Great Gatsby is more similar to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland in overall style because both novels are narrated by one single character. It is also interesting to note that, while we as the readers do care about Alice and Nick, the characters that Alice and Nick describe are much more interesting than themselves. We almost care more about what the narrators have to say rather than how it impacts them. The characters Nick and Alice appear to have a lot in common. Both are fairly normal individuals that find themselves in a curious set of circumstances. The only main difference is that Alice is swimming through a fantasy world, and Nick is picking bodies up out of a swimming pool. Essentially, Alice’s world is a bit more fictional than that of Nick. Both novels employ excellent vocabulary and a crisp, clean-cut literary style that is enjoyable to read.
Reading Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland would also be a good break from the regular school-required book list. I’m not sure how they compile that list, but they need serious help. From me. This novel should actually be added to that list! I feel that my peers today do not think outside the box enough. Reading Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland could be a safe, controlled way to make thinking that outside the box possible.