Alice Liddell

Alice Pleasance Liddell (May 4, 1852 – November 15 or November 16, 1934) was the inspiration for children's classic Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. Her surname Liddell is pronounced /lɪdl/ and rhymes with fiddle.

As with Carroll himself, there are many myths about her life, most of them based on mere rumours without any evidence to support them, but because they were put forward by many biographers as true facts they are falsely believed to be indisputable by the wide public.

Origin of Alice in Wonderland

On July 4, 1862, in a rowing boat travelling on the River Thames from Oxford to Godstow for a picnic outing, 10-year-old Alice asked Charles Dodgson to entertain her and her sisters Edith (age 8) and Lorina (age 13) with a story. As Reverend Robinson Duckworth rowed the boat, Dodgson regaled the girls with fantastic stories of a girl, named Alice, and her adventures after she fell through a rabbit-hole. The story was not so unlike those Dodgson had spun for the sisters before, but this time there was one significant difference. When it was done, Alice asked Mr. Dodgson to write it down for her. He promised to do so, but did not get round to it for some months. He eventually presented her with the manuscript of Alice's Adventures Underground in November 1864.

In the meantime, Dodgson had decided to rewrite the story as a possible commercial venture. Probably with a view to canvassing his opinion, Dodgson sent the manuscript of Underground to his friend the author George MacDonald in the spring of 1863 Dodgson's MS diaries, vol.8, p. 89, British Library. The MacDonald children read the story and loved it, and this probably persuaded Dodgson to seek out a publisher. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, with illustrations by John Tenniel, was published in 1865 under the pen name Lewis Carroll. A second "Alice" book, Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There followed in 1871, and, in 1886, a facsimile of Alice's Adventures under Ground, the original manuscript Dodgson gave Alice, was published.

Biography

Alice Liddell was a daughter of Henry Liddell, Dean of Christ Church, Oxford, and his wife Lorina Hanna, née Reeve. Alice was the fourth child, having two older brothers, Harry (born 1847) and Arthur (born 1850, died of scarlet fever in 1853), and an older sister, Lorina (born 1849). She had six younger siblings, including her sister Edith (born 1854), to whom she was very close. One of her younger brothers died as an infant.

At the time of her birth, her father was the dean of Westminster School, but was soon after appointed to the deanery of Christ Church, Oxford and the Liddell family moved to Oxford in 1856. It was soon after this move that Alice first met Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, who came across the dean's family while he was photographing the cathedral on 25 April 1856 when Alice was almost four. He became a close friend of Alice and the rest of the Liddell family for the following years (see Relationship with Lewis Carroll below). Alice grew up primarily in the company of her two nearest sisters, Lorina, who was three years older, and Edith, who was two years younger. She and her family regularly spent holidays at their holiday-home Penmorfa, now the Gogarth Abbey Hotel on the wild West Shore of Llandudno in North Wales.

When Alice was a young woman, she set out on a grand tour of Europe with Lorina and Edith, as was the custom in those days for families of her standing. Two years later, her younger sister, Edith, died, possibly of measles or possibly of peritonitis (versions seem conflicted), shortly before she was to be married. At this time, another myth has it that Alice was a romantic interest of Prince Leopold, the youngest son of Queen Victoria. But away from the certitudes of the more romantic of her biographers (like Anne Clark), there is very little evidence for this. In fact Leopold's most recent biographer suggests it is far more likely that it was Alice's sister Edith who was the recipient of Leopold's attention. cited in Leach, Karoline In the Shadow of the Dreamchild,p.201 Alice married Reginald Hargreaves on September 15, 1880, at the age of 28 in Westminster Abbey. They had three sons: Alan Knyveton Hargreaves, Leopold Reginald "Rex" Hargreaves (both killed in action in World War I), and Caryl Liddell Hargreaves, who survived to have a daughter of his own. Alice denied that the name 'Caryl' was in any way associated with Charles Dodgson's pseudonym.

The cost of maintaining their home, Cuffnells, was such that it was deemed necessary to sell Alice's copy of Alice's Adventures Under Ground. The manuscript, fetched nearly four times the reserve price given it by the auction house Sotheby's, selling for £15,400. It became the possession of Eldridge R. Johnson, and was displayed at Columbia University on the centennial of Carroll's birth (Alice was present, aged 80, and it was on this visit to America that she met Peter Llewelyn-Davies, one of the brothers who were the inspiration for J. M. Barrie's Peter Pan). At Johnson's death, the book was bought by a consortium of American bibliophiles and presented to the British people "in recognition of Britain's courage in facing Hitler before America came into the war." The manuscript now resides in the British Library.

Relationship with Lewis Carroll

The relationship between Alice Liddell and Charles Dodgson has been the source of much controversy. Many biographers have supposed that Dodgson was romantically attached to the child, though there has never been any direct evidence to support this. Recent writers have claimed this supposition is part of the so-called "Carroll Myth" and thus wildly distorted Leach, Karoline ''In the Shadow of the Dreamchild', London 1999, "The Unreal Alice" . It is certainly true that the evidence pool on which any claims can be based is very small, and many authors writing on the topic have tended to add to this with a great deal of speculation and supposition.

Dodgson first met the Liddell family in 1855. He first befriended Harry, the older brother, and later took both Harry and Ina on several boating trips and picnics in the scenic areas around Oxford. Later, when Harry went to school, Alice and her younger sister Edith joined the party. Dodgson entertained the children by telling them fantastic stories to while away the time. He also often used them as subjects for his hobby, photography. It has often been stated that Alice was clearly the favorite throughout these years, but there is very little actual evidence to suggest this is so. Dodgson's diaries are missing from April 18 1858 to May 8 1862. Presumably they were destroyed by his heirs. They would have covered most of his close friendship with the Liddells – and indeed many other aspects of his experience. No one knows how or why they are now missing.

The close relationship between the Liddells and Dodgson suffered a sudden break in June 1863. Until recently there was no record of why the rift occurred, as the Liddells never openly spoke of it and the single page in Dodgson's diary from June 27-29 1863 (which seems to cover the period of the break) is one of those missing. It was speculated that Alice’s mother, Lorina Liddell, disapproved of Dodgson’s interest in her daughter as she saw him as an unfit suitor. Until recently the only source for knowledge of what happened on that day was guesswork (which there was much of), all centred on the idea that Alice Liddell was somehow the cause of the break.

"Cut Pages in Diary"

Then in 1996 Karoline Leach found what became known as the "Cut Pages in Diary" document ; a note allegedly written by Charles Dodgson's niece Violet Dodgson, summarizing the missing page from June 27-29 1863, apparently written before she (or her sister Menella) removed the page. The note reads:

"L.C. learns from Mrs Liddell that he is supposed to be using the children as a means of paying court to the governess - he is also supposed ^* to be courting Ina" (Leach, 1999).

It is uncertain who wrote the note; Leach has said that the handwriting on the front of the document most closely resembles that of either Menella or Violet Dodgson, Carroll's nieces. However, Morton N. Cohen says in an article recently published in the Times Literary Supplement Cohen, Morton N. "When Love was Young", ''Times Literary Supplement, October 2003 that, in the 1960s, Philip Dodgson Jacques told him that he had written the note himself based on conversations he remembered with his nieces. Cohen's article produced no evidence to support this however, and known samples of Jaques' handwriting do not seem to resemble the writing of the note very closely see discussion on the Lewis Carroll e-list, Autumn 2003. Precisely what this note means has yet to be determined, but it seems to imply that the 'break' between Dodgson and the Liddell family was caused by concern over the alleged 'gossip', linking Dodgson to the governess and to 'Ina' (presumably Alice's older sister). Whether there was any foundation in any of this gossip has not been determined.

Dodgson remained away from the Liddell home for some six months, but eventually returned for a visit in December 1863. However the former closeness does not seem to have been re-established, and the friendship gradually faded away, possibly because Dodgson was in opposition to Alice's father, Dean Liddell, over college politics at the time Christ Church & Reform. Other explanations, involving romantic entanglements and broken hearts have also been put forward, but while there is some evidence to suggest such possibilities, nothing definite is known. After the rift between Dodgson and the Liddells, Alice and her sisters pursued a similar relationship with John Ruskin, as detailed in Ruskin's autobiography Praeterita. However, this may not be entirely factual.

Comparison with fictional Alice

Alice Liddell and "Alice", the character in the book, are clearly not identical. The extent to which "Alice" is based on Alice Liddell is controversial. It was long assumed that she was based very heavily on Alice Liddell, but recent research has contradicted this assumption. Dodgson himself claimed in later years that his "Alice" was entirely imaginary, and not based upon any real child at all. It is clear that Alice Liddell did not inspire the illustrations of "Alice" in the published books. There is a myth that Dodgson sent Tenniel a photo of another child-friend of his, Mary Hilton Badcock, suggesting that he use her as a model Gardner, Martin, The Annotated Alice 1970, chap. 1 . But all attempts to find any evidence for this theory have so far proved fruitless. No one knows what (if any) model Tenniel used for his Alice. Moreover, even Dodgson's own drawings of "Alice" in the original manuscript, Alice's Adventures under Ground, show little resemblance to Alice Liddell. Alice biographer Anne Clark suggested he might have used Alice's younger sister Edith as a model for his drawings Clark, Anne, Lewis Carroll1982, p. 91 but this remains mere speculation with no available factual support.

Whatever the source of the fictional Alice, the books were dedicated to Alice Pleasance Liddell. There is a poem at the end of Through the Looking Glass, which is an acrostic. Reading downward, taking the first letter of each line, spells out Alice's name in full. The poem has no title in Through the Looking Glass but is usually referred to by its first line, "A Boat Beneath a Sunny Sky".

Contemporary writers have written fictional accounts of Alice Liddell. She is one of the main characters of the Riverworld series of books, by Philip José Farmer. Canadian poet Stephanie Bolster also wrote a collection of poems, White Stone, based on her. Katie Roiphe has also written a fictional (although claimed to be based on fact) account of the relationship between Alice and Carroll, titled "Still She Haunts Me." The 1985 movie Dreamchild deals with Alice Liddell Hargreaves' trip to America for the Columbia University presentation described above. Through a series of flashbacks, it promotes the popular assumption that Dodgson was romantically attracted to Alice.

References

Gardner, Martin (1965). Introduction to Alice's Adventures under Ground by Lewis Carroll. Dover Publications. ISBN 0-486-21482-6.
Gardner, Martin (Ed.) (1970). The Annotated Alice (Revised Edition). Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-001387-3.
Gray, Donald J. The Norton Critical Edition of Alice in Wonderland, edited by Donald J. Gray ^*.

External links

A biographical page about Alice Liddell from the Alice in Oxford website
Alice Liddell

1852 births | 1934 deaths | Alice in Wonderland | Women of the Victorian era