Lewis Carroll's "Alice" and Cognitive Narratology


Book Description

We live in an age that is witnessing a growing interest in narrative studies, cognitive neuroscientific tools, mind studies and artificial intelligence hypotheses. This book therefore aims to expand the exegesis of Carroll's "Alice" books, aligning them with the current intellectual environment. The theoretical force of this volume lies in the successful encounter between a great book (and all its polysemous ramifications) and a new interpretative point of view, powerful enough to provide a new original contribution, but well grounded enough not to distort the text itself. Moreover, this book is one of the first to offer a complete, thorough analysis of one single text through the theoretical lens of cognitive narratology, and not just as a series of brief examples embedded within a more general discussion. It emphasises in a more direct, effective way the actual novelty and usefulness of the dialogue established between narrative theory and the cognitive sciences. It links specific concepts elaborated in the theory of cognitive narratology with the analysis of the "Alice" books, helping in this way to discuss, question and extend the concepts themselves, opening up new interpretations and practical methods.




Cognitive Alice


Book Description




Lewis Carroll's "Alice" and Cognitive Narratology


Book Description

We live in an age that is witnessing a growing interest in narrative studies, cognitive neuroscientific tools, mind studies and artificial intelligence hypotheses. This book therefore aims to expand the exegesis of Carroll's "Alice" books, aligning them with the current intellectual environment. The theoretical force of this volume lies in the successful encounter between a great book (and all its polysemous ramifications) and a new interpretative point of view, powerful enough to provide a new original contribution, but well grounded enough not to distort the text itself. Moreover, this book is one of the first to offer a complete, thorough analysis of one single text through the theoretical lens of cognitive narratology, and not just as a series of brief examples embedded within a more general discussion. It emphasises in a more direct, effective way the actual novelty and usefulness of the dialogue established between narrative theory and the cognitive sciences. It links specific concepts elaborated in the theory of cognitive narratology with the analysis of the "Alice" books, helping in this way to discuss, question and extend the concepts themselves, opening up new interpretations and practical methods.




Alice in Wonderland


Book Description

Alice in Wonderland is a dramatization of Lewis Carroll's classic tales, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Glass," adapted for the stage by Alice Gerstenberg. This adaptation brings the beloved characters and fantastical world of Wonderland to life in a theatrical setting, offering audiences a new way to experience these timeless stories.




The Making of the Alice Books


Book Description

Analysing Lewis Carroll's Alice books in the context of children's literature from the seventeenth through the nineteenth century, Ronald Reichertz argues that Carroll's striking originality was the result of a fusion of his narrative imagination and formal and thematic features from earlier children's literature. The Making of the Alice Books includes discussions of the didactic and nursery rhyme verse traditionally addressed by Carroll's critics while adding and elaborating connections established within and against the continuum of English-language children's literature. Drawing examples from a wide range of children's literature Reichertz demonstrates that the Alice books are infused with conventions of and allusions to earlier works and identifies precursors of Carroll's upside-down, looking-glass, and dream vision worlds. Key passages from related books are reprinted in the appendices, making available many hard-to-find examples of early children's literature.




Elucidating Alice


Book Description

This textual commentary looks at "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" quite simply, as a children's novel, investigating the book's narrative structure, analysing how Carroll successfully constructed a pioneering book for children that was to stand the test of time, remaining remarkably relevant to the present day. There are many depths and subtleties in this book that can only be properly appreciated by examining the text line by line. The writing is supremely skilful, and will stand the closest scrutiny-even virtually to every line of the narrative. Most books would crumble under such close analysis. It is testimony to the strength, depth, and quality of "Alice" that the book comes through such intense examination and survives triumphantly. ---- Selwyn Goodacre has a large Lewis Carroll collection including over 2000 copies of the "Alice" books. He is a past chairman of the Lewis Carroll Society, and edited the Society journal from 1974-1997. For years he has pursued a special interest in the text of the "Alice" books, which has led to his current commentary on, and analysis of, the way they were written."




The Place of Lewis Carroll in Children's Literature


Book Description

In this volume, Jan Susina examines the importance of Lewis Carroll and his popular Alice books to the field of children’s literature. From a study of Carroll’s juvenilia to contemporary multimedia adaptations of Wonderland, Susina shows how the Alice books fit into the tradition of literary fairy tales and continue to influence children’s writers. In addition to examining Carroll’s books for children, these essays also explore his photographs of children, his letters to children, his ill-fated attempt to write for a dual audience of children and adults, and his lasting contributions to publishing. The book addresses the important, but overlooked facet of Carroll’s career as an astute entrepreneur who carefully developed an extensive Alice industry of books and non-book items based on the success of Wonderland, while rigorously defending his reputation as the originator of his distinctive style of children’s stories.




Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass


Book Description

Emerging in several different versions during the author's lifetime, Lewis Carroll's Alice novels have a publishing history almost as magical and mysterious as the stories themselves. Zoe Jaques and Eugene Giddens offer a detailed and nuanced account of the initial publication of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass and investigate how their subsequent transformations through print, illustration, film, song, music videos, and even stamp-cases and biscuit tins affected the reception of these childhood favourites. The authors consider issues related to the orality of the original tale and its impact on subsequent transmission, the differences between the manuscripts and printed editions, and the politics of writing and publishing for children in the 1860s. In addition, they take account of Carroll's own responses to the books' popularity, including his writing of major adaptations and a significant body of meta-textual commentary, and his reactions to the staging of Alice in Wonderland. Attentive to the child reader, how changing notions of childhood identity and needs affected shifting narratives of the story, and the representation of the child's body by various illustrators, the authors also make a significant contribution to childhood studies.




The Story of Alice


Book Description

Robert Douglas-Fairhurst illuminates two entangled lives: the Oxford mathematician Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) and Alice Liddell, the child for whom he invented the Alice stories. This relationship influenced Carroll’s imaginative creation of Wonderland—a sheltered world apart during the stormy transition from the Victorian to the modern era.




Forgotten Disney


Book Description

This work demonstrates that not everything that Disney touched turned to gold. In its first 100 years, the company had major successes that transformed filmmaking and culture, but it also had its share of unfinished projects, unmet expectations, and box-office misses. Some works failed but nevertheless led to other more stunning and lucrative ones; others shed light on periods when the Disney Company was struggling to establish or re-establish its brand. In addition, many Disney properties, popular in their time but lost to modern audiences, emerge as forgotten gems. By exploring the studio's missteps, this book provides a more complex portrayal of the history of the company than one would gain from a simple recounting of its many hits. With essays by writers from across the globe, it also asserts that what endures or is forgotten varies from person to person, place to place, or generation to generation. What one dismisses, someone else recalls with deep fondness as a magical Disney memory.