The Themes
| Changing Identity | Death | Social Class Distinctions |
| Rule and Misrule | Language | Meaning in Dreams, Nonsense and Puzzles |
Meaning in Dreaming, Nonsense and Puzzles –
‘Even
a joke should have some meaning.’ – the Red Queen’s observation
to Alice.
Steve Nallon’s Adventures in Wonderland is not just a re-telling of Lewis Carroll’s original it is also a re-invention that tries to some degree to make sense of the apparently surreal and nonsensical Alice stories. Some of the ‘making sense’ is mocking of the many absurd theories that have been put forward as explanations of the tales. In a Newsnight Review skit Steve Nallon has the writer and critic Germaine Greer expound on her view of Alice as a ‘feminist deviant’ followed by her colleague Tom Paulin who thinks the story is about imperialist repression. However, there is some sense in Lewis Carroll’s nonsense.
In
dreams, familiar objects are made unfamiliar -- in Wonderland a flamingo
famously becomes a croquet mallet. In nonsense too, the familiar is made unfamiliar
by juxtaposition -- for example, '"The time has come," the walrus said, "to
talk of many things: of shoes -- and ships --and sealing wax -- of cabbages
-- and kings."' The riddles and puzzles appear to be meaningless. Yet Lewis
Carroll believed that the idea of finding meaning in nonsense, riddles and
puzzles was meaningful to children (and, indeed, adults). Lewis Carroll’s
nonsense is not just nonsense: it is nonsense about nonsense. It comes from
the mind of a trained academic schooled in philosophy and logic. There are
many examples of apparent nonsense being far from nonsense. The pigeon uses
a syllogism to prove that Alice is a serpent. There is logic on both sides
in the argument as to the possibilities of being able or not being able to
chop off the Cheshire Cat’s
head when it is already disembodied.
Steve Nallon’s Adventures in Wonderland explores some of the processes of logic that lead to absurd conclusions. In one scene that reflects Lewis Carroll’s training as a mathematician Steve proves through a simple mathematical formula that 2=1.
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