Hey Can someone help meee!?

[coldsweetpotato]

Ok well i have to do an essay on Lewis Carol, and my thesis is on how he was able to simplify philosophical ideas, so that he could teach children...

but im having problems finding info on that stuff...so if anyone knows anything or any sites can you please help?!

Thanks.

[johntufail]

That is a brilliant subject for an essay!

Very ambitious mind you. And the answer to your question is not simple. I can't for example think offhand of any publiahed biographical works that deal particularly effectively with this subject. Hopefully someone else on the Forum may.

I think the most important thing about Carroll's style is his mastery of how language, in all its form, works. He also used simple myth structures in all his stories, His development of the absurd as a literary device came from his study of logic.

If you can bear these three elements in mind, it may help you to structue your essay. Other than that I'm afraid the best advice I can offer is to find a few sites you feel comfortable with and enter into a dialogue with the site owner.

Actually, I think Mahendra, who is a member of this Foum, might be just the peson to help you as he has a really good intutie grasp of Carroll's unique pedagogy.

Regards

JT

[joelbirenbaum]

You need to read The Philosopher's Alice by Peter Heath. It is long out of print.

[johntufail]

Hi Joel,

Thanks for reminding me about the Heath book. I lent my copy to a 'friend' in 2002. Haven't seen it since! I agree. It's a good, very acceccable read. Also quite influential as i recall. Heath did a fantastic job of delineating between 'nonsense' literature and 'Absurd' literature - putting Carroll firmly into the 'absurd' category. Certainly he fits better with Ionesco than Spike Milligan or Lear!

Fortunately for the enquirer, although out of print, the book is still aailable on-line. Pices vay a lot though, some reach 'absurd' heights - in keeping with the subject matter.

Regards

JT

[mahendra]

I agree that Carroll is very much in the Absurdist camp but I have to protest at his segregation from Spike Milligan, I think Spike's Goon Show occasionally reached genuine Absurdist heights. I read somewhere that georges Perec was fascinated by the Goon Show …

Carroll's logic "games" are so simply & elegantly executed that our explanations always muddy the waters somehow. Such economy of means so perfectly embedded into itself in a closed loop of form & meaning, the mark of a master!

This would be an entertaining, zen-like parlor game for carrollians: explain any Carrollian gambit in haiku form suitable for children or jedi masters:

Example: the Bellman's Rule of Three in the first two stanzas of the Snark:

We're here because we're
here because we're here and our
heres are cause enough

I think it's time for the scotch & water …

cheers! Mahendra

[johntufail]

Hi Mahendra,

I agee about the Goon Show. But the absurdist genius behind that was surely Michael Bentine. Spike Milligan on his own rarely crossed into absurdism.

By the way. That wasn't Haiku. It was Senryu! (tut tut)

Maybe you should absolve the water.

I did like it, but you cheat by using abreviated terms (like we're instead of we are) this destrys the tension between formality and freedom that the Haiku and Senryu forms express - as well as the humour. It is all about the tension between the formal rules of grammar and the the fact that even at its most formal, language, by its very nature creates myriads of meanings and interpretations. Carroll was brilliant at that.

Girl head high flat floot
on elevated heels falls flat
leaves or heels or head

Is a Senryu

Bowing with autumn grace
Maple leaf gives up its place
to gentle gravity

Is Haiku

(Well, sort of, you get the idea I hope!)

Regard

JT

[mahendra]

I stand corrected. I will not blame the water and I certainly will not blame the Balvenie! As you can see, I absolve the water with only the best! I shall remove the human element of Senryu, thusly:

when snark is boojum
the sound of one hand clapping
enlightens no one

à suivre …

[johntufail]

Mahendra,

Good riposte!

I am thus forced to amend my Haiku:

Born with Autumn grace
Maple leaf gives up its place
To gentle gravity

I had thought of replacing'To' with 'with' as it opens up more possibilities, but it seems a little bit forced.

Regards

JT

[mahendra]

John—

Excellent counter-riposte. However, I feel a bit guilty about the original purpose of this thread, assisting a student in Carrollian research. But then again, guilt, it's so … Victorian bourgeois, eh?

It's obvious that we need to work on retelling the Snark in haiku/senryu, gives it a pretty cool faux-zen feel.

Fit the 6th, 1st two stanzas:

thimbles, care, forks, hope
railway-shares, smiles, soap — enough!
the dream of the snark

[johntufail]

Rather ambitiou I think Mahendra!

A rather more modest project would be to reduce all the rhymes in AiW to haiku/senryu

form!

I shall now retire to a potting shed and spend the next 10 years trying to express Father William in such form!

[sadiranson]

now, the question, John, is WHICH version of Father William are you going to use? The original or Alice's? Ah, that is the question....

Sadi

[sadiranson]

John, as to Carroll making his work accessible to children, why not look at his letters to child-friends as there-in may lie some clues, i think, and of course, S&B, but that may be obvious and likely you've already searched there - but that's where i would start. Also, there is a book I have, but the title eludes me right now... a lit crit book about children's literature etc that mentions Carroll....

You may find that interesting.... let me look up the title. It may or may not be useful....