Saturday, February 27, 2010

Alice in Fiction Land



"Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Glass" have been two of my favorite books since I learned to read, and even before. I've also always been fascinated by the story of Charles Dodgson and Alice Liddell. Recently, John and I were perusing Bald Face Books in Dover, NH, and I found a great biography of Lewis Carroll. And I just finished reading "Alice I Have Been" by Melanie Benjamin, a beautifully written fictionalized story of Alice Liddell and Charles Dodgson. Ms. Benjamin attempts to fill in the gaps of what is known about their relationship which she does quite believably as well as capturing the steamy Victorian atmosphere of secrets and repression making this one of those books you can't put down, and a great companion read with the bio.
Of course, reading these books made me want to immerse myself even more into the story so I found some great sites where you can read even more about the Liddell sisters, plus see the photographs :http://www.alice-in-wonderland.net/alice1e.html

This one is a classic:

There was also a dark,dreamy film made in the 80's called "Dreamchild" written by Dennis Potter with Carroll creatures by Jim Henson. Ian Holm plays Dodgson, kind of an unusual choice when you think about it, but he manages to make him a believably haunted character. I'm not so sure about the Tim Burton version which looks pretty creepy...but, then, it IS in 3D, so how can I resist?

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