Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland explores the dream-world experiences of seven-year-old Alice, where she is constantly pulled around into different hectic situations and physically changed in order to match each one of them. In the first two chapters alone, she shrinks and grows and shrinks again. Alice’s physical body goes through so many disorienting changes, and throughout them, her young mind can’t seem to keep up. Once she grows large, she begins to cry out of frustration before scolding herself, saying “You ought to be ashamed of yourself, a great girl like you to go on crying in this way!” (Carroll 9). This way of speaking to herself shows the confusion Alice is experiencing, because she’s both upset at the circumstances and yelling at herself for being upset. She cannot keep up with what’s been happening, thus dividing herself into functionally two beings: the more mature, responsible, “big” Alice, and the emotional, immature, “small” Alice.
This idea of her identity as tied to her physical form continues with her growing and shrinking. When she meets the caterpillar, he asks her who she is, to which she replies, “I hardly know, Sir, just at present––at least I know who I was when I got up this morning, but I think I must have been changed several times since then” (34). Even though nothing has actually changed Alice’s mind, she finds herself unable to believe that she is still the same Alice because of the changes in her physical size that she has experienced in Wonderland. Her body as her identity is also reinforced with her interaction with the pigeon, who tells her that because of her long neck, a consequence of eating the size-changing mushroom, she cannot be a little girl any longer. Rather, he decides that she must be a serpent (40). This is upsetting to Alice, because now she is not just unsure of her identity but is being adamantly told that she cannot be herself. By literally, physically growing up in size, Alice is becoming a different person, someone who she does not recognize, nor do those around her.
Dear teddygrahams,
I love that you focused on the size changes! I want to focus on what you said specifically about “big” and “small” Alice in relation to her identity. I very much think that you’re describing an idea of puberty for girls where they start to become more self-conscious of their bodies growing and changing. With these changes, they experience emotional distress which you wrote as “her young mind can’t keep up.” I would like to further expand your thoughts by asking if we can also consider that Alice shrinks and grows both within and out of the different spaces she enters in Wonderland. I also wonder if the disorientation of mind and body alludes to substance use? Because Alice consumes mushrooms, liquids, and a cake which cause these size changes to begin with. Might be a stretch?
Sincerely,
Alucard
I really like your points about Alice associating her identity with her physical appearance! I wonder if her changing appearance actually changes her at all, or if it is just an anxiety she feels. She could be associating appearance with identity because she is a child, but also because of the way she has been taught to perceive class. When she changes size, does her thinking change too? When she grows bigger during the trial she becomes more assertive. She has more physical power over the cards. Does she lose confidence when she is smaller? Or does she feel most assured towards the end because she is returning to her ‘true’ form?
A person’s identity changing along with their appearance is one that can also be seen in the novel The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. The question that this comparison brings to my mind is a question of origins. A chicken and the egg sort of question. Is she growing because she is maturing or is she maturing because she is growing? Is it possible for her to be large and emotional or small and responsible? I would argue that the answer the Victorians would have for you is a resounding no. Even now children’s rights, such as the right to transition are being ripped away under the guise of protection.
I really liked your post! I especially like the second point you make, where Alice isn’t sure of who she is. In class, we discussed how this section of the tale relates to a more phallic image. To me, it feels almost like a discussion on a young girl’s puberty. Like she feels grown up sometimes, too young others, and she never really knows who she is. This then confuses her identity, and she can’t really pin down who she wants to be. I really liked your post, and I’m glad you wrote about it!