Time to Gro up Alice

Lewis Carroll's use of puns and riddles in Alice in Wonderland help set the theme and tone. He uses word play in the book to show a world of warped reality and massive confusion. He uses such play on words to reveal the underlying theme of ‘growing up’, but with such an unusual setting and ridiculous characters, there is need for some deep analyzing to show this theme. The book contains many examples of assonance and alliteration to add humor. Carroll also adds strange diction and extraordinary syntax to support the theme.

The title character, Alice, is a young girl around pre-teen age. In the real world, the adult characters always look down on her because of her complete nonsense. She is considered the average everyday immature child, but when she is placed in the world of “Wonderland,” the roles seem to switch. The adult characters within Wonderland are full of the nonsense and Alice is now the mature person. Thus creating the theme of ‘growing up’. “...Alice, along with every other little girl is on an inevitable progress toward adulthood herself”(Heydt 62).

Alice is now faced with the responsibility of adulthood. Wonderland just is the initiation between childhood and upcoming maturity. Throughout the book, Alice constantly changes size to adjust to the warped spaces in Wonderland. She often gets frustrated when she is not the right size she wants. Alice seems to be going through puberty for “it was much pleasanter at home, when one wasn’t always growing larger and smaller,” she is not pleased with the size of her body (Carroll 49). This frustration often occurs through the process of 'growing up.'

The characters in the book often speak with puns and odd diction, usually confusing the person to whom they were speaking. This confusion occurs between children and adults when they converse with each other because children are not quite as 'grown up' and familiar with the adult state. For example, in chapter seven, when the door mouse is telling his story, “...that begins with an M, such as mousetraps, and the moon, and memory, and muchness?" (Carroll 116). Telling a nonsense story using only M’s adds to the fairytale matter of the story and shows the immature nonsense in the Wonderland characters. This also shows the childlike quality of the story, which ties to Carroll's theme of 'growing up.'

The caterpillar in chapter five causes great confusion with his use of diction. He takes everything Alice says to him literally, “’I can’t explain myself, I'm afraid, sir’ said Alice, ‘because I’m not myself, you see.’ ‘I don’t see,’ said the caterpillar.’” ‘What size do you want to be?’ it asked. ‘Oh, I’m not particular as to size,’ Alice hastily replied; ‘only one doesn't like changing so often, you know ’ ’I don’t know,’ said the caterpillar"(Carroll 79). When Alice would say, “you know” or “you see” what she is trying to say was if the caterpillar understood. Her use of diction causes the caterpillar to not understand. This adds to the example of confusion between children and adults when conversations occur. Adults usually are annoyed by this nonsense talk and say to children to 'grow up.' Alice is thinking this way of the caterpillar, and the caterpillar thinks the same of Alice.

She has the same problem with the Cheshire cat in chapter six. “‘That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,’ said the Cat, ‘ --so long as I get somewhere,’ Alice adds as an explanation. ‘Oh, you’re sure to do that,’ said the Cat, ‘if you only walk long enough" (Carroll 86). When one takes what Alice is saying literally, the Cat is absolutely correct. If she starts walking she will get somewhere.

Not only does Alice's diction cause her problems in wonderland, but her way of syntax also causes her frustration like at the tea party in chapter seven.

“’ Then you should say what you mean,’ the March Hare went on. ‘I do,’ Alice replied; ‘at least--at least I mean what I say--that’s the same thing, you know.’ ‘Not the same thing a bit!’ said the Hatter. ‘You might just as well say “I see what I eat” is the same thing as ‘I eat what I see”!’ ‘You might just as well say,’ added the March Hare, ‘that “I like what I get” is the same thing as “I get what I like’” (Carroll 99).

This use of emphasis on sentence arrangement is so bizarre and pointless that even common sense could help figure out what Alice was trying to say. Carroll uses this word play to reveal the pure nonsense in the Wonderland characters as that of children to help support the theme of ‘growing up’ and also the minor theme of adult/child communication. Their attentions to Alice’s word