  ewis Carroll was the pen-name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson. He studied at Christ Church College in Oxford and after graduation became a mathmatics teacher and stayed on. He also became the "Reverend" Charles Dodgson, taking holy orders in 1861.A shy, retiring batchelor, he was happiest in the company of children, and his favourite was Alice Liddell, daughter of the Dean of Christ Church. A keen amateur photographer, he took many pictures of Alice and her sisters and they often accompanied him on outings around the town and boat trips along the river.  On the 4th of July 1862, Dodgson and his friend Duckworth treated the three older Liddell sisters to a boating trip up the river Isis for a picnic at Godstow Lock. There he told the story of "Alices' Adventures Underground", weaving into it many of the places and things which they'd seen on their days out around Oxford.Alice was enchanted by the story and begged him to write it down. By the following February Dodgson had written a first draft, and decided to publish it as "Alices' Adventures in Wonderland". As with the follow-up story, "Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There", Dodgson adopted the pen-name "Lewis Carroll" and, although he wrote a wide range of other books, including many on the subject of advanced mathematics, it's probably these two for which he'll best be remembered. Surprisingly, except for the rather dense "Sylvie and Bruno", Dodgson never wrote another successful childrens book.  Dodgson had added his own drawings to the original manuscript but, while they had a charm of their own, he decided he needed a professional illustrator for the commercially printed version. Sir John Tenniel, a "Punch" cartoonist, was engaged to do the work and began in May 1864. Dodgson personally paid Tenniel and provided him with detailed instructions for the illustrations. He hoped to have the book published by the Christmas of 1864, but Tenniel didn't finish the illustrations until June 1865.The Tenniel drawings, a long way from Disneys' cute versions, define the characters perfectly. There have been many illustrators since, who have done a fine job of bringing their own vision of Wonderland to the printed page, but the Tenniel originals are synonomous with the two books. Originally in black and white, they have appeared in more recent editions with colour added by contemporary artists.  Contrary to some popular belief, the fictional Alice bore little resemblance to the real Alice. Although Dodgson had known Alice Liddell since she was about six, she was ten by the time he'd formulated "Alices' Adventures Underground", while fictional Alice was seven. In fact Dodgson was quite specific in his instructions to Tenniel, and the hair and style of dress of fictional Alice was quite different to the dark haired and conservative Alice Liddell. He'd even suggested the illustrations be based on another girl altogether, one Mary Hilton Badcock. Tenniel declined the use of a model, saying, "I no more need one than you should need a multiplication table to work out a mathematical problem!" Still, the illustrationsdo bear a passing resemblence to Miss Badcock. he generally accepted place and time when the ideas for "Alices' Adventures Underground' all came together, is the picnic at Godstow Lock on July 4th 1862. It took three years for the printed book to be written, re-written, printed and re-printed and, eventually, published.  Dodgson gave Alice an early edition, bound in white vellum, on November 26th 1864, but later decided the quality of the printing, particularly the illustrations, was too poor and had it re-done. The final edition came out in the Summer of 1865. "Through the Looking Glass" took even longer. Although it was set some six months after "Wonderland", and the fictional Alice was seven and a half, Alice Liddell received her new book of adventures in 1871 when she was nineteen years old. The years had passed and, while they were still technically friends, Dodgson and Alice rarely saw each other by this time.
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harles Dodgsons' original hand-written and self-illustrated manuscript of "Alices' Adventures Underground" was eventually published in facsimile around 1885. He'd written to Alice, by this time aged 33 and married to Reginald Hargreaves, asking whether she had any objection to the new publication.