5. Lewis Carroll

Nonsense in "Jabberwocky"

1. Introduction

This fifth paper is about Lewis Carroll and his big role in the popularization of nonsense literature as a genre for both children and adults. "Alice in Wonderland" and its sequel, "Through the Looking Glass", are two of the most well-known works in English literature and have been enjoyed since their publication by readers of all ages. The reason of their success will be unraveled in the third section of this paper.

2. About the Poet

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson was born on January 27, 1832, in Daresbury, Cheshire, England. His family moved to the Croft Rectory in North Yorkshire in 1843, where his father became a considerable authority within High Church. Young Charles was educated at home and proved himself very bright. Wanting to be like his father, he enrolled at the Richmond public school at the age of twelve, and two years later at Rugby School in Warwickshire. The three years he spent in that school were a traumatic experience and some biographers link it to possible sexual abuses. Little is known about his stay, but Charles was a stammerer since childhood and that may have caused him to behave awkwardly around boys his age. Moreover, Charles caught whooping cough, which left him with hearing problems on his right ear and would later be the cause of chest pains.

His mother died few days after he entered his father’s old college, Christ Church at Oxford. He didn’t let her death affect his studies, although he became somewhat lazy and distracted. He had already shown good skills at creative writing in the magazines he edited for his family and the short pieces he sent to local publications, so he had no problems graduating with many awards in Mathematics and Classics. One of these awards was the Christ Church Mathematical Lectureship, which he held for 26 years. His experience as a lecturer wasn’t good — his students found him boring and he found his students stupid.

In 1856 he adopted the pseudonym Lewis Carroll and met the four-year-old girl that would inspire Alice’s adventures. The child’s name was Alice Liddell, daughter of Henry Liddell, the new dean of Christ Church. Despite being somewhat self-conscious about his stammering and his lanky appearance, Carroll liked to entertain people, especially children, with his stories, games and songs. He befriended the family instantly and would often take the children rowing and tell them the stories that became part of "Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland", published in 1865. The book sold very well and so did its sequel, "Through the Looking Glass", published in 1871, and "The Hunting of the Snark", published five years later.

There isn’t much information about his late life, only that he liked to travel thanks to the money he earned with his books. He died in Guilford on January 14, 1898.

3. Nonsense verse

Nonsense verse is a literary genre that emerged during the Victorian era. The characteristic features of this genre are its innovative use of language — puns, neologisms, portmanteaus, reduplication — and the absurdity of its situations and characters, that would be unreasonable in the real world. Most nonsense poems have been written for children and it’s true that they are very similar to children’s literature in that both talk about singular characters facing improbable situations in a fantasy world. Due to this kind of plot and the simplicity and musicality of the poem, nonsense verse is considered an amusement for children, although nowadays there are many adults that enjoy it.

Edward Lear, who published many books of limericks such as "Book of Nonsense" in 1846, and Lewis Carroll are the two most important authors of this genre, although their style is different. Carroll relies more on linguistic aspects while Lear, who also coined a few new words, relies more on semantical aspects such as contradiction, pointless cause and effect situations and incongruities.

Nonsense isn’t gibberish because nonsense actually makes sense. There’s a good balance between logical and nonsensical elements in the poems. The nonsensical part of the poem’s form would be the usual appearance portmanteaus and neologisms that don’t mean anything, although they can evoke images from similar words. Furthermore, even though they’re not real words, they are part of a sentence that follows the logical rules of grammar, so their lexical category can be easily inferred from their position.

The content also presents logical and nonsensical elements. Nonsense works often involve social or historical parodies which are at first sight difficult to find among so many contradictions and the genre’s childish connotations.

The explanation for the rise of this childish literature lies in the heavy restrictions imposed on society during the Victorian era. Nonsense offers a whole new world of freedom that brings people back to their childhood, away from strict social conventions. It was also born in opposition to the literary realism characteristic of Victorian novels.

When Carroll wrote this poem, he intended it to be a parody that showed how not to write a poem. It was also written to mock pretentious literary critics. Ironically, most of them have racked their brains to find out the exact meaning of Carroll’s neologisms.

4. Style

"Jabberwocky" is a ballad composed of seven ballad stanzas. A ballad stanza is a four-line stanza in which the first and third line have eight syllables and the second and fourth have six. The first and third lines use iambic tetrameter, while the second and fourth use iambic trimeter.

Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun

The frumious Bandersnatch!

The most common rhyme scheme for a ballad stanza is abcb and although the first and third lines don’t rhyme, they can rhyme internally.

One, two! One, two! and through and through a

The vorpal blade went snicker-snack! b

He left it dead, and with its head c

He went galumphing back. b

However, Carroll introduced many variations to the form: the first three lines of the stanza have eight syllables and the last line six. Furthermore, the third, fifth and sixth stanza rhyme abab.

’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves a

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe; b

All mimsy were the borogoves, a

And the mome raths outgrabe. b

5. Summary

A father warns his son about a dangerous creature called "Jabberwock" with menacing jaws and claws who is accompanied by the likewise dangerous Jubjub bird and Bandersnatch. The boy takes his sword and advances into the forest, where he rests by the Tumtum tree while trying to come up with a plan. Suddenly, the furious Jabberwock appears but the boy kills him with his sword and takes its head back home. The father congratulates his prideful son and both celebrate the achievement. Everything returns to normal.

6. Analysis

Carroll provided a glossary for several words when he published "Jabberwocky" as an individual poem called "Stanza of Anglo-Saxon Poetry" in the periodical Mischmasch in 1855. When the poem was integrated in "Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There" in 1872, the glossary was included as an explanation from the character Humpty Dumpty. Still, a few words were not included and there might be several interpretations for them.

The first stanza has the most number of invented words. Here is the list provided by Carroll:

Brillig (1): "four o’clock in the afternoon—the time when you begin broiling things for dinner."
Slithy (1): "lithe and slimy."
Toves (1): "something like badgers—they’re something like lizards—and they’re something like corkscrews (...) also they make their nests under sun-dials—also they live on cheese."
Gyre (2): "to go round and round like a gyroscope."
Gimble (2): "to make holes like a gimlet."
Wabe (2): "the grass-plot round a sun-dial (...) because it goes a long way before it, and a long way behind it and a long way beyond it on each side."
Mimsy (3): "flimsy and miserable."
Borogrove (3): "a thin shabby-looking bird with its feathers sticking out all round—something like a live mop."
Mome raths (4): "a ’rath’ is a sort of green pig (...) ’mome’ (...) is short for ’from home’—meaning that they’d lost their way."
Outgrabe (4): "’Outgrabing’ is something between bellowing and whistling, with a kind of sneeze in the middle."

"Outgrabe" is the past tense of "outgribe", following the same conjugation pattern as "give-gave". Putting everything together, the first stanza describes a normal afternoon at a rural place inhabited by many kind of animals.

The second stanza introduces two human characters, a father and his son. The father is warning his son about the dangers of three creatures: the Jabberwock (5), the Jubjub bird (7) and the Bandersnatch (8). The name "Jabberwock" comes from the words "jabber" (to talk rapidly, unintelligibly or idly) and "wocky" (some speculate that it derives from early forms of "voice", for example "wackis" in Old Prussian). The origins of the word "Jubjub" are unclear but "Bandersnatch" is composed of the word "snatch" and maybe "bander" (one banded with others) in the sense that it takes people away from a group. The other new word is "frumious" (8), a combination of "fuming" and "furious".

The third stanza explains the father’s warning—his son is going into the forest to kill those dangerous creatures. "Vorpal" (9) is another word of unclear origins, although most critics agree that "verbal" is one of its two parts, which would make sense considering the meaning of "Jabberwock". "Manxome" (10) can mean "fearsome" and "Tumtum" (11) may just be an onomatopoeia.

After resting by the Tumtum tree in "uffish" (13) thought, the Jabberwock appears. "Uffish" was explained by Carroll as "a state of mind when the voice is gruffish, the manner roughish, and the temper huffish". The Jabberwock has fiery eyes and moves fast through the "tulgey wood" (15). "Tulgey" is the other word besides "vorpal" that Carroll wasn’t able to explain but in this context it seems to mean "enlarged", "dark".

The fifth stanza describes the battle between the son and the Jabberwock. The son slashes his sword over and over at the creature, kills and beheads it and comes back with the head. Lines 17 and 18 contain words that suggest action such as "one, two! one, two!" which simulate the rhythmical slashing and "snicker-snack", an onomatopoeia similar to "snickersnee" (fighting with a knife). The word used to describe the way the son comes back is "galumphing" (20), a blend of "gallop" and "triumphant".

The parody of old Anglo-Saxon poetry is made clear in the sixth stanza when the father speaks to his son in Old English ("hast", "thou", "slain"). The father hugs the "beamish" ("smiling") son and "chortles" ("chuckles" and "snorts") in joy "Callooh! Callay!", two onomatopoeic words that form an alliteration; and "O frabjous day!" (23), in which "frabjous" is a blend of "fabulous" and "joyous".

The last stanza is a repetition of the first — the boy has killed the menacing Jabberwock and everything has returned to normal.

7. Conclusion

Alice’s story has been featured in many books, movies and videogames. There’s something about her that still appeals to people nowadays, even though the Victorian repression is long gone. Children love her fantasy world, the colourful characters that live in it and their funny puns and riddles. Adults too buy merchandising that features childish illustrations of the Cheshire Cat and they are awed by Carroll’s universe and imagery. As happens with Peter Pan and other classical tales, adults feel freer when they dive into a naive world without moral restrictions, and some may even appreciate the hidden parodies behind Carroll’s nonsensical rhymes.