Lewis Carroll (real name, C.L. Dodgson) loved telling stories to appreciative audiences, particularly of children. He would cleverly and mischievously modify the songs and poems which they already knew. Today, he would probably have done his own funny and child-friendly versions of pop songs for them..
Many people would now consider that Carroll's versions are much better than the originals. Here are a few of them:
You Are Old, Father William
The poem of "Father William" told by the comical and bizarre old White Knight is a parody of Robert Southey's long moralistic poem "“The Old Man's Comforts and How He Gained Them:” Children might be expected to learn this off by heart, and almost certainly Alice and her sisters had had to do this.
Here is some of Southey's poem, in which the old man passes on the lessons he has learned from life:
"... You are old, father William," the young man cried,
"And pleasures, with youth pass away.
And yet you lament not the days that are gone;
Now, tell me the reason I pray."
"In the days of my youth," Father William replied,
"I remember'd that youth could not last;
I thought of the future, whatever I did,
That I never might grieve for the past."
Perhaps it's not surprising that the children preferred Carroll’s version.
"...You are old," said the youth, "as I mentioned before,
And have grown most uncommonly fat;
Yet you turned a back-somersault in at the door--
Pray what is the reason for that?"
"In my youth," said the sage, as he shook his grey locks,
"I kept all my limbs very supple
By the use of this ointment – one shilling the box –
Allow me to sell you a couple?"
Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat
The Dormouse in the Mad Tea Party parodies the well known "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" by the authoress Jane Taylor. It is a poem which is still well known today.
Twinkle Twinkle little star,
How I wonder what you are
Up above the world so high
Like a diamond in the sky
Chorus: Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
How I wonder what you are..
However, the Dormouse's version goes
Twinkle Twinkle little Bat
How I wonder what you're at
Up above the world you fly
Like a tea tray in the sky...
Chorus (sleepily): Twinkle, twinkle, twinkle, twinkle, twinkle.....
Speak Roughly To Your Little Boy And Beat Him When He Sneezes
The ghastly Duchess from Wonderland is discovered in a chaotic kitchen singing cruelly to her little baby and tossing him up in the air in clouds of pepper. Her song parodies a moral poem called "Speak Gently" which includes the verse:
Speak gently to the young, for they
Will have enough to bear
Pass through this life as best they may
Tis full of anxious care!
Of course the Duchess completely turns the whole thing around, as she is the very opposite of gentle when she bawls:
Speak roughly to your little boy
And beat him when he sneezes
He only does it to annoy
Because he knows it teases!
Chorus: Wow! Wow! Wow!
Influences of Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Some of Carroll's prose has echoes of parody too. In "Through the Looking Glass" the live flowers in the garden refer to Tennyson's long poem "Maud" : "She's coming!" cried the Larkspur. "I hear her footstep, thump thump, along the gravel-walk".
Tennyson also had a rose in a garden crying "She is coming, my dove my dear." Carroll was a great admirer of Tennyson's work, and knew "Maud" well. However, there is no record of whether Tennyson appreciated having fun poked at his work, however gently!
Was Lewis Carroll Really Poking Fun at Morality?
The strange thing is that Lewis Carroll himself half believed in the moralistic verse that he was copying. In later life, he became famous for his moralistic behaviour. Perhaps escaping into "Alice in Wonderland" set him free to discard the seriousness that he felt obliged to show for most of the time.
Check out Lewis Carroll's Education and The Mystery of Lewis Carroll for more information about Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (Lewis Carroll)
Jennifer Woolf - Jennifer Woolf
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