#Victoria 3 time period trial#

In the world of science, Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species was published just six years before the Alice. As Helena Pycior argues, “The parallels between Carroll's nonsense writings and symbolical algebra are striking: both stressed form or structure over meaning, using words (or other symbols) with multiple possible interpretations” ( 165). In fact, as a conservative mathematician, Dodgson found some of the new theories to be rather ridiculous, perhaps provoking him to make fun of them in Alice.

Dodgson, as a mathematician, would have been well aware of the new developments in that field, such as symbolic algebra. (Chapter 12)Īnother common approach for historicists has been to read Alice as a reaction to the contemporary discoveries in the fields of science and mathematics. `Off with her head!' the Queen shouted at the top of her voice. `Hold your tongue!' said the Queen, turning purple. Alice’s failure to understand the “native” culture, and her insistence on imposing her own norms and values ultimately culminates in a life-threatening situation: Daniel Bivona has written an interesting article comparing Alice to an imperialist, “incapable of constructing…the ‘system’ or ‘systems’ that give meaning to the behavior of the creatures” ( 150). Alice was written during the heyday of British colonization, when the British Empire controlled huge portions of land in Africa and India.

#Victoria 3 time period trial#

The extreme violence assigned the “aristocracy” of Wonderland (the Duchess and the Queen) as well as the ridiculous mangling of justice in the Trial (“Sentence first, then verdict” and indeed, the British justice system at the time was in shambles) are both often used as evidence that Alice belongs perhaps more to the genre of Political Satire than even Carroll realized.Īnother interesting line of the political approach is treating Alice as an allegory for colonization. There does seem to be evidence that Dodgson was not over-awed by the Queen ( Lurie 5). One popular approach to Alice has been to read it as a political allegory, with Wonderland a symbolic England, ruled tyrannically by the Queen of Hearts, who of course would correspond with Queen Victoria. “Underground Alice:” the Politics of Wonderland To read more about the historical approach, click here. In this section I explore a few of the major trends in Alice historical criticism, but this is by no means an all-inclusive list. Though the historical approach may seem daunting in sheer scope, it is extremely useful for us to remember that Alice was written during a specific time period with its own specific concerns and habits. As you might imagine, this opens Alice up to an enormous number of focuses and approaches. “Alice was, therefore, far more than its author realized, a tract for the times”– Humphrey CarpenterĪn historical approach to Alice encourages us to rely on a close examination of the trends, culture, and philosophy of the Victorian period for our interpretation of Alice’s encounters in Wonderland. Home -> The Evolution of Alice Criticism -> Historical Criticism -> Victorian Aproach Victorian Interpretations