Стилистический анализ 3 главы сказки Л. Кэррола Алиса в Стране чудес

The text consideration is a passage from the novel "Alice in Wonderland" by Lewis Carroll.

The passage from this novel is about how Alice and animals saved from the Pool of Tears and took part in a Caucus-race after that.

Summary :

The animals and Alice made themselves to the shore wet so that the mouse tried to dry them off by telling a dry story from English history and after her story the Dodo suggested a Caucus-race like a method of getting dry. Alice and the animals line up and race around in circles, starting and stopping whenever they please till a half-hour passed, they are all quite dry as soon as Dodo declared that they are all winners Alice asked Mouse to tell a tale about her tail.

The text represents the novel which penetrated by romantic irony. The analyzed part of the text is under construction on Alice's dialogue with animals

The story in the novel is kept from the third person.

The main characters in this chapter are:

Alice is the heroine of the story. Her adventures begin with her fateful jump down the rabbit hole, and the tale is an extended metaphor for the challenges she will face as she grows into an adult. She possesses unusual composure for a child, and she seems bright but makes many charming mistakes. She grows more confident as the book progresses.

Mouse. Alice meets the mouse while swimming in the pool of tears. He hates cats and dogs, and he begins to tell Alice a disturbing story about being put on trial. He is very sensitive.

Dodo (bird) appears in chapter 2, as one of many fallen in the Pool of Tears incredible creatures. It is in the company of three other birds - Duck, Lory and Eaglet. He suggested taking part in a Caucus-race.

The central theme of this novel is growth into adulthood.

Alice's adventures parallel the journey from childhood to adulthood. She comes into numerous new situations in which adaptability is absolutely necessary for success. She shows marked progress throughout the course of the book; in the beginning, she can barely maintain enough composure to keep herself from crying. By the end of the novel, she is self-possessed and able to hold her own against the most baffling Wonderland logic.

Stylistic devices in the text.

The Alice book is chockfull of games with language, to the reader's delight and Alice's confusion. The games often point out some inconsistency or slipperiness of language in general and English in particular. The book point out the pains and advantages of language. Language is a source of joy and adaptability; it can also be a source of great confusion.

"The first question of course was, how to get dry again: they had a consultation about this, and after a few minutes it seemed quite natural to Alice to find herself talking familiarly with them, as if she had known them all her life. <...> At last the Mouse, who seemed to be a person of authority among them, called out, 'Sit down, all of you, and listen to me! I'LL soon make you dry enough!' <...> 'Ahem!' said the Mouse with an important air, 'are you all ready? This is the driest thing I know. Silence all round, if you please! "William the Conqueror, whose cause was favoured by the pope, was soon submitted to by the English, who wanted leaders, and had been of late much accustomed to usurpation and conquest. Edwin and Morcar, the earls of Mercia and Northumbria--"'

Puns abound. The two meanings of "dry" are played on at the start of the chapter, as the mouse recites from Havilland Chapmell's Short Course of History. Carroll's taste for puns and the playful side of language is a constant source of amusement throughout the book.

'--I proceed. "Edwin and Morcar, the earls of Mercia and Northumbria, declared for him: and even Stigand, the patriotic archbishop of Canterbury, found it advisable--"'

'Found WHAT?' said the Duck.

'Found IT,' the Mouse replied rather crossly: 'of course you know what "it" means.'

'I know what "it" means well enough, when I find a thing,' said the Duck: 'it's generally a frog or a worm. The question is, what did the archbishop find?'

The mouse quotes a passage where the antecedent for the word "it" is missing (though the meaning is still quite clear), and the result is general confusion among the animals; this is one of many moments where the creatures of Wonderland create confusion by taking language at absolute face-value. They allow themselves to be confused by pronouns without antecedents; they also take figurative language literally, or confuse homonyms. Much of one's ability to understand language comes from the ability to ignore its inconsistencies and incoherencies: for example, the listener can understand the meaning of "it" without hearing its antecedent. The creatures of Wonderland are not merely silly: they always have their own logic, a certain sense and reasoning behind their absurd behavior. Their strange reactions to language point out the potential pitfalls of English, and their bizarre rules and sensitivities parallel the arbitrary nature of any culture's customs and habits. Alice's adventures are wonderful training for adapting to the absurd behavior of adults.

Lewis Carroll used homonyms to create the humorous effect, some dialogues are based on the play upon words, and it causes misunderstanding.

"Mine is a long tale!" said the Mouse, turning to Alice, and sighing. "It is a long tail, certainly," said Alice, looking down with wonder at the Mouse's tail; "but why do you call it sad?" And she kept on puzzling about it while the Mouse was speaking, so that her idea of the tale was something like this.

"Fury said to

a mouse, That

he met in the house, 'Let

us both go

to law: I

will prose-

cute you.

Come, I'll

take no de-

nial; We

must have

a trial:

For really

this morn-

ing I've

nothing

to do.'

Said the

mouse to

the cur,

'Such a trial,

dear Sir, With

no jury

or judge,

would

be wast-

ing our

breath.'

I'll be

judge,

I'll be

Jury,'

Said cun-

ning

old

Fury:

'I'll

try

the

whole

cause,

and

con-

demn

you to

death.'"

This way L. Carroll realizes the unwanted mistake of Alice, caused by homonymy of the words "tale" and "tail": and there appeared the verse in the shape of mouse's tail. 'Tale' and 'tail' are homophones.

"First it marked out a race-course, in a sort of circle, ('the exact shape doesn't matter,' it said,) and then all the party were placed along the course, here and there. There was no 'One, two, three, and away,' but they began running when they liked, and left off when they liked, so that it was not easy to know when the race was over. However, when they had been running half an hour or so, and were quite dry again, the Dodo suddenly called out 'The race is over!' and they all crowded round it, panting, and asking, 'But who has won?'" <...>" At last the Dodo said, 'EVERYBODY has won, and all must have prizes.' 'But who is to give the prizes?' quite a chorus of voices asked. 'Why, SHE, of course,' said the Dodo, pointing to Alice with one finger; and the whole party at once crowded round her, calling out in a confused way, 'Prizes! Prizes!' Alice had no idea what to do, and in despair she put her hand in her pocket, and pulled out a box of comfits, (luckily the salt water had not got into it), and handed them round as prizes. There was exactly one a-piece all round. 'But she must have a prize herself, you know,' said the Mouse. 'Of course,' the Dodo replied very gravely. 'What else have you got in your pocket?' he went on, turning to Alice. 'Only a thimble,' said Alice sadly. 'Hand it over here,' said the Dodo. Then they all crowded round her once more, while the Dodo solemnly presented the thimble, saying 'We beg your acceptance of this elegant thimble'; and, when it had finished this short speech, they all cheered. Alice thought the whole thing very absurd, but they all looked so grave that she did not dare to laugh; and, as she could not think of anything to say, she simply bowed, and took the thimble, looking as solemn as she could."

The Caucus Race parodies political process: the participants run around in confused circles, never accomplishing anything. If we can take Alice as a symbol for the average citizen, we see that the Race does very little to benefit her. At the end, Alice is forced to give everyone a prize. Although Alice also receives a prize, she is given something that she already had. More humor comes from the contrast between the animals' sober faces and Alice's secret conviction that the whole process is absurd.

"'I wish I had our Dinah here, I know I do!' said Alice aloud, addressing nobody in particular. 'She'd soon fetch it back!' <...>'Dinah's our cat. And she's such a capital one for catching mice you can't think! And oh, I wish you could see her after the birds! Why, she'll eat a little bird as soon as look at it!'"

Alice makes more unknowing allusions to death, this time to the death of others. She wishes her cat Dinah was there, so that the cat might fetch the mouse back to finish his story. She seems unaware of the fact that this would mean the mouse's death. And she unthinkingly talks about Dinah's amazing talent for catching birds, not realizing that this kind of talk will offend all of her new avian friends.

Another interesting literary device in the novel is personification. All features in this novel especially in this chapter are not people, they all are animals which can talk, know some parts of History (Mouse) and suggest playing the game (Dodo). They all have their own logic and emotions.

L. Carroll also uses syntactical devices in this chapter. The most interesting of them we can see in the thoughts of Alice about Mouse's tale about her tail. Author writes this little poem like a real tail and it device intertwine with pun which we mentioned earlier and more colorful and fun show it.