(Portrait of Lewis Carroll, first published in Carroll's biography by his nephew, Stuart Dodgson Collington in 1898. Collington didn't credit anyone for this photograph and it is in the public domain in the United States because it was published (or registered with the U.S. copyright office before 1 January, 1923.)
Lewis Carroll was well known as the author of many classic stories and poems. Although he was a well-known author and poet, most people don't know that “Lewis Carroll” was a pseudonym that he used when writing and was not his real name. Some of his most famous works, such as Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking Glass, were “nonsense verse.”
Lewis Caroll was the pseudonym used by the English Victorian author, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson. He was much better known as “Lewis Carroll.” He was born in Daresbury, Cheshire, England on January 27, 1832. His father was a member of the clergy in the Anglican Church (Church of England). Being raised in a religious environment, Lewis Carroll remained a spiritual man for the rest of his life, although as an adult, his views tended to be more modern than those of his father.
Carroll was best known as the author of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking Glass. These fictional works are “nonsense verse.” Dictionary.com gives the origin of this term and its use as between the years 1790 and 1800 and defines it as “a form of light verse, usually for children, depicting imaginative characters in amusing situations of fantasy… often employing fanciful phrases and meaningless made-up words.” Some of these made-up words that lack any real definition and are really only used to add to the fantasy of the story are “uffish,” “tulgey,” brillig,” and “frabjous.” Carroll was also known to combine words to create new words. This can be seen in the word ““Slithy,” which is a combination of the words “lithe” and “slimy.”
This image, from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, which is one of many illustrations for the book drawn by Sir John Tenniel, is part of the public domain in the United States, as it was created before 1 January, 1923).
The character, Alice, from these two famous stories, was based on a real girl that Carroll knew. The introduction to a publishing of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland from 1981, written by Morten N. Cohen, says that the story was basically made up as Carroll told the story to Alice Liddell and her two sisters, children of the Dean of Oxford College where Carroll attended, while they took a boat trip down the river. Carroll later wrote the story down as a gift to Alice.
Carroll died in Guildford, Surrey, England on January 14, 1898.
Sources:
- Cohen, Morton N. Introduction. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. By Lewis Carroll. 1981. Bantam Dell, 2006. vii-viii. Print.
- http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/nonsense+verse
- http://www.lewiscarroll.org/carroll/religion/
- http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/78
- http://html.rincondelvago.com/alice-in-wonderland_lewis-carroll.html