Alice's Vacillation between Childhood and Adolescence in Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

The main points of the paper include:

The novel can be classified as 'mixed fantasy.'

Although Alice is seven years of age in the story the reader might see her as an adolescent. Sometimes she tries to act in an adult manner.

The definition of childhood has changed over time. (This is very a very important thing to consider. At times young people never really had a 'childhood' as we know. In Victorian England very young children (nine and under, for example) could end up working in mines and in factories.)

(Part of this relates to how long people lived. For much of human history humans had very short lifespans. This led to a situation where girls might get married when they were twelve or so.)

The King of Hearts points out that Alice is a child.

Alice considers many of the adult figures she meets as being 'irrational and unreliable.'

Alice is fond of showing off her knowledge. (This doesn't work well for her, though, in the story.)

In Victorian times exact repetitions of knowledge was important. (The poems Alice tries to state in the story are like the ones she was supposed to parrot to an adult.)

Alice's life would have been governed by specific rules. (None of these apply in Wonderland.)

Games are important in the books.

The games she are used to, though, have specific rules. The caucus race and the croquet match are examples of games not having specific rules in Wonderland. All this would lead to some confusion for her.

Some of the words in the story have 'slippery' meanings.

An interpretation of the characters in Wonderland representing Alice's alter-egos is possible.

Alice tries to remain polite as long as she can.

At the start of her journey Alice demonstrates little progress in learning but this changes over the course of the story.

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