Boxing Alice
Before we start the second round of LitWit Challenges, we have to give away this set of Alice In Wonderland book-boxes. (Here’s a previous post on the book-boxes.) The biggest book contains another book which contains another book which contains the smallest book, which contains a USB key which contains concept art and still photos from Tim Burton’s film adaptation of Lewis Carroll’s Alice In Wonderland. These book-boxes are not available in stores: If you want them, you’ll have to join this contest.
The set rightfully belongs to someone who’s read Lewis Carroll, so here’s the task: In 250 words, preferably less, give us the plots of Lewis Carroll’s books, Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland and Through The Looking Glass. (If that is too easy for you, then express these two books as a series of equations—Mr. Dodgson would like that.)
Post your answers in Comments. Entries will be accepted until February 28, 2010. The winner will be announced before Tim Burton’s Alice In Wonderland opens in Metro Manila and elsewhere on March 4, 2010. (Winner should be able to collect the prize from the Disney distributor’s office in Mandaluyong, Metro Manila.)
Now off with your heads! Always wanted to say that.
* * * * *
Tuesday, 1737. Tsk tsk tsk, 24 hours, only two entries. And we’re summarizing children’s books. Oh the humanity.
* * * *
Monday, 1 March 2010. WE HAVE A WINNER!
Many otherwise fine entries were disqualified for exceeding the 250-word limit or for being late, displeasing the White Rabbit. The winner is jaime. Congratulations!
You can claim your Alice in Wonderland box set on weekdays between 11am and 5pm at Columbia Pictures on the fifth floor of Shangri-La Plaza Mall, Edsa corner Shaw Boulevard, Mandaluyong. Look for Kat Colobong, marketing assistant for Walt Disney Studios.
Thanks to everyone who joined the contest. See you at the cinema for Alice in Wonderland, opening March 4.
Answers to questions you might be asking, unless you wandered onto this site purely by accident >>>
February 22nd, 2010 at 22:00
hi…just wanna ask…is it 250 words for each or 250 combined?
February 22nd, 2010 at 23:26
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is as the title suggests. Her journey began when she followed a white rabbit and fell on a rabbit hole eventually leading her to Wonderland where she met loads of unusual creatures and characters such as an ever grinning feline, a depressing turtle and a craniectomy-philic queen. After she had explored the land (experiencing body alterations, amnesia and several near death incidents), she woke up to find that it was all a dream.
In the sequel, Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There, our protagonist finds herself in another different dimension after stepping through it in a mirror. This alternate universe plays by the rules of chess. Alice began as a white pawn and to be queen, she had to reach the eighth row. However the blocks of chess in our world is not the same as in this world and Alice realized it too as she got entangled between sibling rivalry, feuding animals and rowing lessons. In the end Alice became a queen but suddenly awoke and realized that it was all yet another dream.
February 23rd, 2010 at 10:38
Alice in Wonderland narrates the peculiar events that take place after Alice falls asleep during a lesson and dreams of following a white rabbit in human clothes down a rabbit hole. Alice encounters bizarre beings such as the eccentric Mad Hatter and the grinning Cheshire Cat along with the resentful Queen of Hearts and her army of cards. She then goes on to find herself in all sorts of odd situations where nonsensical reasons figure.
In the sequel, Through the Looking Glass, Alice wonders to herself a world on the other side of a mirror and is actually pleasantly surprised to discover that she can actually experience this curious world by passing through the glass. She discovers a book with looking-glass poetry ‘Jabberwocky’ which can only be read by holding the poem up to a mirror. As if this magical encounter is not enough, she meets the Red Queen who offers her a throne if she agrees to move to the eighth row in a chess match, the strange bread-and-butterfly insect, the familiar characters of her nursery rhymes Tweedledum and Tweedledee, the White Queen who later morphs into a sheep and Humpty Dumpty, who before meeting his unfortunate fall from the wall, explains to Alice the meaning of Jabberwocky. There was also the Lion and the Unicorn encounter and Alice will go on to be rescued by the Red Knight from the White Knight. This sequel is said to be a story about a game of chess.
February 23rd, 2010 at 21:33
The Lewis Carroll books are stories of what seemingly happens on LSD trips through a deck of cards and a chess game.
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland – Down the rabbit hole into a curious world of growth spurts from mushrooms and tea parties with The Hatter, the March Hare and a Dormouse. Meet a megalomaniac queen from a deck of cards living a nursery rhyme with one solution for all irritations and a grin without a cat that confirms the madness of everything.
Through The Looking Glass and What Alice found Here – Step through the mirror, read a book of looking glass poetry, see twin brothers recite another poem about a walrus and a carpenter, meet an egg that combines words, and become a queen by moving to the eighth rank and mating the sleeping king.
“Why is a raven like a writing desk?”
February 24th, 2010 at 11:49
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is a story of a girl named Alice who is bored while on a picnic with her sister. She finds interest in a white rabbit, dressed in a waistcoat , whom she follows down a rabbit-hole. She drops into a dream underworld of paradox, the absurd and the improbable. As she attempts to follow the rabbit, she has several misadventures, memorably her attendance to a Mad Tea Party (I am so singing Mona Lisa and Mad Hatters right now). Eventually Alice wakes up underneath a tree back with her sister.
Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There picks up the story an unspecified amount of time later, as Alice ponders what the world is like on the other side of a mirror, and to her surprise, is able to pass through to experience this world. She discovers a book with looking-glass poetry, “Jabberwocky” (not that dance crew) , which she can only read by holding it up to a mirror. In her quest for Queendom she meets Tweedledum and Tweedledee, and Humpty Dumpty, who explains the “Jabberwocky” poem to Alice before his fall in the wall. As expected she wakes up again and her alternative world is dissolved.
Either her kitten woke her up, or they finally got her into rehab.
February 24th, 2010 at 13:44
Ang Alice’s Adventure in Wonderland story ay nagsimula nung nakatulog si Alice habang nagbabasa ang kanyang sister ng libro sa ilalim ng puno. Nang gumising siya nakita niya ang isang White Rabbit at sinundan niya ito sa isang butas and bigla siyang nalaglag. Sa butas nakita niya ang ibat-ibang laki na pinto at sa dulo nito ay ang bote, mushroom, susi, at nakabukas na pinto. Nakita niya sa nakabukas na pinto ang isang magandang hardin. Hindi siya makapasok sa pinto kaya ininum niya yung laman ng bote at bigla siyang lumiit. Nagulat ang White Rabbit sa biglang pagliit ni Alice at tumakbo, naiwan niya ang gloves ang fan sa gulat. Nagkaroon ng struggle si Alice sa pagpasok sa magandang hardin at napunta sa lugar ni White Rabbit. Gusto ni Alice na bumalik sa dati niyang size pero nagkaroon siya ng difficulty dito kaya tumakbo siya at nakilala si Cheshire Cat and Caterpillar. Tinulungan siya ni Caterpillar para makabalik sa dati niyang laki. Nakilala niya sa kanyang pag lalakad ang Duchess, duchess’ baby, and nakisali sa tea party ni Mad Hatter and friends. Habang nasa tea party, nainsulto siya sa mga pinagsasabi nila Mad Hatter at umalis, habang naglalakad nakita niya ang isang puno na may pinto at binuksan. Nakita niya sa loob ang hardin na gusto niyang puntahan, pero para makapasok kinailangan niyang lumiit uli kaya kinain niya yung mushroom para lumiit ulit at ng makapasok siya, nakita niya ang ibang baraha na kinukulayan ang puting rosas ng pula dahil ayaw ng Queen of Hearts ng puti. Dumating ang King and Queen of Hearts kasama ang White Rabbit para maglaro ng croquet. Nakita ng Queen of Hearts ang Cheshire Cat at gusto patayin. Inimbita si Alice sa isang trial at habang inuusisa ng King of Hearts ang nasasakdal hiniling si Alice para tumayo maging witnessed pero habang nagsasalita bigla napapansin niya na lumalaki siya ng unti-unti at biglang nagsisigaw siya dahil taliwas siya sa mga patakarang ng King at nagkagulo sa loob ng korte. Bigla na lang naririnig niya na ginigising siya ng kanyang kapatid and nalaman na panaginip pala iyon.
Ang Through The Looking Glass ay nagsimula habang nilalaro ni Alice ang dalawang anak ng kanyang pusa at naisip kung ano ang itsura ng mundo pag tinignan sa isang salamin. Nakakita siya ng mirror at nagulat na totoo na may buhay sa likod ng salamin at pumasok. Habang naglalakad sa kabilang side ng salamin nakita niya ang chess-pieces na gumagalaw at nakilala at namangha sa abilidad ng Red Queen. Sumali si Alice sa laro at pinangakuan na maging Reyna kung manalo. Sa kanyang paglalaro marami siyang nakilalang character at natutunang aral sa mga ito. Nanalo si Alice and biglang nagising habang hawak ang dalawang pusa.
February 24th, 2010 at 14:42
Following Austenbook summary. http://www.much-ado.net/austenbook/
Alice is bored listening to her sister read.
White Rabbit is really late!
Alice is stalking the @White Rabbit and fell down a hole.
Alice became a fan of DRINK ME and EAT ME.
Dodo, Mouse, Alice and 11 of their friends joined the group The Caucus Race.
Alice is now friend with White Rabbit
White Rabbit wants @Bill the Lizard to fix the house problem.
Alice is now friends with Caterpillar.
Alice and Caterpillar became fans of Hookah and Mushrooms.
Alice is now friends with Duchess, Chesire Cat, Mad Hatter, Dormouse and March Hare.
Mad Hatter, Alice, Dormouse and March Hare are attending The Mad Tea Party.
The Cards tagged Alice in the note How to Paint Roses Red.
Alice is attending Croquet with the Queen.
Alice and 21 of her friends are attending the Trial of the Knave of Hearts.
Alice thinks The Trial and “Off with Her Head” is so ridiculous.
Alice became a fan of Waking Up.
Alice is bored again.
Alice became a fan of Mirrors and Jabberwocky Poetry.
Alice joined the group Flowers.
Alice is now friends with Red Queen.
Alice became a fan of Playing Chess.
Alice is now friends with Tweedledum and Tweedledee.
Tweedledum and Tweedledee tagged Alice in the note The Walrus and the Carpenter.
Mad Hatter and @March Hare gives a shout-out to @Alice.
Alice is now friends with White Queen and Humpty Dumpty.
Alice joined the group AKHAKM*.
Alice hates @Red Knight and loves @White Knight.
Alice is Queen!
*All the king’s horse and all the king’s men.
February 26th, 2010 at 20:56
“Tuesday, 1737. Tsk tsk tsk, 24 hours, only two entries. And we’re summarizing children’s books. Oh the humanity.”
AHAHAAA, way too funny!
February 27th, 2010 at 23:42
May 4
Dear Diary,
I thought this day will be bore me to tears, but I was wrong.
When I woke up after a mind-numbing tale from my sister, I stalked on a rabbit that I’d been curious with. The next thing I know was I was already stumbling on a hole with the white rabbit. I eyed a long hallway full of doors. There, I found a key which can unlock a tiny door and through that door I’d seen a beautiful garden. God, that sight was amazing! I drank a something I found and to my surprise, I became small. I didn’t know that an adventure awaits me. I met the grinning Cheshire Cat and the kind Caterpillar. Also, there were Duchess, Mad Hatter, Dormouse and March Hare. Really weird, eh? The most striking is my walk out of the mad Tea Party! I was even invited in a trial where I made a scene when I grew bigger and bigger until…. POOF!! I heard my sister’s voice and I was back to reality. That’s one heck of a dream!
Now I actually think that kids literally and figuratively dream bigger than adults.
-Alice
November 4
Dear Diary,
Today, I’ve realized the following:
-Kittens’ fur is soft.
-Discovering a world behind the mirror tickles one’s curiosity.
-Encountering moving chess pieces, the agile Red Queen, a poem titled “Jabberwocky”, a fat twin, Humpty Dumpty, Red Knight and White Knight tickles it more.
-Chess is mind-bugging and fun.
-I’m sleepy.
Goodnight!
-Alice
February 28th, 2010 at 01:05
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is a novel by English author Charles Dodgson under the pseudonym Lewis Caroll. It tells the story of a girl named Alice who falls down a rabbit hole into a fantasy world populated by peculiar and anthropomorphic creatures – a hookah smoking Caterpillar, an ophidiophobic pigeon, a constantly grinning Cheshire cat, the March Hare, the Dormouse and the time-conscious White Rabbit.
Alice also encounters the Mad Hatter in a tea party. The guests of the Mad Tea Party are probably the most argumentative in all of Wonderland that Alice soon decides to leave. She manages to get through the garden she saw when she first arrived.
This garden is owned by the white rose hating Queen of Hearts who has a lingering obsession with severing her subjects’ heads at the slightest provocation. At the Knave of Hearts’ trial, Alice is so appalled by the ridiculous proceedings that she refuse to be intimidated by the Queen and sparks an attack of playing cards against the hapless Alice. At this point she wakes up, all her adventures have been a fantastic, albeit realistic dream.
Through the Looking-Glass, is the sequel to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Although it makes no reference to the events in the earlier book, the themes and settings of this book make it a kind of mirror image of Wonderland: the first book begins outdoors, in the warm month of May, on Alice’s birthday, uses frequent change in size as a plot device, and draws on the imagery of playing cards; the second book opens indoors on a snowy, wintry night exactly six months later in November. The second book uses frequent changes in time and spatial directions as a plot device and draws on the imagery of chess. In it, there are many mirror themes, including opposites, time running backwards and so on.
February 28th, 2010 at 13:01
Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass = Sleep is an activity; the greatest cure for boredom. It makes you dream of worlds far, far, crazier than the one you’re in. And cats are wonderful pets. Just ask Alice.
February 28th, 2010 at 22:09
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
Alice follows the white rabbit.
Alice falls through rabbit hole and joins a Caucus race (don’t ask).
Alice follows the white rabbit still.
Alice joins a Tea-party with a Mad Hatter, a March Hare and a Dormouse.
Alice plays croquet with the Queen, who likes to order random people to be decapitated.
Alice takes part in a trial to determine who has stolen the Queen’s tarts.
Alice wakes up.
All those while continually changing size and seeing the Chesire Cat, or its grin.
Through the Looking Glass
Alice scolds her cat and goes through the looking-glass.
Alice reads Jabberwocky.
Alice is mistaken for a flower, a very odd flower.
Alice meets Tweedledum and Tweedledee. She recites “The Walrus and the Carpenter.”
Alice encounters Humpty Dumpty, who explains Jabberwocky.
Alice becomes Queen and joind the ranks of the Red Queen and White Queen.
Alice puts the Red King into checkmate.
Alice wakes up and goes back to talking to her cats.
All those while being a piece in a chess game.
March 1st, 2010 at 00:01
“Wonderland”:Human mind at its most fecund and rapt+stifling educational tradition x boredom =English society Bikini Island!Surviving is a limerick reality, absorbing for Alice’s age, peopled by characters that could only be observations of her society – Draconian queen who could only have her way or else “off with your thoughts, er, head, I mean”-and metaphors of Alice’s predicament –metamorphosing caterpillar (Happy b-day Alice!)is key to choices she recurrently makes throughout, grow or shrink.Ultimately she decides to assert herself physically rather, eating the “GROW’ mushroom Now-Butterfly gave her, towering and toppling the Queen’s court that she has had enough of already. She WAKES UP.
“Looking Glass” is about how there is another way of looking, or acknowledging, the world, and how it is as valid or at least how sensical “valid” world is with it.In her crossover to the world in the mirror, there is a poem of foreign language. But she founds out, it is sensical if you read it as a structured thing, revealing how a poem written in say English works. THE UNMAKING OF A WORLD REVEALS ABOUT THE MAKINGS OF THAT WORLD. This diptych is mirrored in Dinah’s two kittens(May dev’t ang character!), twins Tweedledum and -dee, backward-running of time, etc. There is an interactive game of chess, but with the chess pieces though, where she wins and become queen, reigning on some puzzler again.
March 1st, 2010 at 00:05
*sorry, not sure if it got sent (resending)
Alice = 7 1/2
Alice goes to Wonderland.
Alice sees a beautiful garden.
Alice –> beautiful garden.
Alice = 2 sin (theta)
*grows and shrinks periodically
Garden (x,y) = x + y; x = weird experiences, y = rude creatures
Alice’s dreams = 1 / Alice’s reality
Wonderland = Reality
Through the Looking Glass:
Again, Alice converts reality to something else. She turns the reflection of a room she lives in into a different world. She gets caught in a chess game where she becomes one of the pieces. In the quest of becoming a queen, she travels through different places and again meets weird creatures (including other chess pieces) that doesn’t treat her all that nicely.
In the end, she reaches her goal, becomes a queen, but it doesn’t turn out as fun as she has hoped. The Looking Glass world is just as bad as reality, only weirder. Still, when she wakes up, she seems excited by her adventure. I guess everyone just wants to escape and their own adventure.
March 1st, 2010 at 01:04
Hello! I missed this post last week since it was our finals D:
I know the deadline has passed already, but what the hell. I love the book! I just finished re-reading my Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass book earlier, so here goes!
Alice in Wonderland, as Dodgson says, starts when Alice falls into a rabbit-hole “without the least idea what was to happen afterwards.” She meets a flurry of characters: the White Rabbit who’s running late; the Duchess herself, who flees before the Queen; the Mad Hatter and the March Hare, who live for tea-time; the Queen of Hearts, who orders everyone to be off with their heads; and the Cheshire cat and his grin. The story concludes with a trial over the thief of the Queen’s tarts, with Alice addressing the Queen and King: “You’re nothing but a pack of cards!”—and waking up.
Similarly, In “Through the Looking Glass,” Alice returns to Wonderland and gets involved in a highly elaborate game of chess: beating the Red Queen and waking up at the end, to find herself shaking her kitten. Her adventures lead her to meet characters we may have already met, too, in our own dreams: Humpty Dumpty, Tweedledum and Tweedledee, a White Queen, a Unicorn, a Lion, a Sheep.
Alice’s adventures with these characters are nonsensical yet reasonable, only getting “curioser and curioser”—and thus cannot be plotted in the way we know how. In the end, we are given a question: “Who dreamed it?” For Alice and her adventures, we’ll make an exception: this is not a dream. As my lit teacher put it, what we imagine most is what is most real. What Alice is about is our power to imagine, our life in fairy tales.
March 3rd, 2010 at 17:50
Got my prize this afternoon from Kat (and two tickets to the 3D screening). Thanks again!