“Faerie is a perilous land, and in it are pitfalls for the unwary and dungeons for the overbold. And overbold I may be accounted, for though I have been a lover of fairy-stories since I learned to read, and have at times thought about them, I have not studied them professionally. I have been hardly more than a wandering explorer (or trespasser) in the land, full of wonder but not of information.”
J.R.R. Tolkien, “On Fairy Stories.”
“I propose to speak on fairy-stories, though I am aware that this is a rash adventure.”
J.R.R. Tolkien, “On Fairy-Stories”
To-day Isn’t any Other Day… or On Procrastination
(Alice to the White Queen) “But really you should have a lady’s-maid!”
“I’m sure I’ll take you with pleasure! the Queen said. “Twopence a week, and jam every other day.”
Alice couldn’t help laughing, as she said, “I don’t want you to hire me–and I don’t care for jam.”
“It’s very good jam,” said the Queen.
“Well, I don’t want any to-day, at any rate.”
“You couldn’t have it if you did want it,” the Queen said. “The rule is, jam to-morrow and jam yesterday–but never jam to-day.”
“It must come soemtimes to ‘jam to-day,’” Alice objected.
“No, it can’t,” said the Queen. “It’s jam every other day: to-day isn’t any other day, you know.”
Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass, Chapter V
You’re only a sort of thing in his dream… or On Brain in a Vat Schemes
Here she checked herself in some alarm, at hearing something that sounded to her like the puffing of a large steam-engine in the wood near them, though she feared it was more likely to be a wild beast. “are there any lions or tigers about here?” she asked timidly.
It’s only the Red King snoring,” said Tweedledee.
“Come and look at him!” the brothers cried, and they each took one of Alice’s hands and led her up to where the King was sleeping.
“Isn’t he a lovely sight?” said Tweedledum.
Alice couldn’t say honestly that he was. He had a tall red night-cap on, with a tassel, and he was lying crumpled up into a sort of untidy heap and snoring loud - “fit to snore his head off!” as Tweedledum remarked.
“I’m afraid he’ll catch cold with lying on the damp grass,” said Alice, who was a very thoughtful little girl.
“He’s dreaming now,” said Tweedledee: “and what do you think he’s dreaming about?”
Alice said, “Nobody can guess that.”
“Why, about you!” Tweedledee exclaimed, clapping his hands triumphantly. “And if he left off dreaming about you, where do you suppose you’d be?”
“Where I am now, of course,” said Alice.
“Not you!” Tweedledee retorted contemptuously. “You’d be nowhere. Why, you’re only a sort of thing in his dream!
“If that there King was to wake,” added Tweedledum, “you’d gou out–bang!–just like a candle!”
“I shouldn’t!” Alice exclaimed indignantly. “Besides, if I’m only a sort of thing in his dream, what are you, I should like to know?”
“Ditto,” said Tweedledum.
“Ditto, ditto!” cried Tweedledee.
He shouted this so loud that Alice couldn’t help saying, “Hush! You’ll be waking him, I’m afraid, if you make so much noise.”
“Well, it’s no use your talking about waking him,” said Tweedledum, when you’re only one of the things in his dream. You know very well you’re not real.”
“I am real!” said Alice, and began to cry.
“You won’t make yourself a bit realler by crying ,” Tweedledee remarked; “there’s nothing to cry about.”
“If I wasn’t real,” Alice said–half-laughing through her tears, it all seemed so ridiculous–”I shouldn’t be able to cry.”
“I hope you don’t suppose those are real tears?” Tweedledum interrupted in a tone of great contempt.
“I know they’re talking nonsense,” Alice thought to herself: “and it’s foolish to cry about it.” So she brushed awayher tears and went on as cheerfully as she could, “At any rate I’d better be getting out of the wood, for really it’s coming on very dark…
-Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass, Chapter IV
An uncomfortable sort of age… or On Aging
“So here’s a question for you. How old did you say you were?”Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass, Chapter VIAlice made a short calculation, and said, “Seven years and six months.”
“Wrong!” Humpty Dumpty exclaimed triumphantly. “You never said a word like it!”
“I thought you meant ‘How old are you?’” Alice explained.
“If I’d meant that, I’d have said it,” said Humpty Dumpty.
Alice didn’t want to begin another argument, so she said nothing.
“Seven years and six months!” Humpty Dumpty repeated thoughtfully. “An uncomfortable sort of age. Now if you’d asked my advice , I’d have said, ‘Leave off at seven’–but it’s too late now.”
“I never ask advice about growing,” Alice said indignantly.
“Too proud?” the other inquired.
Alice felt even more indignant at this suggestion. “I mean,” she said, “that one can’t help growing older.”
“One can’t, perhaps,” said Humpty Dumpty, “but two can. With proper assistance, you might have left off at seven.”
You seem very clever at explaining words sir… or On Text Criticism Part II
“You seem very clever at explaining words, sir,” said Alice. “Would you kindly tell me the meaning of the poem called ‘Jabberwocky?’”“Let’s hear it,” said Humpty Dumpty. “I can explain all the poems that ever were invented–and a good many that haven’t been invented just yet.”
This sounded very hopeful, so Alice repeated the first verse:
“Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogroves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.”
“That’s enough to begin with,” Humpty Dumpty interrupted: “there are plenty of hard words there. Continue Reading…
When I use a word it means just what I choose it to mean… or On Text Criticism Part I
…–and that shows that there are three hundred and sixty-four days when you might get un-birthday presents–”“Certainly,” said Alice.
“And only one for birthday presents, you know. There’s glory for you!”
“I don’t know what you mean by ‘glory,’” Alice said.
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. “Of course you don’t–till I tell you. I meant ‘there’s a nice knock-down argument for you!’”
“But ‘glory’ doesn’t mean ‘a nice knock-down argument,’” Alice objected.
Continue Reading…
That’s Logic… or On Ecclesiastical Debates
I know what you’re thinking about,” said Tweedledum: “But it ain’t so, nohow.”
“Contrariwise,” continued Tweedledee, “if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn’t, it ain’t. That’s logic.”
Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass
“You have tell me he is mad. He is not mad. He is only more clever than you. It is not the same.”
General Siyuf from the Epiphany of the Long Sun, Gene Wolfe.
