lip lit: an adventure with alice in wonderland

To think I managed my whole childhood without reading Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland seems pretty scandalous. When I finally read it for the first time a few months ago, I thought I was on my way to redemption, but, unfortunately, it only made me realise what I’d missed out on by not picking it up as a kid. My one consolation is that I managed the book before my twenty-first birthday, so if we’re working on technicalities, I was still a child when I read it.

Courtesy of a cartoon movie and a living person version (both of which led me to believe the title of the book is actually Alice in Wonderland), I wasn’t ignorant of the story. I knew it existed, I knew it was a book, I even knew it was written by Lewis Carroll, yet not once had I chosen to delve into the pages. It was only when I bought an e-reader last year and the book came free on my device that I was spurred on to finally read it. I chose to ignore the old, hard-covered edition which has been sitting on my bookshelf since I was about nine, and press through the electronic pages instead.

I absolutely loved the book. I’d heard that Carroll enjoyed playing with the English language, but until I read one of his works I never understood how delightful his word games actually are. I couldn’t help but laugh out loud in places and when I finished reading it, I immediately regretted that I’d never picked it up as a child. I actually felt cheated. I tried to find someone to blame, a teacher, or my mother, but I can remember being told I should read Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland a number of times. Yet I was simply too busy working my way through Scholastic serials to take their advice on board. The movies, of course, don’t do justice to the book. I think in the case of Carroll’s work, so much is lost because most of what he does with language only makes sense when reading. The irony is lost in speech. It is one thing to know the story of Alice; completely another to marvel in the language of the original text.

While I was deep in the throes of regret, it suddenly occurred to me that maybe it was a good thing I hadn’t read it until I was older. I’m sure I wouldn’t have enjoyed the language as much if I’d read it as a child. Then again, I probably would have enjoyed the story itself more. Which made me wish I’d read it as a child and loved it enough to pick it up and read it again when I was older. As I realised I had to stop dwelling on the Alice situation, I started to wonder, which other books have I missed out on because I haven’t read them as a child?

Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book is one that comes to mind. I can remember seeing the Disney movie, but I’ve never read the book. It’s been on my list of ‘must-reads’ for years, but there’s always something more pressing to read instead. Winnie-the-Pooh is another. I have an old set of the A. A Milne books as well as an eightieth anniversary edition of the book, yet my only memories of the characters are from the animated cartoon television show and a couple of animated movies. I’ve never bothered to actually read the book.

Perhaps I’m making too big a deal out of this. It is, after all, impossible to read every single book in existence. Yet, some books are overshadowed by their movie adaptations to the point where merely knowing the storyline is acceptable. It’s not that the movies are terrible, or cannot convey the plot; it’s that a movie isn’t supposed to do what literature does, and is therefore not a substitute.

The only thing left to do now is find my Winnie-the-Pooh teddy bear and my old doona cover, curl up on the couch and read through the children’s books I never did. I can only hope they live up to the high expectations Mr Lewis Carroll set.

Which books do you wish you’d read as a child?

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