Carroll, Lewis
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Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (27 January 1832 – 14 January 1898), better known by his
pen name A pen name or nom-de-plume is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name. A pen name may be used to make the author's na ...
Lewis Carroll, was an English
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,
poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator (thought, thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral t ...
,
mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...
,
photographer A photographer (the Greek φῶς (''phos''), meaning "light", and γραφή (''graphê''), meaning "drawing, writing", together meaning "drawing with light") is a person who uses a camera to make photographs. Duties and types of photograp ...
and reluctant
Anglican Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...
deacon A deacon is a member of the diaconate, an office in Christian churches that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions. Major Christian denominations, such as the Cathol ...
. His most notable works are ''
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (also known as ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English Children's literature, children's novel by Lewis Carroll, a mathematics university don, don at the University of Oxford. It details the story of a ...
'' (1865) and its sequel ''
Through the Looking-Glass ''Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There'' is a novel published in December 1871 by Lewis Carroll, the pen name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, a mathematics lecturer at Christ Church, Oxford, Christ Church, University of Oxford. I ...
'' (1871). He was noted for his facility with
word play Word play or wordplay (also: play-on-words) is a literary technique and a form of wit in which words used become the main subject of the work, primarily for the purpose of intended effect or amusement. Examples of word play include puns, ph ...
, logic, and fantasy. His poems ''
Jabberwocky "Jabberwocky" is a Nonsense verse, nonsense poem written by Lewis Carroll about the killing of a creature named "the Jabberwock". It was included in his 1871 novel ''Through the Looking-Glass'', the sequel to ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' ...
'' (1871) and ''
The Hunting of the Snark ''The Hunting of the Snark'', subtitled ''An Agony, in Eight Fits'', is a poem by the English writer Lewis Carroll. It is typically categorised as a nonsense poem. Written between 1874 and 1876, it borrows the setting, some creatures, and eig ...
'' (1876) are classified in the genre of
literary nonsense Literary nonsense (or nonsense literature) is a broad categorization of literature that balances elements that make sense with some that do not, with the effect of subverting language conventions or logical reasoning. Even though the most well-k ...
. Some of Alice's nonsensical wonderland logic reflects his published work on
mathematical logic Mathematical logic is the study of Logic#Formal logic, formal logic within mathematics. Major subareas include model theory, proof theory, set theory, and recursion theory (also known as computability theory). Research in mathematical logic com ...
. Carroll came from a family of
high-church A ''high church'' is a Christian Church whose beliefs and practices of Christian ecclesiology, liturgy, and theology emphasize "ritual, priestly authority, nd sacraments," and a standard liturgy. Although used in connection with various Christia ...
Anglicans Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...
, and pursued his clerical training at
Christ Church, Oxford Christ Church (, the temple or house, ''wikt:aedes, ædes'', of Christ, and thus sometimes known as "The House") is a Colleges of the University of Oxford, constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Founded in 1546 by Henry V ...
, where he lived for most of his life as a
scholar A scholar is a person who is a researcher or has expertise in an academic discipline. A scholar can also be an academic, who works as a professor, teacher, or researcher at a university. An academic usually holds an advanced degree or a termina ...
,
teacher A teacher, also called a schoolteacher or formally an educator, is a person who helps students to acquire knowledge, competence, or virtue, via the practice of teaching. ''Informally'' the role of teacher may be taken on by anyone (e.g. w ...
and (necessarily for his academic fellowship at the time) Anglican deacon.
Alice Liddell Alice Pleasance Hargreaves (''née'' Liddell, ; 4 May 1852 – 16 November 1934) was an English woman who, in her childhood, was an acquaintance and photography subject of Lewis Carroll. One of the stories he told her during a boating trip becam ...
– a daughter of
Henry Liddell Henry George Liddell (; 6 February 1811– 18 January 1898) was Dean (college), dean (1855–1891) of Christ Church, Oxford, Vice-Chancellor of Oxford University (1870–1874), headmaster (1846–1855) of Westminster School (where a house is n ...
, the
Dean of Christ Church Dean of Christ Church may refer to: * Dean of Christ Church, Oxford * Dean of Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin * Dean of ChristChurch Cathedral, Christchurch, New Zealand See also * Christ Church Cathedral (disambiguation) {{Disambiguation ...
– is widely identified as the original inspiration for ''Alice in Wonderland'', though Carroll always denied this. An avid puzzler, Carroll created the
word ladder Word ladder (also known as Doublets, word-links, change-the-word puzzles, paragrams, laddergrams, or word golf) is a word game invented by Lewis Carroll. A word ladder puzzle begins with two words, and to solve the puzzle one must find a chain of ...
puzzle (which he then called "Doublets"), which he published in his weekly column for '' Vanity Fair'' magazine between 1879 and 1881. In 1982 a memorial stone to Carroll was unveiled at
Poets' Corner Poets' Corner is a section of the southern transept of Westminster Abbey in London, England, where many poets, playwrights, and writers are buried or commemorated. The first poet interred in Poets' Corner was Geoffrey Chaucer in 1400. Willia ...
in
Westminster Abbey Westminster Abbey, formally titled the Collegiate Church of Saint Peter at Westminster, is an Anglican church in the City of Westminster, London, England. Since 1066, it has been the location of the coronations of 40 English and British m ...
. There are societies in many parts of the world dedicated to the enjoyment and promotion of his works.


Early life

Dodgson's family background was predominantly northern English,
conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy and ideology that seeks to promote and preserve traditional institutions, customs, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civiliza ...
, and
high-church A ''high church'' is a Christian Church whose beliefs and practices of Christian ecclesiology, liturgy, and theology emphasize "ritual, priestly authority, nd sacraments," and a standard liturgy. Although used in connection with various Christia ...
Anglican Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...
. Most of his male ancestors were army officers or Anglican clergymen. His great-grandfather, Charles Dodgson, had risen through the ranks of the church to become the
Bishop of Elphin The Bishop of Elphin (; ) is an Episcopal polity, episcopal title which takes its name after the village of Elphin, County Roscommon, Republic of Ireland, Ireland. In the Catholic Church, Roman Catholic Church it remains a separate title, but ...
in rural Ireland. His paternal grandfather, also named Charles, was an army captain fatality of the
Irish rebellion of 1803 The Irish rebellion of 1803 was an attempt by Irish Republicanism, Irish republicans to seize the seat of the British government in Ireland, Dublin Castle, and trigger a nationwide insurrection. Renewing the Irish Rebellion of 1798, struggle o ...
, when his two sons were hardly more than babies. The older of these sons, yet another Charles Dodgson, was Carroll's father. He went to
Rugby School Rugby School is a Public school (United Kingdom), private boarding school for pupils aged 13–18, located in the town of Rugby, Warwickshire in England. Founded in 1567 as a free grammar school for local boys, it is one of the oldest independ ...
and then to Christ Church, a
constituent college A collegiate university is a university where functions are divided between a central administration and a number of constituent colleges. Historically, the first collegiate university was the University of Paris and its first college was the Col ...
of the
University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...
. He reverted to the other family tradition and took
holy orders In certain Christian denominations, holy orders are the ordination, ordained ministries of bishop, priest (presbyter), and deacon, and the sacrament or rite by which candidates are ordained to those orders. Churches recognizing these orders inclu ...
. He was mathematically gifted and won a
double first The British undergraduate degree classification system is a Grading in education, grading structure used for undergraduate degrees or bachelor's degrees and Master's degree#Integrated Masters Degree, integrated master's degrees in the United Kingd ...
degree, which could have been the prelude to a brilliant academic career. Instead, he became a country
parson A parson is an ordained Christian person responsible for a small area, typically a parish. The term was formerly often used for some Anglican clergy and, more rarely, for ordained ministers in some other churches. It is no longer a formal term d ...
.
Cohen Cohen () is a surname of Jewish, Samaritan and Biblical origins (see: Kohen). It is a very common Jewish surname (the most common in Israel). Cohen is one of the four Samaritan last names that exist in the modern day. Many Jewish immigrants ente ...
, pp. 30–35
Dodgson was born on 27 January 1832 at All Saints' Vicarage in
Daresbury Daresbury is a village and civil parish in the Borough of Halton, Cheshire, England. At the 2011 census, it had a population of 246. History The name means "Deor's fortification", derived from an Old English personal name and the word ''burh' ...
,
Cheshire Cheshire ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in North West England. It is bordered by Merseyside to the north-west, Greater Manchester to the north-east, Derbyshire to the east, Staffordshire to the south-east, and Shrop ...
, the oldest boy and the third oldest of 11 children. When he was 11, his father was given the
living Living or The Living may refer to: Common meanings *Life, a condition that distinguishes organisms from inorganic objects and dead organisms ** Living species, one that is not extinct *Personal life, the course of an individual human's life * ...
of
Croft-on-Tees Croft-on-Tees is a village and civil parish in North Yorkshire, England. It has also been known as Croft Spa, and from which the former Croft Spa railway station took its name. It lies north-north west of the county town of Northallerton. Hi ...
, Yorkshire, and the whole family moved to the spacious rectory. This remained their home for the next 25 years. Charles' father was an active and highly conservative
cleric Clergy are formal leaders within established religions. Their roles and functions vary in different religious traditions, but usually involve presiding over specific rituals and teaching their religion's doctrines and practices. Some of the ter ...
of the
Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...
who later became the
Archdeacon of Richmond The Archdeacon of Richmond and Craven is an archdeacon, archdiaconal post in the Church of England. It was created in about 1088 within the See of York and was moved in 1541 to the Bishopric of Chester, See of Chester, in 1836 to the Diocese of ...
and involved himself, sometimes influentially, in the intense religious disputes that were dividing the church. He was high-church, inclining toward
Anglo-Catholicism Anglo-Catholicism comprises beliefs and practices that emphasise the Catholicism, Catholic heritage (especially pre-English Reformation, Reformation roots) and identity of the Church of England and various churches within Anglicanism. Anglo-Ca ...
, an admirer of
John Henry Newman John Henry Newman (21 February 1801 – 11 August 1890) was an English Catholic theologian, academic, philosopher, historian, writer, and poet. He was previously an Anglican priest and after his conversion became a cardinal. He was an ...
and the
Tractarian movement The Oxford Movement was a theological movement of high-church members of the Church of England which began in the 1830s and eventually developed into Anglo-Catholicism. The movement, whose original devotees were mostly associated with the Uni ...
, and did his best to instil such views in his children. However, Charles developed an ambivalent relationship with his father's values and with the Church of England as a whole. During his early youth, Dodgson was educated at home. His "reading lists" preserved in the family archives testify to a precocious intellect: at the age of seven, he was reading books such as ''
The Pilgrim's Progress ''The Pilgrim's Progress from This World, to That Which Is to Come'' is a 1678 Christian allegory written by John Bunyan. It is commonly regarded as one of the most significant works of Protestant devotional literature and of wider early moder ...
''. He also spoke with a
stammer Stuttering, also known as stammering, is a speech disorder characterized externally by involuntary repetitions and prolongations of sounds, syllables, words, or phrases as well as involuntary silent pauses called blocks in which the person who ...
– a condition shared by most of his siblings – that often inhibited his social life throughout his years. At the age of twelve he was sent to Richmond School (later known as Richmond Grammar School and later integrated into the comprehensive
Richmond School Richmond School & Sixth Form College, often referred to simply as Richmond School, is a coeducational comprehensive secondary school with academy status, located in North Yorkshire, England. It was created by the merger of three schools, the ...
) in
Richmond, North Yorkshire Richmond is a market town and Civil parishes in England, civil parish in North Yorkshire, England. It is located at the point where Swaledale, the upper valley of the River Swale, opens into the Vale of Mowbray. The town's population at the 2011 ...
. In 1846, Dodgson entered
Rugby School Rugby School is a Public school (United Kingdom), private boarding school for pupils aged 13–18, located in the town of Rugby, Warwickshire in England. Founded in 1567 as a free grammar school for local boys, it is one of the oldest independ ...
, where he was evidently unhappy, as he wrote some years after leaving: "I cannot say ... that any earthly considerations would induce me to go through my three years again ... I can honestly say that if I could have been ... secure from annoyance at night, the hardships of the daily life would have been comparative trifles to bear." He did not claim he suffered from bullying, but cited little boys as the main targets of older bullies at Rugby. Stuart Dodgson Collingwood, Dodgson's nephew, wrote that "even though it is hard for those who have only known him as the gentle and retiring don to believe it, it is nevertheless true that long after he left school, his name was remembered as that of a boy who knew well how to use his fists in defence of a righteous cause", which is the protection of the smaller boys. Scholastically, though, he excelled with apparent ease. "I have not had a more promising boy at his age since I came to Rugby", observed mathematics master R. B. Mayor. Francis Walkingame's ''The Tutor's Assistant; Being a Compendium of Arithmetic'' – the mathematics textbook that the young Dodgson used – still survives and it contained an inscription in
Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...
, which translates to: "This book belongs to Charles Lutwidge Dodgson: hands off!" Some pages also included annotations such as the one found on p. 129, where he wrote "Not a fair question in decimals" next to a question. He left Rugby at the end of 1849 and
matriculated Matriculation is the formal process of entering a university, or of becoming eligible to enter by fulfilling certain academic requirements such as a matriculation examination. Australia In Australia, the term ''matriculation'' is seldom used now ...
at the
University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...
in May 1850 as a member of his father's old college, Christ Church. After waiting for rooms in college to become available, he went into residence in January 1851.
Clark Clark is an English language surname with historical links to England, Scotland, and Ireland, ultimately derived from the Latin ''clericus'' meaning "scribe", "secretary" or a scholar within a religious order, referring to someone who was educated ...
, pp. 64–65
He had been at Oxford only two days when he received a summons home. His mother had died of "inflammation of the brain" – perhaps
meningitis Meningitis is acute or chronic inflammation of the protective membranes covering the brain and spinal cord, collectively called the meninges. The most common symptoms are fever, intense headache, vomiting and neck stiffness and occasion ...
or a stroke – at the age of 47. His early academic career veered between high promise and irresistible distraction. He did not always work hard, but was exceptionally gifted, and achievement came easily to him. In 1852, he obtained
first-class honours The British undergraduate degree classification system is a grading structure used for undergraduate degrees or bachelor's degrees and integrated master's degrees in the United Kingdom. The system has been applied, sometimes with significant var ...
in Mathematics
Moderations Honour Moderations (or ''Mods'') are a set of examinations at the University of Oxford at the end of the first part of some degree courses (e.g., Greats or '' Literae Humaniores''). Honour Moderations candidates have a class awarded (hence the ...
and was soon afterwards nominated to a
Studentship A scholarship is a form of financial aid awarded to students for further education. Generally, scholarships are awarded based on a set of criteria such as academic merit, diversity and inclusion, athletic skill, and financial need, research exp ...
by his father's old friend Canon
Edward Pusey Edward Bouverie Pusey (; 22 August 180016 September 1882) was an English Anglican cleric, for more than fifty years Regius Professor of Hebrew at the University of Oxford. He was one of the leading figures in the Oxford Movement, with interest ...
. Collingwood, p. 52
Clark Clark is an English language surname with historical links to England, Scotland, and Ireland, ultimately derived from the Latin ''clericus'' meaning "scribe", "secretary" or a scholar within a religious order, referring to someone who was educated ...
, p. 74
In 1854, he obtained first-class honours in the Final Honours School of Mathematics, standing first on the list, and thus graduated as Bachelor of Arts. Collingwood, p. 57 Wilson, p. 51 He remained at Christ Church studying and teaching, but the next year he failed an important scholarship exam through his self-confessed inability to apply himself to study.
Cohen Cohen () is a surname of Jewish, Samaritan and Biblical origins (see: Kohen). It is a very common Jewish surname (the most common in Israel). Cohen is one of the four Samaritan last names that exist in the modern day. Many Jewish immigrants ente ...
, p. 51
Clark Clark is an English language surname with historical links to England, Scotland, and Ireland, ultimately derived from the Latin ''clericus'' meaning "scribe", "secretary" or a scholar within a religious order, referring to someone who was educated ...
, p. 79
Even so, his talent as a mathematician won him the Christ Church Mathematical Lectureship in 1855, which he continued to hold for the next 26 years.
Cohen Cohen () is a surname of Jewish, Samaritan and Biblical origins (see: Kohen). It is a very common Jewish surname (the most common in Israel). Cohen is one of the four Samaritan last names that exist in the modern day. Many Jewish immigrants ente ...
, pp. 414–416
Despite early unhappiness, Dodgson remained at Christ Church, in various capacities, until his death, including that of Sub-Librarian of the Christ Church library, where his office was close to the Deanery, where Alice Liddell lived. Leach, Ch. 2.


Character and appearance


Health problems

The young adult Charles Dodgson was about tall and slender, and he had curly brown hair and blue or grey eyes (depending on the account). He was described in later life as somewhat
asymmetrical Asymmetry is the absence of, or a violation of, symmetry (the property of an object being invariant to a transformation, such as reflection). Symmetry is an important property of both physical and abstract systems and it may be displayed in pre ...
, and as carrying himself rather stiffly and awkwardly, although this might be on account of a knee injury sustained in middle age. As a very young child, he suffered a fever that left him deaf in one ear. At the age of 17, he suffered a severe attack of
whooping cough Whooping cough ( or ), also known as pertussis or the 100-day cough, is a highly contagious, Vaccine-preventable diseases, vaccine-preventable Pathogenic bacteria, bacterial disease. Initial symptoms are usually similar to those of the common c ...
, which was probably responsible for his chronically weak chest in later life. In early childhood, he acquired a
stammer Stuttering, also known as stammering, is a speech disorder characterized externally by involuntary repetitions and prolongations of sounds, syllables, words, or phrases as well as involuntary silent pauses called blocks in which the person who ...
, which he referred to as his "hesitation"; it remained throughout his life. The stammer has always been a significant part of the image of Dodgson. While one apocryphal story says that he stammered only in adult company and was free and fluent with children, there is no evidence to support this idea. Many children of his acquaintance remembered the stammer, while many adults failed to notice it. Dodgson himself seems to have been far more acutely aware of it than most people whom he met; it is said that he caricatured himself as the
Dodo The dodo (''Raphus cucullatus'') is an extinction, extinct flightless bird that was endemism, endemic to the island of Mauritius, which is east of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean. The dodo's closest relative was the also-extinct and flightles ...
in ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'', referring to his difficulty in pronouncing his last name, but this is one of the many supposed facts often repeated for which no first-hand evidence remains. He did indeed refer to himself as a dodo, but whether or not this reference was to his stammer is simply speculation. Dodgson's stammer did trouble him, but it was never so debilitating that it prevented him from applying his other personal qualities to do well in society. He lived in a time when people commonly devised their own amusements and when singing and recitation were required social skills, and the young Dodgson was well equipped to be an engaging entertainer. He could reportedly sing at a passable level and was not afraid to do so before an audience. He was also adept at mimicry and storytelling, and reputedly quite good at
charades Charades (, ). is a parlor game, parlor or party game, party word game, word guessing game. Originally, the game was a dramatic form of literary charades: a single person would act out each syllable of a word or phrase in order, followed by the wh ...
.


Social connections

In the interim between his early published writings and the success of the ''Alice'' books, Dodgson began to move in the
pre-Raphaelite The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (PRB), later known as the Pre-Raphaelites, was a group of English painters, poets, and art critics, founded in 1848 by William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Michael Rossetti, ...
social circle. He first met
John Ruskin John Ruskin (8 February 1819 20 January 1900) was an English polymath a writer, lecturer, art historian, art critic, draughtsman and philanthropist of the Victorian era. He wrote on subjects as varied as art, architecture, Critique of politic ...
in 1857 and became friendly with him. Around 1863, he developed a close relationship with
Dante Gabriel Rossetti Gabriel Charles Dante Rossetti (12 May 1828 – 9 April 1882), generally known as Dante Gabriel Rossetti ( ; ), was an English poet, illustrator, painter, translator, and member of the Rossetti family. He founded the Pre-Raphaelite Brother ...
and his family. He would often take pictures of the family in the garden of the Rossetti's house in
Chelsea, London Chelsea is an area in West London, England, due south-west of Kilometre zero#Great Britain, Charing Cross by approximately . It lies on the north bank of the River Thames and for postal purposes is part of the SW postcode area, south-western p ...
. He also knew
William Holman Hunt William Holman Hunt (2 April 1827 – 7 September 1910) was an English painter and one of the founders of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. His paintings were notable for their great attention to detail, vivid colour, and elaborate symbolism ...
,
John Everett Millais Sir John Everett Millais, 1st Baronet ( , ; 8 June 1829 – 13 August 1896) was an English painter and illustrator who was one of the founders of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. He was a child prodigy who, aged eleven, became the youngest s ...
, and Arthur Hughes, among other artists. He knew fairy-tale author
George MacDonald George MacDonald (10 December 1824 – 18 September 1905) was a Scottish author, poet and Christian Congregational minister. He became a pioneering figure in the field of modern fantasy literature and the mentor of fellow-writer Lewis Carrol ...
well – it was the enthusiastic reception of ''Alice'' by the young MacDonald children that persuaded him to submit the work for publication.
Cohen Cohen () is a surname of Jewish, Samaritan and Biblical origins (see: Kohen). It is a very common Jewish surname (the most common in Israel). Cohen is one of the four Samaritan last names that exist in the modern day. Many Jewish immigrants ente ...
, pp. 100–4


Politics, religion, and philosophy

In broad terms, Dodgson has traditionally been regarded as politically, religiously, and personally conservative.
Martin Gardner Martin Gardner (October 21, 1914May 22, 2010) was an American popular mathematics and popular science writer with interests also encompassing magic, scientific skepticism, micromagic, philosophy, religion, and literatureespecially the writin ...
labels Dodgson as a
Tory A Tory () is an individual who supports a political philosophy known as Toryism, based on a British version of traditionalist conservatism which upholds the established social order as it has evolved through the history of Great Britain. The To ...
who was "awed by lords and inclined to be snobbish towards inferiors".
William Tuckwell William Tuckwell (27 November 1829 – 1 February 1919), who liked to be known as the "radical parson", was an English Anglican clergyman well known on political platforms for his experiments in allotments, his advocacy of land nationalisation, a ...
, in his ''Reminiscences of Oxford'' (1900), regarded him as "austere, shy, precise, absorbed in mathematical reverie, watchfully tenacious of his dignity, stiffly conservative in political, theological, social theory, his life mapped out in squares like Alice's landscape". Having failed to obtain exemption from the college's standard requirement for dons at the time, Dodgson was ordained a deacon in the
Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...
on 22 December 1861. In ''The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll'', the editor states that "his Diary is full of such modest depreciations of himself and his work, interspersed with earnest prayers (too sacred and private to be reproduced here) that God would forgive him the past, and help him to perform His holy will in the future." When a friend asked him about his religious views, Dodgson wrote in response that he was a member of the Church of England, but "doubt dif he was fully a '
High Church A ''high church'' is a Christian Church whose beliefs and practices of Christian ecclesiology, Christian liturgy, liturgy, and Christian theology, theology emphasize "ritual, priestly authority, ndsacraments," and a standard liturgy. Although ...
man. He added: Dodgson also expressed interest in other fields. He was an early member of the
Society for Psychical Research The Society for Psychical Research (SPR) is a nonprofit organisation in the United Kingdom. Its stated purpose is to understand events and abilities commonly described as psychic or paranormal. It describes itself as the "first society to condu ...
, and one of his letters suggests that he accepted as real what was then called "thought reading". Dodgson wrote some studies of various philosophical arguments. In 1895, he developed a philosophical regressus-argument on deductive reasoning in his article "
What the Tortoise Said to Achilles "What the Tortoise Said to Achilles", written by Lewis Carroll in 1895 for the philosophical journal ''Mind'', is a brief allegorical dialogue on the foundations of logic. The title alludes to one of Zeno's paradoxes of motion, in which Achill ...
", which appeared in one of the early volumes of ''
Mind The mind is that which thinks, feels, perceives, imagines, remembers, and wills. It covers the totality of mental phenomena, including both conscious processes, through which an individual is aware of external and internal circumstances ...
''. The article was reprinted in the same journal a hundred years later in 1995, with a subsequent article by
Simon Blackburn Simon Walter Blackburn (born 12 July 1944) is an English philosopher known for his work in metaethics, where he defends quasi-realism, and in the philosophy of language. More recently, he has gained a large general audience from his efforts ...
titled "Practical Tortoise Raising".


Artistic activities


Literature

From a young age, Dodgson wrote poetry and short stories, contributing heavily to the family magazine ''
Mischmasch ''Mischmasch'' was a periodical that Lewis Carroll wrote and illustrated for the amusement of his family from 1855 to 1862. It is notable for containing the earliest version of the poem "Jabberwocky", which Carroll would later expand and publis ...
'' and later sending them to various magazines, enjoying moderate success. Between 1854 and 1856, his work appeared in the national publications ''The Comic Times'' and ''The Train'', as well as smaller magazines such as the ''
Whitby Gazette The ''Whitby Gazette'' is an English provincial newspaper published in Whitby, North Yorkshire. History The ''Whitby Gazette'' was founded on 6 July 1854 by Ralph Horne, a local printer, bookseller, stationer, bookbinder, paperhanger and shi ...
'' and the ''Oxford Critic''. Most of this output was humorous, sometimes satirical, but his standards and ambitions were exacting. "I do not think I have yet written anything worthy of real publication (in which I do not include the ''Whitby Gazette'' or the ''Oxonian Advertiser''), but I do not despair of doing so someday," he wrote in July 1855. Sometime after 1850, he did write
puppet A puppet is an object, often resembling a human, animal or Legendary creature, mythical figure, that is animated or manipulated by a person called a puppeteer. Puppetry is an ancient form of theatre which dates back to the 5th century BC in anci ...
plays for his siblings' entertainment, of which one has survived: ''La Guida di Bragia''. In March 1856, he published his first piece of work under the name that would make him famous. A romantic poem called "Solitude" appeared in ''The Train'' under the authorship of "Lewis Carroll". This pseudonym was a play on his real name: ''Lewis'' was the anglicised form of ''Ludovicus'', which was the Latin for ''Lutwidge'', and ''Carroll'' an Irish surname similar to the Latin name ''Carolus'', from which comes the name ''Charles''. The transition went as follows: "Charles Lutwidge" translated into Latin as "Carolus Ludovicus". This was then translated back into English as "Carroll Lewis" and then reversed to make "Lewis Carroll". This pseudonym was chosen by editor
Edmund Yates Edmund Hodgson Yates (3 July 183120 May 1894) was a British journalist, novelist and dramatist. Early life He was born in Edinburgh to the actor and theatre manager Frederick Henry Yates and was educated at Highgate School in London from 1840 ...
from a list of four submitted by Dodgson, the others being Edgar Cuthwellis, Edgar U. C. Westhill, and Louis Carroll.


Alice books

In 1856, Dean
Henry Liddell Henry George Liddell (; 6 February 1811– 18 January 1898) was Dean (college), dean (1855–1891) of Christ Church, Oxford, Vice-Chancellor of Oxford University (1870–1874), headmaster (1846–1855) of Westminster School (where a house is n ...
arrived at Christ Church at
Oxford University The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the second-oldest continuously operating u ...
, bringing with him his young family, all of whom would figure largely in Dodgson's life over the following years, and would greatly influence his writing career. Dodgson became close friends with Liddell's wife, Lorina, and their children, particularly the three sisters Lorina, Edith, and Alice Liddell. He was widely assumed for many years to have derived his own "Alice" from
Alice Liddell Alice Pleasance Hargreaves (''née'' Liddell, ; 4 May 1852 – 16 November 1934) was an English woman who, in her childhood, was an acquaintance and photography subject of Lewis Carroll. One of the stories he told her during a boating trip becam ...
; the
acrostic An acrostic is a poem or other word composition in which the ''first'' letter (or syllable, or word) of each new line (or paragraph, or other recurring feature in the text) spells out a word, message or the alphabet. The term comes from the Fre ...
poem at the end of ''Through the Looking-Glass'' spells out her name in full, and there are also many superficial references to her hidden in the text of both books. It has been noted that Dodgson himself repeatedly denied in later life that his "little heroine" was based on any real child, Leach, Ch. 5 "The Unreal Alice" and he frequently dedicated his works to girls of his acquaintance, adding their names in acrostic poems at the beginning of the text. Gertrude Chataway's name appears in this form at the beginning of ''
The Hunting of the Snark ''The Hunting of the Snark'', subtitled ''An Agony, in Eight Fits'', is a poem by the English writer Lewis Carroll. It is typically categorised as a nonsense poem. Written between 1874 and 1876, it borrows the setting, some creatures, and eig ...
'', and it is not suggested that this means that any of the characters in the narrative are based on her. Information is scarce (Dodgson's diaries for the years 1858–1862 are missing), but it seems clear that his friendship with the Liddell family was an important part of his life in the late 1850s, and he grew into the habit of taking the children on rowing trips (first the boy, Harry, and later the three girls) accompanied by an adult friend to nearby
Nuneham Courtenay Nuneham Courtenay is a village and civil parish about SSE of Oxford. It occupies several miles close to the east bank of the River Thames. Geography The parish is bounded to the west by the River Thames and on other sides by field boundaries. ...
or
Godstow Godstow is a hamlet about northwest of the centre of Oxford. It lies on the banks of the River Thames between the villages of Wolvercote to the east and Wytham to the west. The ruins of Godstow Abbey, also known as Godstow Nunnery, are here. ...
. Leach, Ch. 4 It was on one such expedition on 4 July 1862 that Dodgson invented the outline of the story that eventually became his first and greatest commercial success. He told the story to Alice Liddell and she begged him to write it down, and Dodgson eventually (after much delay) presented her with a handwritten, illustrated manuscript entitled ''Alice's Adventures Under Ground'' in November 1864. Before this, the family of friend and mentor
George MacDonald George MacDonald (10 December 1824 – 18 September 1905) was a Scottish author, poet and Christian Congregational minister. He became a pioneering figure in the field of modern fantasy literature and the mentor of fellow-writer Lewis Carrol ...
read Dodgson's incomplete manuscript, and the enthusiasm of the MacDonald children encouraged Dodgson to seek publication. In 1863, he had taken the unfinished manuscript to Macmillan the publisher, who liked it immediately. After the possible alternative titles were rejected – ''Alice Among the Fairies'' and ''Alice's Golden Hour'' – the work was finally published as ''
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (also known as ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English Children's literature, children's novel by Lewis Carroll, a mathematics university don, don at the University of Oxford. It details the story of a ...
'' in 1865 under the Lewis Carroll pen name, which Dodgson had first used some nine years earlier. The illustrations this time were by
Sir John Tenniel John Tenniel (; 28 February 182025 February 1914) was an English illustrator, graphic humourist and political cartoonist prominent in the second half of the 19th century. An alumnus of the Royal Academy of Arts in London, he was knighted for ar ...
; Dodgson evidently thought that a published book would need the skills of a professional artist. Annotated versions provide insights into many of the ideas and hidden meanings that are prevalent in these books. Critical literature has often proposed
Freudian Sigmund Freud ( ; ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating pathologies seen as originating from conflicts in t ...
interpretations of the book as "a descent into the dark world of the
subconscious In psychology, the subconscious is the part of the mind that is not currently of focal awareness. The term was already popularized in the early 20th century in areas ranging from psychology, religion and spirituality. The concept was heavily popu ...
", as well as seeing it as a satire upon contemporary mathematical advances. The overwhelming commercial success of the first Alice book changed Dodgson's life in many ways. The fame of his alter ego "Lewis Carroll" soon spread around the world. He was inundated with fan mail and with sometimes unwanted attention. Indeed, according to one popular story,
Queen Victoria Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until Death and state funeral of Queen Victoria, her death in January 1901. Her reign of 63 year ...
herself enjoyed ''Alice in Wonderland'' so much that she commanded that he dedicate his next book to her, and was accordingly presented with his next work, a scholarly mathematical volume entitled ''An Elementary Treatise on Determinants''. Dodgson himself vehemently denied this story, commenting "... It is utterly false in every particular: nothing even resembling it has occurred"; and it is unlikely for other reasons. As T. B. Strong comments in a ''
Times Time is the continued sequence of existence and events, and a fundamental quantity of measuring systems. Time or times may also refer to: Temporal measurement * Time in physics, defined by its measurement * Time standard, civil time specificat ...
'' article, "It would have been clean contrary to all his practice to identify heauthor of Alice with the author of his mathematical works". He also began earning quite substantial sums of money but continued with his seemingly disliked post at Christ Church. Late in 1871, he published the sequel ''
Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There ''Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There'' is a novel published in December 1871 by Lewis Carroll, the pen name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, a mathematics lecturer at Christ Church, Oxford, Christ Church, University of Oxford. I ...
''. (The title page of the first edition erroneously gives "1872" as the date of publication.) Its somewhat darker mood possibly reflects changes in Dodgson's life. His father's death in 1868 plunged him into a depression that lasted some years.


The Hunting of the Snark

In 1876, Dodgson produced his next work, ''
The Hunting of the Snark ''The Hunting of the Snark'', subtitled ''An Agony, in Eight Fits'', is a poem by the English writer Lewis Carroll. It is typically categorised as a nonsense poem. Written between 1874 and 1876, it borrows the setting, some creatures, and eig ...
'', a fantastical "nonsense" poem, with illustrations by
Henry Holiday Henry Holiday (17 June 183915 April 1927) was an English Victorian painter of historical genre and landscapes, also a stained-glass designer, illustrator, and sculptor. He was influenced by the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, many of whom he knew. ...
, exploring the adventures of a bizarre crew of nine tradesmen and one beaver, who set off to find the snark. It received largely mixed reviews from Carroll's contemporary reviewers, but was enormously popular with the public, having been reprinted seventeen times between 1876 and 1908, and has seen various adaptations into musicals, opera, theatre, plays and music. Painter
Dante Gabriel Rossetti Gabriel Charles Dante Rossetti (12 May 1828 – 9 April 1882), generally known as Dante Gabriel Rossetti ( ; ), was an English poet, illustrator, painter, translator, and member of the Rossetti family. He founded the Pre-Raphaelite Brother ...
reputedly became convinced that the poem was about him.


Sylvie and Bruno

In 1895, 30 years after the publication of his first books, Carroll attempted a comeback, producing a two-volume tale of the fairy siblings
Sylvie and Bruno ''Sylvie and Bruno'', first published in 1889, and its second volume ''Sylvie and Bruno Concluded'' published in 1893, form the last novel by Lewis Carroll published during his lifetime. Both volumes were illustrated by Harry Furniss. The nove ...
. Carroll entwines two plots set in two alternative worlds, one set in rural England and the other in the fairytale kingdoms of Elfland, Outland, and others. The fairytale world satirises English society and, more specifically, the world of academia. ''Sylvie and Bruno'' came out in two volumes and is considered a lesser work, although it has remained in print for over a century.


Photography (1856–1880)

In 1856, Dodgson took up the new art form of photography under the influence first of his uncle Skeffington Lutwidge, and later of his Oxford friend Reginald Southey. He soon excelled at the art and became a well-known gentleman-photographer, and he seems even to have toyed with the idea of making a living out of it in his very early years. A study by Roger Taylor and Edward Wakeling exhaustively lists every surviving print, and Taylor calculates that just over half of Dodgson's surviving work depicts young girls. Thirty surviving photographs depict nude or semi-nude children. About 60% of Dodgson's original photographic portfolio was deliberately destroyed. Dodgson also made many studies of men, women, boys, and landscapes; his subjects also include skeletons, dolls, dogs, statues, paintings, and trees. His pictures of children were taken with a parent in attendance and many of the pictures were taken in the Liddell garden because natural sunlight was required for good exposures. Dodgson also found photography to be a useful entrée into higher social circles. During the most productive part of his career, he made portraits of notable sitters such as
John Everett Millais Sir John Everett Millais, 1st Baronet ( , ; 8 June 1829 – 13 August 1896) was an English painter and illustrator who was one of the founders of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. He was a child prodigy who, aged eleven, became the youngest s ...
,
Ellen Terry Dame Alice Ellen Terry (27 February 184721 July 1928) was a leading English actress of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Born into a family of actors, Terry began performing as a child, acting in Shakespeare plays in London, and toured ...
, Maggie Spearman,
Dante Gabriel Rossetti Gabriel Charles Dante Rossetti (12 May 1828 – 9 April 1882), generally known as Dante Gabriel Rossetti ( ; ), was an English poet, illustrator, painter, translator, and member of the Rossetti family. He founded the Pre-Raphaelite Brother ...
,
Julia Margaret Cameron Julia Margaret Cameron (; 11 June 1815 – 26 January 1879) was an English photographer who is considered one of the most important portraitists of the 19th century. She is known for her Soft focus, soft-focus close-ups of famous Victorian era, ...
,
Michael Faraday Michael Faraday (; 22 September 1791 – 25 August 1867) was an English chemist and physicist who contributed to the study of electrochemistry and electromagnetism. His main discoveries include the principles underlying electromagnetic inducti ...
,
Lord Salisbury Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury (; 3 February 183022 August 1903), known as Lord Salisbury, was a British statesman and Conservative Party (UK), Conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of the United ...
, and
Alfred Tennyson Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson (; 6 August 1809 – 6 October 1892) was an English poet. He was the Poet Laureate during much of Queen Victoria's reign. In 1829, Tennyson was awarded the Chancellor's Gold Medal at Cambridge for one of ...
. By the time that Dodgson abruptly ceased photography (1880, after 24 years), he had established his own studio on the roof of
Tom Quad The Great Quadrangle, more popularly known as Tom Quad, is one of the quadrangles of Christ Church, Oxford, England. It is the largest college quad in Oxford, measuring 264 by 261 feet. Although it was begun by Cardinal Wolsey in 1525–1529, he ...
, created around 3,000 images, and become an amateur master of the medium, though fewer than 1,000 images have survived time and deliberate destruction. He stopped taking photographs because keeping his studio working was too time-consuming. He used the wet collodion process; commercial photographers who started using the dry-plate process in the 1870s took pictures more quickly. He often altered his photographs through blurring techniques or by painting over them. He exerted his agency of this craft by literally rewriting the text created by the image to produce a new dialogue about childhood. However, popular taste changed with the advent of
Modernism Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...
, affecting the types of photographs that he produced.


Inventions

To promote letter writing, Dodgson invented "The Wonderland Postage-Stamp Case" in 1889. This was a cloth-backed folder with twelve slots, two marked for inserting the most commonly used penny stamp, and one each for the other current denominations up to one shilling. The folder was then put into a slipcase decorated with a picture of Alice on the front and the
Cheshire Cat The Cheshire Cat ( ) is a fictional cat popularised by Lewis Carroll in ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' and known for its distinctive mischievous grin. While now most often used in ''Alice''-related contexts, the association of a "Chesh ...
on the back. It intended to organise stamps wherever one stored their writing implements; Carroll expressly notes in ''
Eight or Nine Wise Words about Letter-Writing ''Eight or Nine Wise Words about Letter-Writing'' is an essay by Lewis Carroll on useful tips for composing, writing, mailing, and recording letters. The essay was published in 1890 by Emberlin and Son as a hardcover booklet consisting of 35 pages ...
'' it is not intended to be carried in a pocket or purse, as the most common individual stamps could easily be carried on their own. The pack included a copy of a pamphlet version of this lecture. Another invention was a writing tablet called the
nyctograph Nyctography (''in Nyctography:'' ) is a form of substitution cipher writing created by Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson) in 1891. It is written with a nyctograph (a device invented by Carroll) and uses a system of dots and strokes all b ...
that allowed note-taking in the dark, thus eliminating the need to get out of bed and strike a light when one woke with an idea. The device consisted of a gridded card with sixteen squares and a system of symbols representing an alphabet of Dodgson's design, using letter shapes similar to the
Graffiti Graffiti (singular ''graffiti'', or ''graffito'' only in graffiti archeology) is writing or drawings made on a wall or other surface, usually without permission and within public view. Graffiti ranges from simple written "monikers" to elabor ...
writing system on a
Palm Palm most commonly refers to: * Palm of the hand, the central region of the front of the hand * Palm plants, of family Arecaceae ** List of Arecaceae genera **Palm oil * Several other plants known as "palm" Palm or Palms may also refer to: Music ...
device. He also devised a number of games, including an early version of what today is known as
Scrabble ''Scrabble'' is a word game in which two to four players score points by placing tiles, each bearing a single letter, onto a Board game, game board divided into a 15×15 grid of squares. The tiles must form words that, in crossword fashion, re ...
. Devised sometime in 1878, he invented the "doublet" (see
word ladder Word ladder (also known as Doublets, word-links, change-the-word puzzles, paragrams, laddergrams, or word golf) is a word game invented by Lewis Carroll. A word ladder puzzle begins with two words, and to solve the puzzle one must find a chain of ...
), a form of brain-teaser that is still popular today, changing one word into another by altering one letter at a time, each successive change always resulting in a genuine word. For instance, CAT is transformed into DOG by the following steps: CAT, COT, DOT, DOG. It first appeared in the 29 March 1879 issue of '' Vanity Fair'', with Carroll writing a weekly column for the magazine for two years; the final column dated 9 April 1881. The games and puzzles of Lewis Carroll were the subject of Martin Gardner's March 1960
Mathematical Games column Over a period of 24 years (January 1957 – December 1980), Martin Gardner wrote 288 consecutive monthly "Mathematical Games" columns for ''Scientific American'' magazine. During the next years, until June 1986, Gardner wrote 9 more columns, br ...
in ''
Scientific American ''Scientific American'', informally abbreviated ''SciAm'' or sometimes ''SA'', is an American popular science magazine. Many scientists, including Albert Einstein and Nikola Tesla, have contributed articles to it, with more than 150 Nobel Pri ...
''. Other items include a rule for finding the day of the week for any date; a means for justifying right margins on a typewriter; a steering device for a velociman (a type of tricycle); fairer elimination rules for tennis tournaments; a new sort of postal money order; rules for reckoning postage; rules for a win in betting; rules for dividing a number by various divisors; a cardboard scale for the Senior Common Room at Christ Church which, held next to a glass, ensured the right amount of liqueur for the price paid; a double-sided adhesive strip to fasten envelopes or mount things in books; a device for helping a bedridden invalid to read from a book placed sideways; and at least two
cipher In cryptography, a cipher (or cypher) is an algorithm for performing encryption or decryption—a series of well-defined steps that can be followed as a procedure. An alternative, less common term is ''encipherment''. To encipher or encode i ...
s for
cryptography Cryptography, or cryptology (from "hidden, secret"; and ''graphein'', "to write", or ''-logy, -logia'', "study", respectively), is the practice and study of techniques for secure communication in the presence of Adversary (cryptography), ...
. He also proposed alternative systems of parliamentary representation. He proposed the so-called Dodgson's method, using the
Condorcet method A Condorcet method (; ) is an election method that elects the candidate who wins a majority of the vote in every head-to-head election against each of the other candidates, whenever there is such a candidate. A candidate with this property, the ...
. In 1884, he proposed a proportional representation system based on multi-member districts, each voter casting only a single vote, quotas as minimum requirements to take seats, and votes transferable by candidates through what is now called Liquid democracy.


Mathematical work

Within the academic discipline of mathematics, Dodgson worked primarily in the fields of
geometry Geometry (; ) is a branch of mathematics concerned with properties of space such as the distance, shape, size, and relative position of figures. Geometry is, along with arithmetic, one of the oldest branches of mathematics. A mathematician w ...
, linear and
matrix algebra In abstract algebra, a matrix ring is a set of matrices with entries in a ring ''R'' that form a ring under matrix addition and matrix multiplication. The set of all matrices with entries in ''R'' is a matrix ring denoted M''n''(''R'') (alterna ...
,
mathematical logic Mathematical logic is the study of Logic#Formal logic, formal logic within mathematics. Major subareas include model theory, proof theory, set theory, and recursion theory (also known as computability theory). Research in mathematical logic com ...
, and
recreational mathematics Recreational mathematics is mathematics carried out for recreation (entertainment) rather than as a strictly research-and-application-based professional activity or as a part of a student's formal education. Although it is not necessarily limited ...
, producing nearly a dozen books under his real name. Dodgson also developed new ideas in linear algebra (e.g., the first printed proof of the
Rouché–Capelli theorem Rouché–Capelli theorem is a theorem in linear algebra that determines the number of solutions of a system of linear equations, given the ranks of its augmented matrix and coefficient matrix. The theorem is variously known as the: * Rouché ...
), probability, and the study of elections (e.g., Dodgson's method) and
committee A committee or commission is a body of one or more persons subordinate to a deliberative assembly or other form of organization. A committee may not itself be considered to be a form of assembly or a decision-making body. Usually, an assembly o ...
s; some of this work was not published until well after his death. His occupation as Mathematical Lecturer at Christ Church gave him some financial security.


Mathematical logic

His work in the field of mathematical logic attracted renewed interest in the late 20th century. Martin Gardner's book on logic machines and diagrams and William Warren Bartley's posthumous publication of the second part of Dodgson's symbolic logic book have sparked a reevaluation of Dodgson's contributions to symbolic logic. It is recognised that in his ''Symbolic Logic Part II'', Dodgson introduced the Method of Trees, the earliest modern use of a truth tree.


Algebra

Robbins' and Rumsey's investigation of
Dodgson condensation In mathematics, Dodgson condensation or method of contractants is a method of computing the determinants of square matrices. It is named for its inventor, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (better known by his pseudonym, as Lewis Carroll, the popular aut ...
, a method of evaluating
determinant In mathematics, the determinant is a Scalar (mathematics), scalar-valued function (mathematics), function of the entries of a square matrix. The determinant of a matrix is commonly denoted , , or . Its value characterizes some properties of the ...
s, led them to the alternating sign matrix conjecture, now a theorem.


Recreational mathematics

The discovery in the 1990s of additional ciphers that Dodgson had constructed, in addition to his "Memoria Technica", showed that he had employed sophisticated mathematical ideas in their creation.


Correspondence

Dodgson wrote and received as many as 98,721 letters, according to a special letter register which he devised. He documented his advice about how to write more satisfying letters in a missive entitled "
Eight or Nine Wise Words about Letter-Writing ''Eight or Nine Wise Words about Letter-Writing'' is an essay by Lewis Carroll on useful tips for composing, writing, mailing, and recording letters. The essay was published in 1890 by Emberlin and Son as a hardcover booklet consisting of 35 pages ...
", published in 1890.


Later life

Dodgson's existence remained little changed over the last twenty years of his life, despite his growing wealth and fame. He continued to teach at Christ Church until 1881 and remained in residence there until his death. Public appearances included attending the West End musical ''
Alice in Wonderland ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (also known as ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English Children's literature, children's novel by Lewis Carroll, a mathematics university don, don at the University of Oxford. It details the story of a ...
'' (the first major live production of his ''Alice'' books) at the
Prince of Wales Theatre The Prince of Wales Theatre is a West End theatre in Coventry Street, near Leicester Square in London. It was established in 1884 and rebuilt in 1937, and extensively refurbished in 2004 by Sir Cameron Mackintosh, its current owner. The theatre ...
on 30 December 1886. The two volumes of his last novel, ''
Sylvie and Bruno ''Sylvie and Bruno'', first published in 1889, and its second volume ''Sylvie and Bruno Concluded'' published in 1893, form the last novel by Lewis Carroll published during his lifetime. Both volumes were illustrated by Harry Furniss. The nove ...
'', were published in 1889 and 1893, but the intricacy of this work was apparently not appreciated by contemporary readers; it achieved nothing like the success of the ''Alice'' books, with disappointing reviews and sales of only 13,000 copies. The only known occasion on which he travelled abroad was a trip to Russia in 1867 as an ecclesiastic, together with the Reverend
Henry Liddon Henry Parry Liddon (20 August 1829 – 9 September 1890), usually cited as H. P. Liddon, was an English Anglican theologian. From 1870 to 1882, he was Dean Ireland's Professor of the Exegesis of Holy Scripture at the University of Oxford. ...
. He recounts the travel in his "Russian Journal", which was first commercially published in 1935. On his way to Russia and back, he also saw different cities in Belgium, Germany, partitioned Poland and Lithuania, and France. In his early sixties, Dodgson increasingly suffered from
synovitis Synovitis is the medical term for inflammation of the synovial membrane. This membrane lines joints that possess cavities, known as synovial joints. The condition is usually painful, particularly when the joint is moved. The joint usually swells ...
which eventually prevented him walking and sometimes left him bed-ridden for months.


Death

Dodgson died of
pneumonia Pneumonia is an Inflammation, inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as Pulmonary alveolus, alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of Cough#Classification, productive or dry cough, ches ...
following
influenza Influenza, commonly known as the flu, is an infectious disease caused by influenza viruses. Symptoms range from mild to severe and often include fever, runny nose, sore throat, muscle pain, headache, coughing, and fatigue. These sympto ...
on 14 January 1898 at his sisters' home "The Chestnuts" in
Guildford Guildford () is a town in west Surrey, England, around south-west of central London. As of the 2011 census, the town has a population of about 77,000 and is the seat of the wider Borough of Guildford, which had around inhabitants in . The nam ...
, Surrey. His funeral was held at the nearby St Mary's Church. He was interred at the
Mount Cemetery Mount Cemetery, also known as Guildford Cemetery, is a cemetery in Guildford, Surrey, England. It is the location of Booker's Tower. Guildford Cemetery is surrounded by low-density houses with gardens and a covered reservoir beyond the east co ...
in Guildford. In 1935, Dodgson was commemorated at
All Saints' Church, Daresbury All Saints' Church is in the village of Daresbury, Cheshire, England. It is known for its association with Lewis Carroll who is commemorated in its stained glass windows depicting characters from ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland''. It is recor ...
, in its stained glass windows depicting characters from ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland''.''All Saints' Church, Daresbury'', Church booklet


Controversies and mysteries


''The Secret World of Lewis Carroll'' (2015) BBC documentary

A BBC documentary from 2015, ''The Secret World of Lewis Carroll'', critically examined Dodgson's relationship with Alice Liddell and her sisters. It explored the possibility that Dodgson's rift with the Liddell family (and his temporary suspension from the college) might have been caused by improper relations with their children, including Alice. The research for the documentary found a "disturbing" full frontal nude of Alice's adolescent sister Lorina during filming, and speculated on the "likelihood" of Dodgson taking the photo. However, it was later revealed the chronology for this research had more than met the eye. The photo currently exists in the archives of the
Musée Cantini The Musée Cantini is a museum in Marseille that has been open to the public since 1936. The museum specializes in modern art, especially paintings from the first half of the twentieth century. The building The musée Cantini building was buil ...
in
Marseille Marseille (; ; see #Name, below) is a city in southern France, the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Departments of France, department of Bouches-du-Rhône and of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur Regions of France, region. Situated in the ...
, and was attributed to Dodgson by a currently unknown hand. It was subsequently revealed in early 2015 by the Carroll scholar Edward Wakeling that the photo first appeared in the 1970s, when it was owned by Parisian photo collectors. The provenance of the photo's link to Dodgson could be questioned. It was left to the Musée de Cantini. There was no link to Dodgson, and no link to the Liddell family. This was not explained in the documentary. The documentary raised suspicions about Dodgson being a "repressed paedophile", as one of the interviewees,
Will Self William Woodard Self (born 26 September 1961) is an English writer, journalist, political commentator and broadcaster. He has written 11 novels, five collections of shorter fiction, three novellas and nine collections of non-fiction writing. Se ...
, put it. This aspect was leaked to ''
The Telegraph ''The Telegraph'', ''Daily Telegraph'', ''Sunday Telegraph'' and other variant names are often names for newspapers. Newspapers with these titles include: Australia * The Telegraph (Adelaide), ''The Telegraph'' (Adelaide), a newspaper in Adelaid ...
'' a week in advance. When reviewing the documentary, papers sought to link the 19th-century Carroll with 21st-century sexual conduct revelations about recent paedophiles. This attempted link could be considered an act of scapegoating inspired by the press's reactions to the U.K.'s early 2010 Yewtree investigations. When problems about the documentary's conduct and research surfaced, ''
The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...
'' and ''The Telegraph'' reported it. The material in the documentary has come under intense scrutiny by Carroll scholars, including those such as Jenny Woolf and Edward Wakeling, who appeared in it. Woolf claimed that she was not told of the use of the alleged photo until editing of the documentary was underway. Edward Wakeling's paper/review
Eight or nine wise words on documentary making
appeared in March 2015 as part of the Lewis Carroll society newsletter ''Bandersnatch''. Wakeling also echoed Woolf's assertions that he was not given time to talk about the alleged photo. Wakeling claimed, "The documentary knew I could authenticate he photoor not, but they chose to keep it from me as they anticipated my response." Wakeling further criticises in his paper the Cantini photo's authenticity, the BBC's failure to tell participants of the found photo, and several factual errors. Wakeling draws attention to the irregular "trimmed" nature of the photo itself, and no trace of Dodgson's writing. The inscription on the back of the photo, attributed "lewis Carroll" in pencil, "is an unknown hand... so it could have been written by anybody". The photo negative is also missing the personal catalogue number that Dodgson meticulously catalogued his photos under. " odgson'susual practice was to add a number on the back of any prints which he had developed". Wakeling also points out that Dodgson never made "full frontal studies...particularly a girl as mature as this.. There's no way the Liddells would have allowed a picture of this kind to have been taken."'''' It is currently unknown whether this photo is by Dodgson, nor who wrote the pencil inscription on the back of it and for what reason. The photo was not included in Wakeling's catalogue raisonné of Dodgson's complete surviving photographs ' and has remained unused by other subsequent documentaries on Dodgson.'' '' The BBC Trust later ruled that the documentary could not be shown on UK TV in its current form again, as the BBC failed to tell participants of the photo's appearance during filming or give them time to fully react to it.


Speculation of sexual conduct by scholars (1940s onwards)

Late 20th-century biographers have speculated that Dodgson's interest in children might have had an "erotic" element, including
Morton N. Cohen Morton Norton Cohen (27 February 192112 June 2017) was a Canadian-born American author and scholar who was a professor at City University of New York. He is best known for his studies of children's author Lewis Carroll including the 1995 biography ...
in his ''Lewis Carroll: A Biography'' (1995),
Cohen Cohen () is a surname of Jewish, Samaritan and Biblical origins (see: Kohen). It is a very common Jewish surname (the most common in Israel). Cohen is one of the four Samaritan last names that exist in the modern day. Many Jewish immigrants ente ...
, pp. 166–167, 254–255
Cohen, in particular, speculates that Dodgson's "sexual energies sought unconventional outlets", and further writes: Cohen goes on to note that Dodgson "apparently convinced many of his friends that his attachment to the nude female child form was free of any
erotic Eroticism () is a quality that causes sexual feelings, as well as a philosophical contemplation concerning the aesthetics of sexual desire, sensuality, and romantic love. That quality may be found in any form of artwork, including painting, sculp ...
ism", but adds that "later generations look beneath the surface" (p. 229). He argues that Dodgson may have wanted to marry the 11-year-old Alice Liddell and that this was the cause of the unexplained "break" with the family in June 1863, Catherine Robson refers to Carroll as "the Victorian era's most famous (or infamous) girl lover". Media studies scholar
Will Brooker Will Brooker is a writer and academic, professor of film and cultural studies at Kingston University and an author of several books of cultural studies dealing with elements of modern pop culture and fandom, specifically Batman, Star Wars and Al ...
points out that perception of Dodgson this way in the 20th century was heavily influenced by Sigmund Freud's theories. Brooker considers Dodgson's alleged perversion as a product of its time that outstayed its welcome culturally:
The psychoanalytic reudianinterpretations of the Alice books in the 1930s were a product of a specific moment and movement... The discourses that I traced in journalism and in some biographies, that Carroll was emotionally arrested, a repressed paedophile, an obsessive, stammering social reject... -- have more to do with our own attitudes to childhood and celebrity than they do to the culture Carroll lived through.
Several other writers and scholars have challenged the evidential basis for Cohen's and others' views about Dodgson's potential exploitative behaviour. Hugues Lebailly has endeavoured to set Dodgson's child photography within the "Victorian Child Cult", which perceived child nudity as essentially an expression of innocence. He claims that Dodgson's diaries contained numerous entries that reveal an appreciation for adult women, as well as their appearance in art and theatre, even "vulgar" entertainment. Dodgson's nieces removed such references from early manuscripts of Dodgson's diaries, but kept references to children, because such appreciation was not controversial at the time.
Karoline Leach Karoline Leach (born 20 July 1967) is a British playwright and author, best known for her book ''In the Shadow of the Dreamchild'' (), which re-examines the life of Lewis Carroll (pseudonym of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson), the author of ''Alice's ...
's reappraisal of Dodgson focused in particular on his controversial interest in nude children. She argues that the allegations of paedophilia rose initially from a misunderstanding of Victorian morals, as well as the mistaken idea – fostered by Dodgson's various biographers – that he had no interest in adult women. She termed the traditional image of Dodgson "the Carroll Myth". She drew attention to the large amounts of evidence in his diaries and letters that he was also keenly interested in adult women, married and single, and enjoyed several relationships with them that would have been considered scandalous by the social standards of his time. She also pointed to the fact that many of those whom he described as "child-friends" were girls in their late teens and even twenties. She argues that suggestions of paedophilia emerged only many years after his death, when his well-meaning family had suppressed all evidence of his relationships with women in an effort to preserve his reputation, thus giving a false impression of a man interested only in little girls. Similarly, Leach points to a 1932 biography by Langford Reed as the source of the dubious claim that many of Carroll's female friendships ended when the girls reached the age of 14.


Ordination

Dodgson had been groomed for the ordained ministry in the
Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...
from a very early age, and was expected to be
ordained Ordination is the process by which individuals are Consecration in Christianity, consecrated, that is, set apart and elevated from the laity class to the clergy, who are thus then authorized (usually by the religious denomination, denominationa ...
within four years of obtaining his master's degree as a condition of his residency at Christ Church. He delayed the process for some time but was eventually ordained as a
deacon A deacon is a member of the diaconate, an office in Christian churches that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions. Major Christian denominations, such as the Cathol ...
on 22 December 1861, but when the time came a year later to be ordained as a priest, Dodgson appealed to the dean for permission not to proceed. This was against college rules and, initially, Dean Liddell told him that he would have to consult the college ruling body, which would almost certainly have resulted in his being expelled. For unknown reasons, Liddell changed his mind overnight and permitted him to remain at the college in defiance of the rules. Dodgson never became a priest, unique among senior students of his time. There is currently no conclusive evidence about why Dodgson rejected the priesthood. Some have suggested that his stammer made him reluctant to take the step because he was afraid of having to preach. Wilson quotes letters by Dodgson describing difficulty in reading lessons and prayers rather than preaching in his own words. However Dodgson did indeed preach in later life, even though not in priest's orders, so it seems unlikely that his impediment was a major factor affecting his choice. Wilson also points out that the
Bishop of Oxford The Bishop of Oxford is the diocesan bishop of the Church of England Diocese of Oxford in the Province of Canterbury; his seat is at Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford. The current bishop is Steven Croft (bishop), Steven Croft, following the Confirm ...
,
Samuel Wilberforce Samuel Wilberforce, Fellow of the Royal Society, FRS (7 September 1805 – 19 July 1873) was an English bishop in the Church of England, and the third son of William Wilberforce. Known as "Soapy Sam", Wilberforce was one of the greatest public sp ...
, who ordained Dodgson, had strong views against clergy going to the theatre, one of Dodgson's great interests. He was interested in minority forms of Christianity (he was an admirer of F. D. Maurice) and "alternative" religions (
theosophy Theosophy is a religious movement established in the United States in the late 19th century. Founded primarily by the Russian Helena Blavatsky and based largely on her writings, it draws heavily from both older European philosophies such as Neop ...
). Dodgson became deeply troubled by an unexplained sense of sin and guilt at this time (the early 1860s), and frequently expressed the view in his diaries that he was a "vile and worthless" sinner, unworthy of the priesthood, and this sense of sin and unworthiness may well have informed his decision to abandon being ordained to the priesthood.


Missing diaries

At least four complete volumes and around seven pages of text are missing from Dodgson's 13 diaries. The loss of the volumes remains unexplained; the pages have been removed by an unknown hand. Most scholars assume that the diary material was removed by family members in the interests of preserving the family name, but this has not been proven. Except for one page, material is missing from his diaries for the period between 1853 and 1863 (when Dodgson was 21–31 years old). During this period, Dodgson began experiencing great mental and spiritual anguish and confessing to an overwhelming sense of his own sin. This was also the period of time when he composed his extensive love poetry, leading to speculation that the poems were autobiographical. Many theories have been put forward to explain the missing material. A popular explanation for one missing page (27 June 1863) is that it might have been torn out to conceal a proposal of marriage on that day by Dodgson to the 11-year-old Alice Liddell. However, there has never been any evidence to suggest this, and a paper suggests evidence to the contrary which was discovered by
Karoline Leach Karoline Leach (born 20 July 1967) is a British playwright and author, best known for her book ''In the Shadow of the Dreamchild'' (), which re-examines the life of Lewis Carroll (pseudonym of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson), the author of ''Alice's ...
in the Dodgson family archive in 1996. This paper is known as the "cut pages in diary" document. Carroll's nephew Philip Dodgson Jacques reports that he wrote it well after Carroll's death, based on information from his aunts, who destroyed two diary pages, including the one for 27 June 1863. Jacques did not see the pages himself. The summary for 27 June states that Mrs. Liddell told Dodgson there was gossip circulating about him and the Liddell family's
governess A governess is a woman employed as a private tutor, who teaches and trains a child or children in their home. A governess often lives in the same residence as the children she is teaching; depending on terms of their employment, they may or ma ...
, as well as about his relationship with "Ina", presumably Alice's older sister Lorina Liddell. The "break" with the Liddell family that occurred soon after was presumably in response to this gossip. Without evidence, Leach suggests an alternative interpretation; Lorina was also the name of Alice Liddell's mother. What is deemed most crucial and surprising is the document seems to imply that Dodgson's break with the family was not connected with Alice at all. Until a primary source is discovered, the events of 27 June 1863 will remain in doubt; however, a 1930 letter from the younger Lorina Liddell to Alice may shed light on the matter. Reporting an interview with an early Dodgson biographer, she wrote:


Migraine and epilepsy

In his diary from 1880, Dodgson recorded experiencing his first episode of
migraine Migraine (, ) is a complex neurological disorder characterized by episodes of moderate-to-severe headache, most often unilateral and generally associated with nausea, and light and sound sensitivity. Other characterizing symptoms may includ ...
with aura, describing very accurately the process of "moving fortifications" that are a manifestation of the aura stage of the syndrome.Wakeling, Edward (Ed.) "The Diaries of Lewis Carroll", Vol. 9, p. 52 There is no clear evidence to show whether this was his first experience of migraine ''per se'' or he previously had the far more common form of migraine without aura, although the latter seems most likely, given the fact that migraine most commonly develops in the teens or early adulthood. Another form of migraine aura called
Alice in Wonderland syndrome Alice in Wonderland Syndrome (AIWS), also known as Todd's Syndrome or Dysmetropsia, is a neurological disorder that distorts perception. People with this syndrome may experience distortions in their visual perception of objects, such as appear ...
has been named after Dodgson's book of the same name and its titular character, because its manifestation can resemble the sudden size-changes in the book. It is also known as
micropsia Micropsia is a condition affecting human visual perception in which objects are perceived to be smaller than they actually are. Micropsia can be caused by optical factors (such as wearing glasses), by distortion of images in the eye (such as optica ...
and
macropsia Macropsia is a neurological condition affecting human visual perception, in which objects within an affected section of the visual field appear larger than normal, causing the person to feel smaller than they actually are. Macropsia, along with its ...
, a brain condition affecting the way that objects are perceived by the mind. For example, an affected person may look at a larger object such as a basketball and perceive it as having the size of a golf ball. Some authors have suggested that Dodgson experienced this type of aura and used it as an inspiration in his work, but there is no evidence that he did. Dodgson also had two attacks in which he lost consciousness. He was diagnosed by a Dr Morshead, Dr Brooks, and Dr Stedman, and they believed the attack and a consequent attack to be an "epileptiform" seizure (initially thought to be fainting, but Brooks changed his mind). Some have concluded from this that he had this condition for his entire life, but there is no evidence of this in his diaries beyond the diagnosis of the two attacks already mentioned. Some authors, Sadi Ranson in particular, have suggested that Carroll had
temporal lobe epilepsy In the field of neurology, temporal lobe epilepsy is an enduring brain disorder that causes unprovoked seizures from the temporal lobe. Temporal lobe epilepsy is the most common type of focal onset epilepsy among adults. Seizure symptoms and b ...
in which consciousness is not always completely lost but altered, and in which the symptoms mimic many of the same experiences as Alice in Wonderland. Carroll had at least one incident in which he suffered full loss of consciousness and awoke with a bloody nose, which he recorded in his diary and noted that the episode left him not feeling himself for "quite sometime afterward". This attack was diagnosed as possibly "epileptiform", and Carroll himself later wrote of his "seizures" in the same diary. Most of the standard diagnostic tests of today were not available in the 19th century. Yvonne Hart, consultant neurologist at the
John Radcliffe Hospital John Radcliffe Hospital (informally known as the JR or the John Radcliffe) is a large tertiary teaching hospital in Oxford, England. It forms part of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and is named after John Radcliffe (physician) ...
, Oxford, considered Dodgson's symptoms. Her conclusion, quoted in Jenny Woolf's 2010 ''The Mystery of Lewis Carroll'', is that Dodgson very likely had migraine and may have had epilepsy, but she emphasises that she would have considerable doubt about making a diagnosis of epilepsy without further information.


Legacy

There are societies in many parts of the world dedicated to the enjoyment and promotion of his works and the investigation of his life. Copenhagen Street in
Islington Islington ( ) is an inner-city area of north London, England, within the wider London Borough of Islington. It is a mainly residential district of Inner London, extending from Islington's #Islington High Street, High Street to Highbury Fields ...
, north London is the location of the Lewis Carroll Children's Library. In 1982, his great-nephew unveiled a memorial stone to him in
Poets' Corner Poets' Corner is a section of the southern transept of Westminster Abbey in London, England, where many poets, playwrights, and writers are buried or commemorated. The first poet interred in Poets' Corner was Geoffrey Chaucer in 1400. Willia ...
,
Westminster Abbey Westminster Abbey, formally titled the Collegiate Church of Saint Peter at Westminster, is an Anglican church in the City of Westminster, London, England. Since 1066, it has been the location of the coronations of 40 English and British m ...
. In January 1994, an asteroid, 6984 Lewiscarroll, was discovered and named after Carroll. The Lewis Carroll Centenary Wood near his birthplace in Daresbury opened in 2000. As Carroll was born in All Saints' Vicarage, he is commemorated at
All Saints' Church, Daresbury All Saints' Church is in the village of Daresbury, Cheshire, England. It is known for its association with Lewis Carroll who is commemorated in its stained glass windows depicting characters from ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland''. It is recor ...
by stained glass windows depicting characters from ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland''. The Lewis Carroll Centre, attached to the church, was opened in March 2012. A private collection of thousands of items connected with Lewis Carroll, including letters, photographs, illustrations and books, were donated to Christ Church, part of the University of Oxford in 2025.


Works


Literary works

* ''La Guida di Bragia, a Ballad Opera for the Marionette Theatre'' (ca.1850) * ''Miss Jones'', comic song (1862) * ''
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (also known as ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English Children's literature, children's novel by Lewis Carroll, a mathematics university don, don at the University of Oxford. It details the story of a ...
'' (1865) * ''Phantasmagoria (poem), Phantasmagoria and Other Poems'' (1869) * ''
Through the Looking-Glass ''Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There'' is a novel published in December 1871 by Lewis Carroll, the pen name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, a mathematics lecturer at Christ Church, Oxford, Christ Church, University of Oxford. I ...
, and What Alice Found There'' (includes "
Jabberwocky "Jabberwocky" is a Nonsense verse, nonsense poem written by Lewis Carroll about the killing of a creature named "the Jabberwock". It was included in his 1871 novel ''Through the Looking-Glass'', the sequel to ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' ...
" and "The Walrus and the Carpenter") (1871)
''The Blank Cheque: A Fable''
(1874) * ''
The Hunting of the Snark ''The Hunting of the Snark'', subtitled ''An Agony, in Eight Fits'', is a poem by the English writer Lewis Carroll. It is typically categorised as a nonsense poem. Written between 1874 and 1876, it borrows the setting, some creatures, and eig ...
'' (1876) * ''Phantasmagoria (poem), Rhyme? And Reason?'' (1883) – shares some contents with the 1869 collection, including the long poem "Phantasmagoria" * ''A Tangled Tale'' (1885) * ''
Sylvie and Bruno ''Sylvie and Bruno'', first published in 1889, and its second volume ''Sylvie and Bruno Concluded'' published in 1893, form the last novel by Lewis Carroll published during his lifetime. Both volumes were illustrated by Harry Furniss. The nove ...
'' (1889) * ''The Nursery "Alice"'' (1890) * ''Sylvie and Bruno Concluded'' (1893) * ''Pillow Problems'' (1893) * ''
What the Tortoise Said to Achilles "What the Tortoise Said to Achilles", written by Lewis Carroll in 1895 for the philosophical journal ''Mind'', is a brief allegorical dialogue on the foundations of logic. The title alludes to one of Zeno's paradoxes of motion, in which Achill ...
'' (1895) * ''Three Sunsets and Other Poems'' (1898) * ''The Manlet'' (1903)''The Hunting of the Snark and Other Poems and Verses'', New York: Harper & Brothers, 1903


Mathematical works

* ''A Syllabus of Plane Algebraic Geometry'' (1860) * ''The Fifth Book of Euclid Treated Algebraically'' (1858 and 1868) * ''An Elementary Treatise on Determinants, With Their Application to Simultaneous Linear Equations and Algebraic Equations'' * ''Euclid and his Modern Rivals'' (1879), both literary and mathematical in style * ''Symbolic Logic Part I'' * ''Symbolic Logic Part II'' (published posthumously) * ''The Alphabet Cipher'' (1868) * ''The Game of Logic'' (1887) * ''Curiosa Mathematica I'' (1888) * ''Curiosa Mathematica II'' (1892) * ''A discussion of the various methods of procedure in conducting elections'' (1873), ''Suggestions as to the best method of taking votes, where more than two issues are to be voted on'' (1874), ''A method of taking votes on more than two issues'' (1876), collected as ''The Theory of Committees and Elections'', edited, analysed, and published in 1958 by Duncan Black


Other works


''Some Popular Fallacies about Vivisection''
* Eight or Nine Wise Words about Letter-Writing, ''Eight or Nine Wise Words About Letter-Writing'' (1890)
''Notes by an Oxford Chiel''
(1865–74) * ''The Principles of Parliamentary Representation'' (1884)


See also

* Lewis Carroll identity * Lewis Carroll Shelf Award * RGS Worcester and The Alice Ottley School – Miss Ottley, the first Headmistress of The Alice Ottley School, was a friend of Lewis Carroll. One of the RGS Worcester and The Alice Ottley School#Houses, school's houses was named after him. * Carroll diagram * ''Origins of a Story'' * ''The White Knight (book), The White Knight''


References


Bibliography

* * * * * * Pizzati, Giovanni: ''"An Endless Procession of People in Masquerade". Figure piane in'' Alice in Wonderland. 1993, Cagliari. * Reed, Langford: ''The Life of Lewis Carroll'' (1932. London: W. and G. Foyle) * Taylor, Alexander L., Knight: ''The White Knight'' (1952. Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd) * Taylor, Roger & Wakeling, Edward: ''Lewis Carroll, Photographer''. 2002. Princeton University Press. . (Catalogues nearly every Carroll photograph known to be still in existence.) * * * Woolf, Jenny: ''The Mystery of Lewis Carroll''. 2010. New York: St Martin's Press.


Further reading

* Black, Duncan (1958). The Circumstances in which Rev. C. L. Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) wrote his Three Pamphlets and Appendix: Text of Dodgson's Three Pamphlets and of 'The Cyclostyled Sheet' in ''The Theory of Committees and Elections'', Cambridge: Cambridge University Press * * Brooker, Will (2004). ''Alice's adventures: Lewis Carroll in Popular Culture''. New York: Continuum Books. * Carroll, Lewis: ''The Annotated Alice: 150th Anniversary Deluxe Edition.'' Illustrated by John Tenniel. Edited by Martin Gardner & Mark Burstein. W. W. Norton. 2015. * Dodgson, Charles L.: ''Euclid and His Modern Rivals''. Macmillan. 1879. * Dodgson, Charles L.: ''The Pamphlets of Lewis Carroll'' ** Vol. 1: ''The Oxford Pamphlets.'' 1993. ** Vol. 2: ''The Mathematical Pamphlets.'' 1994. ** Vol. 3: ''The Political Pamphlets.'' 2001. ** Vol. 4: ''The Logic Pamphlets.'' 2010 . * Douglas-Fairhurst, Robert (2016). ''The Story of Alice: Lewis Carroll and the Secret History of Wonderland.'' Harvard University Press. ISBN 9780674970762. * * * Edward Guiliano (1982). ''Lewis Carroll, a Celebration: Essays on the Occasion of the 150th Anniversary of the Birth of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson'', C. N. Potter, London. * Huxley, Francis: ''The Raven and the Writing Desk''. 1976. . * Kelly, Richard: ''Lewis Carroll''. 1990. Boston: Twayne Publishers. * Kelly, Richard (ed.): ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland''. 2000. Peterborough, Ontario: Broadviewpress. * Lakoff, Robin T.: ''Lewis Carroll: Subversive Pragmaticist''. 2022. Pragmatics : Quarterly Publication of the International Pragmatics Association, pp. 367–85 * Lovett, Charlie: ''Lewis Carroll Among His Books: A Descriptive Catalogue of the Private Library of Charles L. Dodgson.'' 2005. * Joanna Richardson, Richardson, Joanna: ''The Young Lewis Carroll''. London: Max Parrish, 1963. * * * * Jackie Wullschläger, Wullschläger, Jackie: ''Inventing Wonderland''. . – Also looks at Edward Lear (of the "nonsense" verses), J. M. Barrie (''Peter Pan''), Kenneth Grahame (''The Wind in the Willows''), and A. A. Milne (''Winnie-the-Pooh''). * N.N.: ''Dreaming in Pictures: The Photography of Lewis Carroll''. Yale University Press & SFMOMA, 2004. (Places Carroll firmly in the art photography tradition.) * Schütze, Franziska: ''Disney in Wonderland: A Comparative Analysis of Disney's Alice in Wonderland Film Adaptations from 1951 and 2010''


External links

Digital collections * * * * *
The Poems of Lewis Carroll
at Poetry-Index.net
Lewis Carroll - First Editions
(Google site) Archival material collections
Guide to Harcourt Amory collection of Lewis Carroll
at Houghton Library, Harvard University :Includes Carroll's correspondence and drawings, drawings for ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' and ''Through the looking-glass'' by Sir John Tenniel, and other materials.
Cassady Lewis Carroll Collection
from University of Southern California Digital Library :Consists of publications, correspondence, and other materials by and related to Lewis Carroll and come from th
Cassady Lewis Carroll collection
The collection continues to grow as Dr. Cassady donates additional material.
Lewis Carroll Photography Collection (available online)
at the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin :In addition to a number of loose prints, the major portion of photographs are contained in five personal albums compiled by him during his lifetime, which contain well over 200 original albumen prints made chiefly by Carroll himself.
Scrap-book belonging to Lewis Carroll
(ca.1834 ca.1872) available online at the Library of Congress :Collection of miscellaneous clippings with manuscript title-page. Partial contents, probably in Carroll's handwriting, on inside of cover and on a separate sheet, laid in. *
Lewis Carroll (archived 2021)
at the British Library Biographical information and scholarship
Lewis Carroll
at VictorianWeb.org
Contrariwise: "the Association for New Lewis Carroll Studies"


from ''Smithsonian Magazine'', April 2010
Lewis Carroll: Logic
in ''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' Other links * * *
The Lewis Carroll Society UK

The Lewis Carroll Society of North America
{{DEFAULTSORT:Carroll, Lewis Lewis Carroll, 1832 births 1898 deaths 19th-century Anglican deacons 19th-century British inventors 19th-century English short story writers 19th-century English diarists 19th-century English educators 19th-century English mathematicians 19th-century English novelists 19th-century English photographers 19th-century English poets 19th-century pseudonymous writers Alumni of Christ Church, Oxford British game designers British male poets British portrait photographers British surrealist writers Burials at Mount Cemetery Conservative Party (UK) people Deaths from pneumonia in England Dodgson family English Anglicans English anti-vivisectionists English children's writers English fantasy writers English logicians English male novelists English male short story writers English novelists 19th-century English philosophers English short story writers English writers with disabilities Fellows of Christ Church, Oxford Mathematics popularizers Mathematics writers People educated at Rugby School People from Richmond, North Yorkshire People with epilepsy People with speech disorders Photographers from Cheshire Photographers from Oxfordshire Recreational mathematicians Victorian novelists Victorian poets Voting theorists Writers from Cheshire Writers from Oxford Writers who illustrated their own writing Writers of Gothic fiction