Famous Last Words: Through the Looking Glass

This week I read about Britomart in The Faerie Queene, and I really enjoyed that story. As per usual, the women did not get a lot of the rights and respect that I would like, but I did enjoy that it was about a female knight who was breaking the mold and going out to find her love. That style of writing was really enjoyable to me, and flowed really well. I did not realize that The Faerie Queene was so long, and I do not know if I would want to read all of the books published for the entire epic, but I did enjoy the short segment that I read. I finished up the second half of Through the Looking Glass too, and was extremely impressed by the intricate detail of Lewis Carroll's writing. There were so many ways that he fit a chess match into his story without being obvious or obtuse. I would really like to go back and read the entire story. I also did not realize that Alice was only seven years old in both those stories, because she has been portrayed as so much older in recent movies that I have seen. There is kind of a darkness in his writing, or at least a queerness that is not childlike at all, although I think a child could enjoy these stories very much. But it is interesting to read them as an adult because you get the sense of something much different when reading the exact same words. I also think the text has a special prose that a movie simply cannot capture, particularly since Through the Looking Glass focuses so much on poetry. All in all I really enjoyed my readings this week and I am kind of glad I have forced myself into doing some extra credit so I can do these readings.

Life-size statue of Alice Through the Looking-Glassin the grounds of Guildford Castle

(Wikipedia)