Edition History: Lewis Carroll’s Alice In Wonderland

Let’s start with a little fun fact – this was written by English author Charles Lutwidge Dodgson under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll.

In 1864, on this day, November 26th,  Lewis Carroll sent Alice Liddell the handwritten manuscript for Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland after he read his written down adventures to Oxford University’s Vice Chancellor’s 3 daughters, upon a boat on a golden afternoon – after which one of the girls, Alice, requested he write it down for her, and thus began the manuscript!

A tale of a young girl, Alice falling through a rabbit hole into a fantasy world populated by peculiar, anthropomorphic creatures. a story which plays with logic, giving the story lasting popularity with adults as well as with children.

On 26 November 1864 he gave Alice the handwritten manuscript of Alice’s Adventures Under Ground, with illustrations by Dodgson (or Carroll) himself, dedicating it as “A Christmas Gift to a Dear Child in Memory of a Summer’s Day”

It is considered to be one of the best examples of the literary nonsense genre and is a legacy today with plays, movies, board games, video games and adaptations of all kinds!