New York: Children's Classics, 1988. Gutmann, Bessie Pease; Tenniel, John. First Thus. Hard Cover. Near Fine / No Jacket - Pictorial Cover. Item #2351546
ISBN: 0517659611

First thus. An excellent copy. Binding tight and square, pages clean, bright, and unmarked.

8 color plates by Bessie Pease Gutmann, with original John Tenniel illustrations in black-and-white, a preface by Claire Booss, and a foreword by Ellen S. Shapiro. In 1862 Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, a shy Oxford mathematician with a stammer, created a story about a little girl tumbling down a rabbit hole. Thus began the immortal adventures of Alice, perhaps the most popular heroine in English literature. Countless scholars have tried to define the charm of the Alice books - with those wonderfully eccentric characters the Queen of Hearts, Tweedledum, and Tweedledee, the Cheshire Cat, Mock Turtle, the Mad Hatter et al. - by proclaiming that they really comprise a satire on language, a political allegory, a parody of Victorian children's literature, even a reflection of contemporary ecclesiastical history. Perhaps, as Dodgson might have said, Alice is no more than a dream, a fairy tale about the trials and tribulations of growing up - or down, or all turned round - as seen through the expert eyes of a child.

Price: $15.00