In his article “‘Alice’ on the Stage,” Carroll wrote the following when comparing the Rabbit to Alice: “And the White Rabbit, what of him? Was he framed on the ‘Alice’ lines, or as a contrast? As a contrast, distinctly. For her ‘youth,’ ‘audacity,’ ‘vigour’ and ‘swift directness of purpose,’ read ‘elderly,’ ‘timid,’ ‘feeble,’ and ‘nervously shilly-shallying,’ and you will get something of what I meant him to be. I think the White Rabbit should wear spectacles. I am sure his voice should quaver, and his knees quiver, and his whole air suggest a total inability to say ‘Boo’ to a goose!”

“I Shall Be Too Late!”: The Rabbit’s sense of urgency has, over time, become quite famous beyond its own reason for being. Why is the Rabbit late in returning to Wonderland?  This obsession with timekeeping (shared by the Hatter) may be a jest about the Great Tom bell in Tom Tower, which is located near to where both Carroll and Alice lived. Oxford is situated five miles west of Greenwich, and so the bell of Great Tom rings five minutes after the actual hour. If the poor White Rabbit (being a tourist of Oxfordshire while he is above ground) has his own watch set to Great Tom instead of Wonderland, he will always be late!

Dinah, Alice’s Favored Pet: The Liddells’ cat Dinah was an actual pet, originally given to Alice’s sister Lorina. But Alice loved Dinah more than anything. Per Alice Liddell’s reminiscences, the cat “was given to Ina, but became my special pet … Dinah I was devoted to.”  Dinah originally had a male companion, Villikens. The two were named in honor of the characters in a popular Victorian song, “Villikens and His Dinah.”  Whether Villikens was the father of Kitty and Snowdrop (featured in Through the Looking-Glass) remains an open question.

The Carrollian Dream-Child: Alice changes as she falls down the rabbit-hole. Although the distinction is not often commented upon, it is clear that Alice “in Wonderland” is quite a different person than Alice Pleasance Liddell. Carroll’s illustrations in Alice’s Adventures Under Ground—the first draft of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland—portrayed Ms. Liddell herself, but they were idealized in a Pre-Raphaelite fashion, featuring an Alice Liddell with longer hair. We do know for certain that Carroll sought to remove particularly personal identifiers from the published version of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. (As another example, he changed the names of two of Alice’s actual companions to Ada and Mabel.)  In a similar fashion, the blonde, classically-featured Alice of Tenniel’s drawings is nothing like Ms. Liddell herself. The illustrated Alice “of Wonderland” is the dream-child, the idealized representation of strength and innocence, as written by Carroll and envisioned by Tenniel. The implication may well be that we are bettered by our dreams.

Falling Off the Top of the House: One of our first hints that the Alice books are subversive, and not at all like most Victorian fairy-tales, is that Carroll is referentially grim throughout the story. He quite often takes the time to point out moments of darkness, such as this one. Here he makes it clear that Alice wouldn’t say anything after falling off the top of the house, because she would probably break her neck and die in the fall!

The Antipathies: Alice is quite close here, actually! What she really means is the Antipodes, which is a term that refers (from the English perspective) to Australia and New Zealand. The joke may have been amusing to Victorian readers because “antipathy” means “absolutely without sympathy,” and Australia was largely colonized by English criminals!

The Lamps in the Hall: Considering the age of Alice’s adventures (the 1860s), these lamps would very likely be gaslight, which would explain why Alice felt so hot beneath their glow. Indeed, it is possible that the poisonous fumes played a part in her discombobulation!

The Secret Doors in the Hall: We are never told but are left to wonder: where might the other doors in the hall go to? Given that one of the doors leads into the royal garden, and another comes out inside a tree in the middle of the forest, they could lead anywhere. Possibilities include the homes of various characters (such as the Dodo, the Mouse, and very likely the White Rabbit), or other trees, or places in nearby Looking-Glass Land, or even the corridors of the Palace of Hearts itself. Some might even open onto the Underwater School, which would explain the presence of the Crabs at the Pool of Tears. We shall never know, but it is an interesting puzzle to contemplate!

The Unseen Table: Carroll does not quite tell us why Alice failed to find the three-legged table during her first circuit around the hall. It may be that the table appeared by magic, or that its transparency caused her not to notice it the first time. Most likely, however, is that Alice is dreaming and her yearning for a way out causes a (dubious) means of exit to appear.

The Loveliest Garden: From the nature of the Queen’s croquet-ground, we know that the royal garden is actually a dream-image of the Deanery and Cathedral Gardens, located outside Alice’s own home back in Oxford.

“How I Wish I Could Shut Up Like a Telescope”: Although it is subtle, the appearance of the “DRINK ME” bottle upon the table is actually caused by Alice wishing here out loud.

A Bottle Marked “Poison”: Some of these grim thoughts of children meeting terrible ends come from Struwwelpeter, a book featuring the deaths and punishment of naughty children. Alice might also be remembering the unexpurgated edition of Kinder- und Hausmärchen, commonly known today as Grimm’s Fairy Tales.

“Going Out Like a Candle”: Alice’s thoughts here are dark indeed. She is contemplating the idea of not just death, but non-existence and absolute annihilation. Carroll, however, pointedly left his religious beliefs out of the Alice works (with the exceptions of prefaces and inserted pamphlets).