Lewis Carroll

Lewis Carroll is the pen-name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832-1898), professor of mathematics in Oxford and a pioneer photographer, who achieved lasting fame through his children's book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

Dodgson had seven sisters and two brothers.

Dodgson was homeschooled until he was 12. After three years at the Rugby School, he said "no earthly consideration" would ever get him to return to that boarding school, due to mistreatment from the other boys

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland began as a one of many fantastic tales while rowing on the Thames. This one incorporated each member of the boating party as a character: Lorina Liddell as Lory, Alice Liddell as Alice, Edith Liddell as the Eaglet, Reverend Duckworth as the Duck, himself as the Dodo (a nickname he picked up in public school, from having stuttered his surname). The three Liddell girls also appear as Prima, Secunda and Tertia in the prefatory poem All in the Golden Afternoon and in the Mad Tea Party: the Dormouse begins a tale of three little sisters, Elsie (L.C. = Lorina Charlotte), Lacie (anagram of Alice), and Tillie (family nickname for Edith).

Dodgson wrote four versions of Alice in Wonderland:

1. He stayed up late on July 4, 1862 writing down the first draft of the story he had told that afternoon
2. He presented Alice a handwritten and illustrated manuscript for Christmas 1865 (about 18,000 words)
3. For publication, he nearly doubled its length, adding the Mad Tea Party and getting Punch cartoonist to create illustrations (to Dodgson's exacting specifications)
4. The Nursery Alice was a much shorter work aimed at toddlers