Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There - Hardcover

Lewis Carroll

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0688120490 ISBN 13: 9780688120498

Publisher: HarperCollins, 1993

Synopsis

When Through the Looking Glass was published in 1871, readers were as delighted with that book as they were with Lewis Carroll's first masterpiece, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. In the topsy-turvy world that lies beyond the looking-glass, Alice meets such fantastical characters as Tweedledum and Tweedledee, Humpty Dumpty, and the Jabberwock.

For over 120 years John Tenniel's superb illustrations have been the perfect complement to Lewis Carroll's timeless story. This is the first edition of Looking-glass to reproduce Tenniel's exquisite drawings from engravings taken directly from the original woodblocks. Here, Tenniel's fine line work is far crisper, delicate shadings are reproduced with more subtlety, and details never seen before are now visible.

The pictures for the first edition of Looking-glass were created by transferring the artist's drawings to woodblocks. These original blocks served as masters from which metal plates were made for printing. Unfortunately, these plates deteriorated from the repeated pressure applied during the printing process, and over time, many of the fine lines in Tenniel's pictures simply vanished.

The original woodblocks disappeared and were believed lost; then, in 1985 they were discovered in a London bank vault. Now, for the first time, engravings from these woodblocks have been used to produce a deluxe gift edition. At last, readers can see the Looking-glass that Carroll and Tenniel had originally intended.

About this title

From the Back Cover

This 1872 sequel to Lewis Carroll's beloved Alice's Adventures in Wonderland finds the inquisitive heroine in a fantastic land where everything is reversed. Looking-glass land, a topsy-turvy world lurking just behind the mirror over Alice's mantel, is a fantastic realm of live chessmen, madcap kings and queens, strange mythological creatures, talking flowers and puddings, and rude insects.
Brooks and hedges divide the lush greenery of looking-glass land into a chessboard, where Alice becomes a pawn in a bizarre game of chess involving Humpty Dumpty, Tweedledum and Tweedledee, the Lion and the Unicorn, the White Knight, and other nursery-rhyme figures. Promised a crown when she reaches the eighth square, Alice perseveres through a surreal landscape of amusing characters that pelt her with riddles and humorous semantic quibbles and regale her with memorable poetry, including the oft-quoted "Jabberwocky."

About the Author

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832-1898), better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll, published Alice's Adventures in Wonderland in 1865 and its sequel, Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There, in 1871. Considered a master of the genre of literary nonsense, he is renowned for his ingenious wordplay and sense of logic, and his highly original vision.

Sir John Tenniel briefly attended the Royal Academy Schools, but for the most part he was a self taught artist. His illustrations appeared regularly in Punch, but it was the Alice books that confirmed his international reputation as an illustrator. Tenniel was knighted in 1893.

Peter Glassman is the owner of Books of Wonder, the New York City bookstore and publisher specializing in new and old imaginative books for children. He is also the editor of the Books of Wonder Classics, a series of deluxe facsimiles and newly illustrated editions of timeless tales. And he is the author of The Wizard Next Door, illustrated by Steven Kellogg. Mr. Glassman lives in New York City.

Edition details

• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Publication date: 1993
• ISBN 10: 0688120490
• ISBN 13: 9780688120498
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 240
• Illustrator: John Tenniel