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Lewis Carrol was an English writer who created games and wrote as a child. He received a studentship at Christ Church at the age of 20 and was appointed as a Lecturer in Mathematics. Lewis was shy but enjoyed making stories for children.
Carrol’s most noticed books contain Through the Looking-Glass and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. In addition to that, he was a famous poet and mathematician. Mainly, he was noted for his sense of humor, wordplay, logic, and fantasy.
Let’s take a look at the early life of Carrol and how he became a writer.
Carrol’s Early Life
Lewis Carroll was born on January 27, 1832. His full name was Charles Lutwidge Dodgson but he was well known by his pen name Lewis Carroll. Lewis was the eldest boy in a family and had 11 siblings.
Carroll loves to entertain himself and his siblings but his father raised them in a rectory as he was a clergyman. As a normal guy, he excelled in mathematics and won multiple academic prizes.
He was awarded a studentship at Christ college at the age of 20. In addition to serving as a lecturer in mathematics, he loves to write essays, poetry, political pamphlets, and click photographs.
By publishing “The Hunting of the Snark” he displayed his amazing ability in the Literary nonsense genre.
Literary Style and Themes
Carrol knows what children want. That’s why he only focused on the writing style that can bring smiles to their faces or keep them engaged. In the early years, no one noticed this style. But Queen Victoria noticed that her kids were so taken with Alice in Wonderland.
For this reason, he requested Carroll to be the first person to receive a copy of his next work. She received what she requested, the book is related to Linear equations and Algebraic Geometry.
But it completely shows how Lewis reconciled his fiction work with Literature and Mathematics. In addition to Alice’s books, his famous work was his longer story poem The Hunting of the Snark.
Carroll also drew cartoons for his siblings and conjured multiple tricks for them that involved the storytelling process. He was always an outsider in society and relates more to children instead of adults.
Lewis Carrol Literary Success
Lewis Carrol suffered from a stammering problem but he speaks vocally fluently with children. He had great relations with young people in his adult years. These relations have a lot of interest in them and inspire Carroll to write for multiple years.
Furthermore, he loved to entertain and spend time with kids. His famous book Alice’s adventures in Wonderland was inspired by Alice the daughter of Henry George Liddell.
Alice remembers spending hours and hours with Carroll, sitting on the couch while he told fantastic tales of his dream worlds. During an afternoon picnic with Alice and her 2 sisters, Lewis told the 1st iteration of what would later become “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”.
After returning home, Alice exclaimed that Carroll must write the story down for her. That’s why he fulfilled the request of a small girl. Later through a series of coincidences, the story fell into the hands of the novelist Henry Kingsley. He urged Carroll to publish this story and in 1865 the story finally got published.
The story gained steady popularity and as a result, Lewis wrote the sequel Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There in 1871. By the time of Lewis’s death, Alice had become a popular children’s book in England and by 1932 it became popular around the world.
Furthermore, here is a list of some amazing books by Lewis Carrol.
- What the Tortoise Said to Achilles
- Jabberwocky
- You are Old, Father William
- The Complete Works of Lewis Carroll
- The Walrus and the Carpenter and much more
Photography and Legacy
In addition to writing, Lewis Carroll created various fine photographs. His notable portraits include those of the poet Alfred Tennyson and the actress Ellen Terry. He also photographed kids in every possible costume and situation.
He also makes nude studies of them. Because of this, he faced some issues with child abuse. In short, before his 66th birthday, he caught a severe case of influenza which led to pneumonia. He died of this disease on January 14, 1898, leaving an enigma behind him.