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Alice's Illustrators: searching for the "right" Alice
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From: Maia <maia>
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2000 13:54:14 -0700
Pawing through my unshelved books last week, I found the copy of that has many of the Alice images I remember from my childhood. It's a 1966 edition published by Delacorte Press, with illustrations by swede Tove Jansson of the Finn Family Moonmitroll stories. These pictures portray a much less resilient Alice than Tenniel's did, but also, to me, a more sympathetic one. (Tenniel's Alice seemed a bit of a snot.) Jansson's sketches of Alice with a long neck swaying above the trees, and weeping in a hall full of tears are particularly moving. Her duchess and cook, queen and king are rather terrifying, though - which, as much as Disney, may have influenced my sense of an oppressed Alice.
But I have yet to see a version of Alice that looks like any dreamland I recognize. When I dream, the colors and sounds and "presence," if you will, are hypersaturated - but instead, all of the Alices I see look rather spare in comparison. Is there a lush Alice out there, preferably one that is not creepy or intimidating? Maybe an Alice where the art reflects that center-of-the-storm and magical feeling that can sometimes be found in dreams?
Maia
-maia at littlefolktales.org www.littlefolktales.org the Spirited Review: www.littlefolktales.org/reviews
Received on Tue 17 Oct 2000 03:54:14 PM CDT
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2000 13:54:14 -0700
Pawing through my unshelved books last week, I found the copy of that has many of the Alice images I remember from my childhood. It's a 1966 edition published by Delacorte Press, with illustrations by swede Tove Jansson of the Finn Family Moonmitroll stories. These pictures portray a much less resilient Alice than Tenniel's did, but also, to me, a more sympathetic one. (Tenniel's Alice seemed a bit of a snot.) Jansson's sketches of Alice with a long neck swaying above the trees, and weeping in a hall full of tears are particularly moving. Her duchess and cook, queen and king are rather terrifying, though - which, as much as Disney, may have influenced my sense of an oppressed Alice.
But I have yet to see a version of Alice that looks like any dreamland I recognize. When I dream, the colors and sounds and "presence," if you will, are hypersaturated - but instead, all of the Alices I see look rather spare in comparison. Is there a lush Alice out there, preferably one that is not creepy or intimidating? Maybe an Alice where the art reflects that center-of-the-storm and magical feeling that can sometimes be found in dreams?
Maia
-maia at littlefolktales.org www.littlefolktales.org the Spirited Review: www.littlefolktales.org/reviews
Received on Tue 17 Oct 2000 03:54:14 PM CDT
