Carroll Lewis (real name Charles Latwidge Dodgson) (1832-1898), English writer and mathematician.

Born on January 27, 1832 in the village of Daresbury (Cheshire) into a large family of a rural priest. Even as a child, Charles was interested in literature; he set up his own puppet theater and composed plays for it.

The future writer wanted to become a priest, like his father, so he entered Oxford University to study theology, but there he became interested in mathematics. He then taught mathematics at Oxford's Christchurch College for a quarter of a century (1855-1881).

On July 4, 1862, young Professor Dodgson went for a walk with the family of his Liddell acquaintances. During this walk for Alice Liddell and her two sisters, he told a fairy tale about Alice's adventures. Charles was persuaded to write down the story he had invented. In 1865, Alice in Wonderland was published as a separate book. However, Dodgson, who by that time had already been ordained as a priest, could not sign it with his name. He took the pseudonym Lewis Carroll. The author himself considered “Alice” a fairy tale for adults and only in 1890 did he release its children’s version. After the release of the first edition of the fairy tale, many letters came from readers asking to continue the fascinating story. Carroll wrote Through the Looking-Glass (published 1871). Exploring the world through play, proposed by the writer, has become a common technique in children's literature.

The Alice books are not Carroll's only works.

In 1867, he left England for the only time in his life, going to Russia with his friend. Carroll described his impressions in the Russian Diary.

He also wrote poems for children and the book “Silvia and Bruno”.

The writer himself called his works nonsense (nonsense) and did not attach any significance to them. He considered the main work of his life to be a serious mathematical work dedicated to the ancient Greek scientist Euclid.

Modern experts believe that Dodgson made his main scientific contribution with his works on mathematical logic. And children and adults enjoy reading his fairy tales.

Lewis Carroll is one of the most mysterious personalities in the history of world literature. Widely known as a storyteller, the author of the famous “Alice in Wonderland,” he was also a wonderful, and according to experts, the best photographer of his time. Some scandalousness of his personality was given by the fact that his weakness was to photograph little girls naked. “I adore all children,” Carroll once said, “except boys.” At the same time, there were researchers who claimed that he had a morbid sexual interest in his models and even drew an analogy between him and the murderous maniac Jack the Ripper. At the same time, it is known that his colleagues who studied at Oxford, clergy, and artists trusted him endlessly, otherwise how can one explain that the children of acquaintances most often posed for the artist?

However, first things first...

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson was born (later he would take the pseudonym Lewis Carroll) on January 27, 1832 in Cheshire, England. large family parish priest. He was the third child and eldest son in a family of four boys and seven girls. Charles began his education at home and already in childhood was distinguished by his exceptional intelligence. When he was little, he was left-handed, and they tried very hard to retrain him, prohibiting him from writing with his left hand, which later led to stuttering. At first, the boy’s father was involved in the boy’s education, but at the age of 12 the child entered a grammar private school near Richmond, where he really liked it, but after 2 years the parents sent the child to a privileged closed educational institution, Rugby School, where he liked it much less, but it was At this school his outstanding abilities in mathematics and classical languages ​​were revealed. Having received an excellent education and possessing a number of talents, the young man entered Oxford, where he was admitted to scientific work and lecturing, which, however, was rather boring for him. Around this time, he became passionate about photography. In 1855, Dodgson was offered a professorship at his college, which in those days meant taking holy orders and a vow of celibacy. However, the latter was easy for him; it was rumored that Carroll experienced absolute indifference to sexual life and died a virgin. What worried Dodgson himself most about these changes was that this circumstance could become a serious obstacle to further photography and his beloved visits to the theater. However, in 1861 Dodgson was ordained deacon, the first intermediate step towards becoming a priest. However, changes in university status subsequently freed him from the need for further steps in this direction.

For a more complete understanding of the writer’s personality and those facts from his life that have survived to this day, it should be noted that he was very shy from childhood and, as we know, noticeably stuttered. He led an orderly lifestyle: he gave lectures, took obligatory walks on foot, ate only in certain hours and was known as a pathological pedant. But what amazed those around him: his shyness and stuttering immediately disappeared as soon as he found himself in the company of little girls. This circumstance was noted by all his acquaintances, and his friendship with little girls was thoroughly discussed in 1856, when a new dean, Henry Lidell, appeared at the college where Lewis worked. He arrived at his new job accompanied by his wife and four small children: Harry, Lorina, Alicia and Edith. Dodgson, who was very fond of small children, very soon became friends with the girls and became frequent guest at the Liddell house. The restraint with which Carroll described his meetings with Alice is extremely surprising, and yet on April 25, 1856, a record appeared that the writer went for a walk with his three sisters. By that time, Carroll was already acquainted with the eldest of the Liddell sisters, the youngest at that time was only two years old, and therefore it is logical to assume that the writer was amazed precisely by the meeting with four-year-old Alice, whom he had never seen before. But the name of this girl did not appear in Carroll's diary entries until May 1857, when the writer gave Alice a small present for her fifth birthday. Carroll often went to the dean's house to play with Alice and her two sisters (of course, having previously received an invitation from Mrs. Liddell); the girls came to visit him (with their mother’s permission, of course); they walked together, went boating, went out of town (of course, in the presence of the governess Miss Prickett - and it turned out that most often the five of them). Carroll spent so much time in the Liddell house that rumors spread around the college where he taught about his affair with the Liddell children's governess, after which the writer noted in his diary that “from now on, when in society, I will avoid any mention of girls, except in cases where it will not cause any suspicion.”

Beginning in November 1856, Carroll began to feel hostile towards himself on the part of Mrs. Liddell. From the writer’s diary, apparently, the entries devoted to the period from April 18, 1858 to May 8, 1862, disappeared forever, namely, it formed the basis for the masterpiece created somewhat later - “Alice in Wonderland.” The famous summer boat ride took place on July 4, 1862. On this day, Lewis, his priest friend and the dean's three daughters took a boat up one of the tributaries of the Thames. The day turned out to be very hot, and the tired girls asked their older friend to tell them a fairy tale. And Carroll began to come up with an intricate plot on the fly about Alice’s adventures underground, where the girl fell asleep in a meadow. And she dreams extraordinary dream as she falls in rabbit hole, meets strange characters and takes part in amazing adventures. What was unusual about this fairy tale was that in it, seven-year-old Alice tries to reason and participate in various discussions with fantastic heroes, but her thoughts and conclusions defy ordinary logic.

Subsequently, Carroll wrote down this fairy tale (at the girl’s request), which was published 2 years later under the title “Alice’s Adventures Underground,” and after a triumphant march around the world it began to be called “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.” He gave his own handwritten copy to the “customer”, pasting at the end of the manuscript a photograph of the main character he personally took.

In 1928, Mrs. R. G. Hargreaves (Alice Liddell) auctioned the manuscript at Sotheby's and received £15,400 for it, which was then donated to Great Britain. The manuscript is currently in the British Museum in London.

Mrs. Liddell's dissatisfaction with the relationship between Carroll and her daughters grew more and more. In 1864, she completely banned any walks and meetings between the writer and the girls and destroyed all the letters Alice received from Carroll. And the writer himself, apparently, tore out from his diaries that have reached us, pages that mention precisely this period of the break in relations with the Liddells.

Despite the fact that Lewis Carroll is the author of outstanding scientific books, articles on mathematics and logic, it was his fairy tales that brought him worldwide fame and were most discussed by critics and readers. Moreover, the subject of the study was also the personal life of the writer-scientist, which also “did not fit into any framework.”

Especially a lot of controversy and discussion arose around his strange long-term friendship with Alice Liddell, for whom he wrote his fairy tale, whom he constantly photographed and drew, including nude.

Alice is often present in his photographs; in one of the most famous, she depicts a beggar. A seven-year-old girl is looking at us from this photo. In a free pose, with a bare shoulder, she looks defiantly sexy.

It was not only young Alice that occupied Carroll's attention. He approached girls when he saw them in stores and on beaches. And he even specially carried puzzle toys with him to lure youngsters. And having become friends, he wrote them tender letters, reminding them that “we remember each other and feel tender affection for each other.”

There is a lot of similar evidence of such strange behavior of the writer. Indeed, he gave reason to suspect him of hidden pedophilia. After all, evidence that Carroll had sexual relations with his young girlfriends (and researchers counted that he was friends with almost a hundred girls) was never found.

But, according to the biographer N.M. Demurova, this is for everyone known version Carroll's "pedophilism" is a gross exaggeration. She is convinced that the relatives deliberately fabricated a lot of evidence about the supposedly great pure love Carroll to the children, because they wanted to hide his overly active social life, unforgivable either for a deacon (he had holy rank) or for a professor. According to this evidence, Carroll was not at all modest: he loved to go to the theater, appreciated painting, dined with young girls in cafes, stayed overnight in the houses of widows and married women- in general, he was a lover of life. And such a way of life was in no way consistent with his sacred rank. Such a truth about a relative seemed murderous to the nieces; most of all, they were afraid that their uncle would be spoken of as an adulterer. And then they decided to focus on his crazy love for little misses. Concerned about the reputation of Lewis Carroll after his death, relatives clearly overdid it and destroyed most of his diaries, drawings of little girls, photographs and negatives of “a’naturel”, his sketches of fancy dresses, trying to create a heavily “powdered” biography. Most of the photographs Carroll took were destroyed, and none of the nude photographs survived. In fact, Carroll gradually exposed his models, and only in 1879 he began to take photographs of girls “in the costume of Eve,” as he himself wrote about it in his diary: “the naked girls are completely pure and delightful,” he writes to one of his friends, “But the nakedness of boys must be covered.” Meanwhile, he wrote in his diary: “If I found the most beautiful girl in the world for my photographs and discovered that she was embarrassed by the idea of ​​posing naked, I would consider it my sacred duty before God, no matter how fleeting her timidity and no matter how easy was to overcome it, immediately abandon this idea once and for all...” – the author of “Alice in Wonderland” wrote in his diaries.

Thus, the writer’s relatives and friends deliberately wanted to present him as a person who “really, really loved children.” This is from the point of view modern man, attention to girls is perceived as unhealthy. In the era when the author of “Alice” lived, they looked at it completely differently. The Victorians viewed the naked body differently and distinguished sexual desire from aesthetic desire. On postcards of the era, naked children as angels are the norm. In Victorian England, photographing and drawing little girls, including in the nude, was in fashion and symbolized purity and purity), and children under 12 were generally considered asexual, unable to evoke thoughts of fornication. In addition, Carroll made portraits famous people, and not just girls. However, as soon as suspicious townsfolk began to whisper behind his back, he immediately stopped drawing and photographing children.

From the point of view of that morality, the writer’s nieces, emphasizing his relationship with children, did not imagine that, by protecting Victorian virtues, they would condemn their famous relative to more serious accusations of pedophilia and other “oddities.” Even a whole direction has emerged that analyzes Carroll’s pathological tendencies through the study of his work. According to one of the “Freudian” versions, in the image of Alice, Carroll developed his own reproductive organ. There were “critics” who discovered “elements of sadism” and “oral aggression” of the writer. Proof: in “Wonderland,” Alice drinks or eats something all the time to change her height, but the Queen of Hearts screams at the top of her lungs: “Cut off your head!”

Concluding this topic, it should be noted that a careful reading of Carroll’s correspondence with the girls revealed that many of them had long since left childhood. Some people were even over 30, although the writer treated them like little ones, but at the same time he paid for music lessons for one, and visits to the dentist for another.

At the same time, it cannot be denied that Carroll was really very, very an unusual man who hid his many-sided aspirations under the mask of Victorian respectability. For example, he ate exclusively in the college cafeteria, but several shelves of his bookcases were occupied by cookbooks. He hardly drank alcohol, but the books “Deadly Alcohol” and “Uncontrollable Drunkenness” were prominently displayed in his library. He did not have children, but a place of honor in his library was occupied by works on the upbringing, nutrition, and training of children from the cradle until they enter into “full intelligence.”

The writer’s relationship with the already matured Alice is interesting, which over time became extremely rare and unnatural. After one of them, in April 1865, he wrote: “Alice has changed a lot, although I seriously doubt that better side. She may be entering puberty." The girl was twelve years old at that time. In 1870 Carroll made last photo Alice, then a young woman, who came to meet the writer, accompanied by her mother.

Two meager notes, made by Carroll in old age, tell about the writer’s sad meetings with the one who was once his muse.
One of them took place in 1888, and Alice was accompanied by her husband, Mr. Hargreaves, who was once a student of Dodgson himself. Carroll makes the following entry: “It was not easy to put together in my head her new face and my old memories of her: her strange appearance today with the one who was once so close and beloved “Alice.”

Another passage tells of a meeting of the almost seventy-year-old Carroll, who could not walk due to problems with his joints, with Alice Liddell: “Like Mrs. Hargreaves, the real “Alice” was now sitting in the dean’s office, I invited her to tea. She could not accept my invitation, but was kind enough to come to see me for a few minutes in the evening along with her sister Rhoda. "[In Carroll's memoirs, these two scenes are presented in the form of a peculiar triangle of images - the awkward presence of the husband, the imprint of time on the woman's face and the ideal girl from the memories. Nabokov in his Lolita combines these two scenes into one, when the despairing Humbert last time meets a matured Lolita, living with some vulgar type].

Rhoda was the youngest of the Liddell daughters; Carroll brought her to the role of Rose in the Garden of Fresh Flowers in Alice Through the Looking Glass.

One of the last letters dates back to the period when Alice came to Oxford in connection with her father's retirement.
Carroll's invitation letter to an old acquaintance contains a professional reference to the linguistic concept of the dual meaning of words:
“You may prefer to come accompanied by someone; I leave the decision up to you, only noting that if your spouse is with you, I will accept it with great (crossed out) great pleasure (I crossed out the word “great” because it is ambiguous, I’m afraid, like most words). I met him not long ago in our break room. It was hard for me to come to terms with the fact that he was the husband of the one whom I still, even now, imagine as a seven-year-old girl.”

Dodgson suffered from insomnia: he spent nights trying to find solutions to complex mathematical problems. He was worried that no one remembered him scientific works, and at the end of his days, tired of Carroll’s fame, he even said that he “had nothing to do with any pseudonym or book published under my real name.”

Nabokov's novel gave names to this brand of eroticism. Only here we can probably talk about eroticism, perhaps platonic. Apparently, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson could only possess a woman - or more precisely, a little girl - only in his imagination. And even then only in those moments while the photography lasted (the words “forty-two seconds” run through the book about Alice in Oxford like an obsessive motif). As young Chukovsky wrote in his Diary, old maids and old virgins are the most unhappy people in the world.

It's amazing that much of Alice's time has survived to this day. The elm planted by Alice on the wedding day of the Prince of Wales lived until 1977 (then, like many of his neighbors in the alley, he fell ill with fungal elm disease, and the trees had to be cut down). The famous Punch magazine (where Teniel, the first Alice illustrator, worked) closed quite recently. But the devils, rabbits and gargoyles that decorate the windows of the Oxford University Museum are there forever.
In Lewis Carroll's book The Logic Game, where he teaches the art of reasoning logically, drawing correct conclusions from not exactly incorrect but unusual premises, there is the following problem: “No fossil animal can be unhappy in love. The oyster is unhappy in love." The answer is also the conclusion: “The oyster is not a fossil animal.”

Lewis Carroll, professor of mathematics at Oxford, deacon, amateur photographer, amateur artist, amateur writer, died in 1898. Many of those around him had no idea that this shy, stuttering man lived such a bizarre secret existence. Some psychiatrists argued that Carroll had schizoid disorders and that he literary creativity- confirmation of this.

However, if there were such disorders, they led to the fact that scientific works were written by the “sick”, who contributed to science, and immortal works of art were created, published all over the world. He dreamed of returning to childhood, turning back time and, indeed, became immortal thanks to his amazing fairy tales!

Carroll lived to be 66 years old and looked very youthful until the end of his life, but was not in good health, as he suffered from severe migraines. Many believed that he took laudanum (opium), but in those days many people did this even with minor ailments, since it was considered a simple medicine. The drug helped Carroll cope with his stuttering - after taking opium he felt more confident. It is likely that the “treatment” had an impact on his creative fantasies, because, for example, in “Alice in Wonderland” incredible events and amazing transformations take place.

The writer’s originality was manifested in the fact that he managed to organically weave into his fantasies not only real characters such as Alice Liddell, but also everyday suffering associated with his illness, which later received its name in honor of the work in which Alice in Wonderland syndrome was mentioned .

Alice in Wonderland syndrome is one of the rare forms migraine auras, a complex of brief (no more than an hour) neurological disorders that precede the onset of a migraine attack. An aura does not always accompany a headache, and doctors make a separate diagnosis in such cases – migraine with aura. Typically, an aura is a set of visual or sensory disturbances, manifested as bright or iridescent spots, loss of part of the visual field, or numbness, a crawling sensation in the hand, arm or face. Sometimes the aura may be present in the form of motor disturbances or olfactory phenomena. Perhaps the most famous literary description aura in the form of a violation of the sense of smell, is found in Mikhail Bulgakov’s novel “The Master and Margarita”:

“More than anything else in the world, the procurator hated the smell of rose oil, and everything now foreshadowed a bad day, since this smell began to haunt the procurator since dawn...” Yes, there is no doubt! It’s her, her again, the invincible, terrible disease of hemicrania, which makes half your head hurt. There is no remedy for it, there is no salvation. I’ll try not to move my head.”

Alice in Wonderland syndrome is a rare form of migraine aura and occurs primarily in children. Manifestations of the syndrome can be different: from perversion of smell or taste to complex, detailed disturbances of perception, reminiscent of hallucinations. Visual phenomena usually appear as images of people or animals that swim from one side of the visual field and disappear on the other, or materialize from air currents, like the Cheshire cat.

“Okay,” said the Cat and disappeared – very slowly this time. The tip of his tail disappeared first, and his smile last. She hovered in the air for a long time, when everything else had already disappeared.”

Sufferers of Alice in Wonderland syndrome realize that these images are just visions, since the images are usually stereotypical and located at a specific point in space.

There are studies that prove that the headaches of many artists were reflected in their works. The fact can be traced by studying, for example, the works of outstanding artists: for example, elements that in all respects resemble manifestations of the visual aura of a migraine can be found in the paintings of Picasso and Matisse.

Another fragment of the book, which describes how Alice became smaller and larger after drinking from a bottle and eating a piece of mushroom, also has a very real origin. Lewis Carroll so effectively described the manifestations of macropsia and micropsia, which are also considered features of Alice in Wonderland syndrome. These are temporary changes in perception in which surrounding objects appear larger in size than they really are, or, accordingly, smaller.

In addition to the above, those who suffer from Alice in Wonderland syndrome may experience a sensation of distorted body diagram. Derealization (a feeling of the unreality of what is happening), depersonalization (a feeling of “I’m not me”), deja vue occur, the sense of the passage of time is disturbed, or palinopsia appears (violation visual perception, in which an object that is no longer in the field of view remains in it or appears again). If you carefully re-read Alice in Wonderland, descriptions of many of these phenomena can be easily found.

Apparently, Carroll, who suffered from migraines, transferred his experiences of the aura of the attack to the characters of his works. By the way, the author also experienced the usual visual aura of migraine, which can be seen in his drawings. For example, the famous writer correctly and clearly reflected all the smallest details, but in the figure of the dwarf he missed part of the face, shoulder and left hand. This is very similar to a scotoma (loss of vision), which is a common element of the visual aura in migraines.

Fortunately, there is little chance of encountering Alice in Wonderland syndrome outside of a book: the syndrome is very rare, usually occurs in childhood, can be treated and, as a rule, its manifestations decrease with age.

PS:Richard Wallis's book "Jack the Ripper, Fickle Friend" was published in 1996. In it, the author claimed that the mysterious killer who brutally murdered London prostitutes in 1888 was... Lewis Carroll. He made his conclusions after discovering... anagrams in Carroll's books. He took several sentences from the storyteller's works and composed new sentences from the letters in them that told about Dodgson's atrocities as Jack the Ripper. True, Wallis chose long sentences. There were so many letters in them that, if desired, anyone could compose a text with any meaning.

Lewis Carroll (real name Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, or Charles Lutwidge Dodgson) - English writer, mathematician, logician, philosopher, deacon and photographer - born January 27, 1832 at the vicarage in the village of Daresbury, Cheshire.

In total there were 7 girls and 4 boys in the family. He started studying at home and showed himself to be smart and quick-witted. His father was in charge of his education. Was left-handed; according to unverified data, he was forbidden to write with his left hand, which traumatized the young psyche (presumably this led to stuttering).

At the age of 12 he entered a small grammar private school near Richmond. He liked it there, but in 1845 Lewis had to go to Rugby School, where he liked it much less. He studied at this school for 4 years and showed excellent abilities in mathematics and theology.

In May 1850 was enrolled at Christ Church, one of the most aristocratic colleges at Oxford University, and moved to Oxford in January of the following year. Didn't study very well, but thanks to outstanding mathematical abilities After receiving his bachelor's degree, he won a competition to give mathematical lectures at Christ Church. He gave these lectures for the next 26 years. They provided good income, although they were boring to him.

According to the college charter, he was ordained, but not as a priest, but only as a deacon, which gave him the right to preach sermons without working in the parish. He began his writing career while studying in college. Wrote poems and short stories, sending them to various magazines under the pseudonym "Lewis Carroll". This pseudonym was invented on the advice of publisher and writer Yates. It is formed from the author's real names "Charles Lutwidge", which are equivalents of the names "Charles" (Latin: Carolus) and "Louis" (Latin: Ludovicus). Dodgson chose other English equivalents of the same names and swapped them around.

Other options for a pseudonym are Edgar Cutwellis (the name Edgar Cutwellis is obtained by rearranging the letters from Charles Lutwidge), Edgard W.C. Westhill and Louis Carroll were rejected. Gradually he gained fame. Since 1854 his works began to appear in serious English publications: The Comic Times and The Train. In 1856 A new dean appeared at the college - Henry Liddell, with whom his wife and 5 children arrived, among whom was 4-year-old Alice.

In 1864 wrote famous work"Alice in Wonderland." After 3 years the deacon Church of England Dodgson visited Russia with the theologian Reverend Henry Liddon (not to be confused with Deacon Henry Liddell). This was a period of theological contact between Anglican and Orthodox churches, in which Lyddon and the influential Bishop of Oxford, Samuel Wilberforce, were especially interested, whose letters of recommendation were secured by both clerics.

Together with Liddon, Carroll was received in Moscow and Sergiev Posad by Metropolitan Philaret (the visit was timed to coincide with the 50th anniversary of his tenure at the Moscow see) and Archbishop Leonid (Krasnopevkov). The route of the trip was as follows: London - Dover - Calais - Brussels - Cologne - Berlin - Danzig - Koenigsberg - St. Petersburg - Moscow - Nizhny Novgorod - Moscow - Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius - St. Petersburg - Warsaw - Breslau - Dresden - Leipzig - Ems - Paris - Calais - Dover - London.

This was Carroll's only trip abroad. He described it himself in the “Diary of a Travel to Russia in 1867” (not intended for publication, but published posthumously), which provides tourist impressions from the cities visited, notes about meetings with Russians and Englishmen in Russia and recordings of individual Russian phrases.

He also published many scientific works on mathematics under his own name. He studied Euclidean geometry, linear and matrix algebra, mathematical analysis, probability theory, mathematical logic and entertaining mathematics(games and puzzles). In particular, he developed one of the methods for calculating determinants (Dodgson condensation).

However, his mathematical work did not leave any noticeable mark on the history of mathematics, while his achievements in the field of mathematical logic were ahead of their time.

Lewis Carroll died January 14, 1898 in Guildford, Surrey. He was buried there, along with his brother and sister, in the Ascension Cemetery.

Works:
"Useful and edifying poetry" ( 1845 )
"Algebraic analysis of the Fifth Book of Euclid" ( 1858 )
"Alice's Adventures Under Ground" (written before "Alice in Wonderland" in November 1864, Russian translation by Nina Demurova ( 2013 ))
"Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" ( 1864 )
"Information from the theory of determinants" ( 1866 )
"Bruno's Revenge" (the main core of the novel "Silvia and Bruno") ( 1867 )
"An Elementary Guide to the Theory of Determinants" ( 1867 )
"Phantasmagoria and Other Poem" ( 1869 )
“Through the Mirror and What Alice Saw There” (“Alice Through the Looking Glass”) ( 1871 )
"The Hunt for the Snark" ( 1876 )
Mathematical work "Euclid and his modern rivals"; "Doublets, word riddles" ( 1879 )
"Euclid" (Books I and II) ( 1881 )
Collection “Poems? Meaning?" ( 1883 )
"A Tangled Tale" 1885 ) - a collection of riddles and games
"Logic game" ( 1887 )
"Mathematical Curiosities" (Part I) ( 1888 )
"Silvia and Bruno" (Part I) ( 1889 )
"Alice for Children" and "Round Billiards"; "Eight or nine words of wisdom about how to write letters" ( 1890 )
"Symbolic Logic" (Part I) ( 1890 )
“Conclusion of “Sylvie and Bruno”” ( 1893 )
The second part of “Mathematical Curiosities” (“Midnight Problems”) ( 1893 )

Introduction

Translated literature has always occupied an important place in children's reading. It, just like native literature, has a serious influence on the moral and aesthetic education children. Best works Progressive foreign writers instill in young citizens humanism, devotion to moral ideas, love of knowledge, and hard work. This is the most important means of exchanging cultural values, helping to bring people closer together and interact. It promotes the study of social conditions and cultures of peoples different countries, since without sociocultural knowledge real communication and understanding cannot take place. “Art has the magical ability to overcome barriers of nationality and tradition, making people aware of their universal wealth. The scientific and technical achievements of a nation win it respect and admiration, but the creations of art make everyone fall in love with this nation,” wrote S.Ya. Marshak.

Of particular importance in translated children's literature are the works of British writers, such as: Edward Lear, Lewis Carroll, Kenneth Grahame, Joseph Rudyard Kipling, Walter de la Mare, Eleanor Farjeon, Alan Alexander Milne, Hugh Lofting.

Lewis Carroll: biography and creativity

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, whom everyone knows under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll, was born on January 27, 1832 in the small village of Daresbury, located in Cheshire. He was the first child of the parish priest Charles Dodgson. The future writer's mother's name was Frances Jane Lutwidge. At baptism, the child received two names: the first, Charles, in honor of his father, the second, Lutwidge, in honor of his mother. Later, Charles had seven more sisters and three brothers - at that time large families were commonplace. Lewis Carroll was British to the core. He had a special appearance: asymmetrical eyes, the corners of his lips were turned up, he was deaf in his right ear; stuttered.

All children in the Dodgson family received home education: the father himself taught them the law of God, literature and the basics of natural sciences, “biography” and “chronology”. The boy was then sent to Richmond Grammar School. After six months of study, young Charles managed to enter Rugby School, where he studied for four years. During his studies, teachers noted the boy's outstanding abilities in theology and mathematics. Carroll's entire subsequent life was connected with Oxford.

In May 1850, Dodgson was admitted to Christ Church College, Oxford University, and in January of the following year he moved permanently to Oxford. Charles graduated from college with honors in two departments: mathematics and classical languages, which was a rare case even at that time. Considering the young man’s outstanding abilities, he was offered to stay and work at Oxford, and in the fall of 1855 he was appointed professor of mathematics at one of the colleges. In those years prerequisite scientific work was the adoption of holy orders and the vow of celibacy. Dodgson hesitated for some time, fearing that taking holy orders would force him to give up his favorite pastimes - photography and going to the theater.

In 1861, Dodgson was ordained deacon, the first step in the priesthood process, but university rules soon changed and ordination became optional.

Dodgson wrote a large number of scientific books and brochures on logic and mathematics. The most famous books- this is an Algebraic analysis of the fifth book of Euclid (The Fifth Book of Euclid Treated Algebraically, 1858, 1868), Notes on Algebraic Planimetry (A Syllabus of Plane Algebraical Geometry, 1860), An Elementary Treatise on Determinants, 1867) and Euclid and His Modern Rivals (1879), Mathematical Curiosities (Curiosa Mathematica, 1888 and 1893), Symbolic Logic (1896).

In Oxford, Charles Dodgson lived in a small, cozy house with turrets. In his youth, he wanted to learn to be an artist, so he drew a lot, mainly with charcoal or pencil, and he himself illustrated his own handwritten magazines, which he published for his brothers and sisters. Once he sent several of his drawings to the humorous supplement of the Time newspaper, but the editors did not publish them. Then Charles became acquainted with the art of photography, a passion for which he retained throughout his life. He bought a camera and took up photography seriously. In the era of the birth of photography, the process of photographing was unusually complex: photographs had to be taken with a long shutter speed, on glass plates coated with a colloidal solution. The plates then had to be developed very quickly after shooting. For a long time, photographs of Dodgson were not known to a wide circle, but in 1950, the book “Lewis Carroll the Photographer” was published, which revealed Dodgson as a talented photographer.

Lewis Carroll loved Alice Liddell, a seven-year-old beauty with wide with open eyes, the rector's daughter, who, thanks to Carroll, turned into fairy-tale Alice.

Carroll, indeed, was friends with her for many years, including after she successfully married. He took many wonderful photographs of little and big Alice Liddell.

Alice. Photo by Carroll

Dodgson was a rather strange person - he avoided making friends, had poor hearing in one ear and had diction defects. He delivered his lectures in a abrupt, lifeless tone. Carroll simply loved the theater. This was clearly visible from the outside when he, already a famous writer, was personally present at the rehearsals of his fairy tales on the theater stage, showing a deep understanding of the theater and the laws of the stage.

Dr. Dodgson often suffered from severe insomnia. At night, while trying to sleep, he would invent “midnight problems”—various mathematical puzzles—and solve them himself in the dark. Having collected these problems together, Carroll published them a separate book"Mathematical curiosities."

In 1867, Dodgson went on a very unusual trip to Russia. On the way, he visited Calais, Brussels, Potsdam, Danzig, and Koenigsberg. The journey was very exciting. In Russia, Dodgson visited St. Petersburg, Sergiev Posad, Moscow, and a fair in Nizhny Novgorod. After a month in Russia, he returned back to England. The return route passed through Vilna, Warsaw, Ems, and Paris. Dodgson loved children very much: as a young boy, he wrote stories, small poems, came up with various games, and drew pictures for his younger brothers and sisters. Dodgson had such a strong attachment to children (mostly girls) that it even confused his contemporaries. It is difficult to say unequivocally what attracted Carroll to little girls, but in our time many biographers and critics, studying the psychology of the writer, never cease to accuse him of pedophilia.

Of Dodgson's childhood friends, the most famous were those with whom he had been friends since his youth - these were the children of the dean of his college, Liddell: Harry, Lorina, Alice (Alice), Rhoda, Edith and Violet.

Favorite Alice became the main character of Dodgson's improvisations, with which he entertained his young girlfriends on river walks or in his house, in front of the camera. Charles's photo models were his little girlfriends. He told the most unusual and fascinating story on July 4, 1862 to Lorina, Edith, Alice Liddell and Canon Duckworth near Godstow, walking in the upper reaches of the Thames. Young Alice persuaded Dodgson to write down his story on paper, which he did. Then, on the advice of J. MacDonald and Henry Kingsley, he rewrote his book so that it would be interesting not only for children, but also for adults. Charles added several more fascinating stories to the future book that he had previously told to Liddell's children. In July 1865, the book was published under the title Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Soon, a continuation of Alice's adventures appeared, also collected from earlier and later stories. This continuation was published at Christmas 1871. New book It was called “Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There.” The illustrations for both books were created by D. Tenniel, who carried them out according to the exact instructions of Dodgson himself.

The fairy tales “Alice in Wonderland” and “Alice Through the Looking Glass” are loved by adults and children. They are quoted, philologists and physicists refer to it, they are studied by philosophers and linguists, psychologists and mathematicians. Many articles have been written about them, scientific works, books. Movies have been made based on Lewis Carroll's books and plays have been staged. Hundreds of artists drew illustrations for his books, including Salvador Dali himself. Alice's Adventures have been translated into more than a hundred languages.

Dodgson wrote wonderful and original humorous poetry. Carroll published some poems from the books about Alice in 1855 in the Comic Times and in 1856 in Train magazine. He published many more of his poetry collections in these and various other periodicals, anonymously or under his pseudonym Lewis Carroll. Carroll's most famous poetic work is the nonsense poem "The Hunting of the Snark."

In the winter of 1898, Lewis Carroll fell ill with influenza in Guildford. The flu caused a complication - pneumonia, from which Charles Dodgson died on January 14, 1898.

Carroll's ability to skillfully “juggle” words and invent various new words made it impossible to unambiguously translate his works. Despite the efforts of the translators, some of the subtext was still lost. Now there are dozens of different translations into Russian of Lewis Carroll's works. In the Soviet Union, L. Carroll's works were first translated by A.P. Olenich-Gnenenko. From 1940 to 1961, the publication was published five times. The 1958 edition contained the first Soviet illustrations for "Alice", which were made by the artist V.S. Alfeevsky.

Place of birth: Date of death: Place of death: Citizenship: Type of activity: Works on the website Lib.ru Works on Wikisource.

Lewis Carroll. Self-portrait

Biography

He also published many scientific works on mathematics under his own name. One of his hobbies was photography.

Friendship with girls

Lewis Carroll was a bachelor. In the past, it was believed that he was not friends with members of the opposite sex, making an exception for actress Ellen Terry.

Carroll's greatest joy came from his friendships with little girls. “I love children (not boys),” he once wrote.

...Girls (unlike boys) seemed amazingly beautiful to him without clothes. Sometimes he drew or photographed them naked - of course, with the permission of their mothers.

Carroll himself considered his friendships with girls completely innocent; there is no reason to doubt that this was the case. Moreover, in the numerous memories that his little girlfriends later left about him, there is not a hint of any violation of decency.

"Carroll's Myth"

The information, as well as the quotes posted below, are taken from the article by A. Borisenko and N. Demurova “Lewis Carroll: Myths and Metamorphoses,” which, in turn, is based on the works of Guy Lebeily and Caroline Leach ( Hugues Lebaily And Caroline Leach).

IN last decades it turned out that most of his “little” girlfriends were over 14, many were 16-18 years old and older. Carroll's girlfriends often underestimated their ages in their memoirs. For example, actress Isa Bowman writes in her memoirs

As a child, I often amused myself by drawing caricatures, and one day, when he was writing letters, I began to sketch him on the back of an envelope. Now I don’t remember what the drawing looked like - it was probably a nasty cartoon - but suddenly he turned around and saw what I was doing. He jumped up and blushed terribly, which scared me very much. Then he grabbed my unfortunate sketch and, tearing it to shreds, silently threw it into the fire. (...) I was then no more than ten or eleven years old, but even now this episode stands before my eyes, as if it all happened yesterday...

In reality, she was at least 13 years old.

Another “young girlfriend” of Carroll, Ruth Gamlen, in her memoirs, reports how in 1892, Carroll’s parents invited Carroll to dinner with Isa, who was visiting him at that time. There Isa is described as a "shy child of about twelve", in fact in 1892 she was 18 years old.

Carroll himself also called the word “child” not only little girls, but also women 20-30 years old. Thus, in 1894 he wrote:

One of the main joys of my - surprisingly happy - life stems from the affection of my little friends. Twenty or thirty years ago I would have said that ten was the ideal age; now the age of twenty to twenty-five seems preferable to me. Some of my dear girls are thirty or more: I think that old man sixty-two years old has the right to still consider them children.

Research has shown that more than half of the “girls” with whom he corresponded were over 14 years old; Of the 870 comments he made about acting, 720 were about adult actors and only 150 about children.

In Victorian England at the end of the 19th century, girls under 14 were considered asexual. Carroll's friendship with them was, from the point of view of the morality of that time, a completely innocent quirk. On the other hand, being too close to a young woman (especially in private) was strictly condemned. This could have caused Carroll to declare his acquaintances the women and girls “little girls”, and to underestimate their age.

Bibliography

• “Useful and edifying poetry” ()
• "Algebraic analysis of the Fifth Book of Euclid" ()
• "Information from the theory of determinants" (