Imagine it: Alice is sitting with her elder sister outdoors enjoying a little “Picnic” (= eats and drinks out of doors). She feels drowsy in the midday heat, and then she sees a White Rabbit all dressed up in a waistcoat, trousers and quaint (= odd looking) shoes. He mutters “I’m late, I’m late. No time to talk I’ve got a date. Hallo, Goodbye. I’m late, I’m late, I’m late.” He then disappears down a hole in the ground near Alice.
Fascinated by this unusual sight, she follows the rabbit down the hole. Suddenly, she finds herself falling for a long time. When she stops she finds herself in a long hallway with doors lining both sides and the ends. There is a table with a key resting on it. This key can unlock a tiny door; through this doorway she spies (=can see) a beautiful garden. She longs to go there but the doorway is too small. Then she sees a drink on an elegant table with a note that says “Drink Me.” Later Alice sees a cake with a note that asks her to eat it; Alice does these things but she can’t get a handle on things (=work it all out, or understand what to do): she is either too small to reach the key or too large (=big) to go through the doorway. Eventually she makes it (=succeeds) and passes through the tiny doorway.
While she is tiny, she slips and falls into a pool of water. She realizes that this little sea is made from the tears she has cried. She swims to shore with a number of other animals, most notable a sensitive mouse, but manages to offend everybody by talking about her cat’s ability to catch birds and mice. The animals all go away. Alice, left all alone, walks through a wood and runs into (=meets) the White Rabbit. He mistakes her for his maid servant and sends her to fetch some things from his house. While in the White Rabbit’s home, she eventually finds a little cake which, when eaten, makes her small again.
She returns to the wood and comes across (=finds) a Caterpillar sitting on a mushroom. He gives her some valuable advice as well as a valuable tool: the two sides of the mushroom, which can make Alice either grow larger or smaller as she wishes. The first time she uses the mushroom she stretches out her body tremendously. While stretched out, she pokes her head up into the branches of a tree and meets a Pigeon. The Pigeon is convinced that Alice is a serpent (=snake), and although Alice tries to reason with her the Pigeon tells her to “be off.”
Alice gets herself down to normal proportions (=size) and continues her trek (=journey) through the woods. In an open clearing (=space) she comes across a little house and shrinks herself down enough to go inside. It is the house of the Duchess; the Duchess and the Cook are battling fiercely, and they seem unconcerned about the safely of the baby that the Duchess is nursing. Alice takes the baby away with her; but the child turns into a little pig (=piglet) and trots off into the woods. Going along further, Alice next meets the Cheshire Cat (who was sitting in the Duchess’s house but had said nothing). The Cheshire Cat helps her to find her way through the woods, but he warns her that everybody she meets will be mad.
Alice goes to the March Hare’s house, where she is treated to a Mad Tea Party. Present at the Tea Party are the March Hare, the Hatter (who is supposed to spend his time making hats) and the Dormouse. Ever since ‘time’ (his pocket watch) stopped working for the Hatter, it has always been six o’clock; it is therefore, always teatime. The creatures of the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party are some of the most argumentative of all in Wonderland.
Alice tires of this and goes out. She travels on and finds a tree with a door in it. When she looks through the doorway she spies the same door-lined hallway she found at the beginning of her adventure.
This time she was prepared (she knew how to handle the size problem by using the mushroom) and she gets into the lovely garden that she saw earlier. She walks on through the garden admiring the flowers, especially the white roses. This is the garden of the Queen of Hearts. Here, three gardeners (with bodies made from playing cards) are hurriedly painting the roses red. This is because if the Queen finds out they planted white roses by mistake, she will demand their heads be cut off. The Queen herself soon arrives, and she does indeed, order their execution. Alice helps to hide the gardeners under a large flower pot.
The Queen invites Alice to play croquet, which is a very difficult game in Wonderland, as all the balls and mallets are live animals. The game is interrupted by the appearance of the Cheshire Cat, to whom the King of Hearts takes an immediate dislike.
The Queen takes Alice to the Gryphon, who in turn takes Alice to the Mock Turtle. The Gryphon and the Mock Turtle tell Alice bizarre stories about their school under the sea. The Mock Turtle sings a melancholy (=sad) song about turtle soup, and soon afterwards the Gryphon drags Alice off to see the trial of the Knave of Hearts.
The Knave of Hearts has been accused of stealing the Queen’s tarts, but the evidence against him is very poor. Alice is appalled at the ridiculous proceedings. She soon starts to grow larger. She is called to the witness stand; by this time she had become giant-sized. She refused to be intimidated by the bad logic of the court and all the bluster (=talk) from the King and Queen of Hearts. Suddenly all the cards rise up and attack her. At this point she wakes up. Her adventures in Wonderland had all been a fantastic dream.
(See the Book ‘Alice in Wonderland’ and the Film; also the book ‘Alice through the looking glass.’)
Resubmitted by R.O.S