Looking-Glass: Queen Alice

This story is part of the Looking-Glass unit. Story source: Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There by Lewis Carroll (1871).

CHAPTER IX. Queen Alice

LIBRIVOX AUDIO: Chapter 9

'Well, this IS grand!' said Alice. 'I never expected I should be a Queen so soon — and I'll tell you what it is, your majesty,' she went on in a severe tone (she was always rather fond of scolding herself), 'it'll never do for you to be lolling about on the grass like that! Queens have to be dignified, you know!'

So she got up and walked about — rather stiffly just at first, as she was afraid that the crown might come off, but she comforted herself with the thought that there was nobody to see her, 'and if I really am a Queen,' she said as she sat down again, 'I shall be able to manage it quite well in time.'

Everything was happening so oddly that she didn't feel a bit surprised at finding the Red Queen and the White Queen sitting close to her, one on each side; she would have liked very much to ask them how they came there, but she feared it would not be quite civil. However, there would be no harm, she thought, in asking if the game was over. 'Please, would you tell me — ' she began, looking timidly at the Red Queen.

'Speak when you're spoken to!' the Queen sharply interrupted her.

'But if everybody obeyed that rule,' said Alice, who was always ready for a little argument, 'and if you only spoke when you were spoken to, and the other person always waited for YOU to begin, you see nobody would ever say anything, so that — '

'Ridiculous!' cried the Queen. 'Why, don't you see, child — ' here she broke off with a frown and, after thinking for a minute, suddenly changed the subject of the conversation. 'What do you mean by "If you really are a Queen"? What right have you to call yourself so? You can't be a Queen, you know, till you've passed the proper examination. And the sooner we begin it, the better.'

'I only said "if"!' poor Alice pleaded in a piteous tone.

The two Queens looked at each other, and the Red Queen remarked, with a little shudder, 'She SAYS she only said "if" — '

'But she said a great deal more than that!' the White Queen moaned, wringing her hands. 'Oh, ever so much more than that!'

'So you did, you know,' the Red Queen said to Alice. 'Always speak the truth — think before you speak — and write it down afterwards.'

'I'm sure I didn't mean — ' Alice was beginning, but the Red Queen interrupted her impatiently.

'That's just what I complain of! You SHOULD have meant! What do you suppose is the use of a child without any meaning? Even a joke should have some meaning — and a child's more important than a joke, I hope. You couldn't deny that, even if you tried with both hands.'

'I don't deny things with my HANDS,' Alice objected.

'Nobody said you did,' said the Red Queen. 'I said you couldn't if you tried.'

'She's in that state of mind,' said the White Queen, 'that she wants to deny SOMETHING — only she doesn't know what to deny!'

'A nasty, vicious temper,' the Red Queen remarked, and then there was an uncomfortable silence for a minute or two.

The Red Queen broke the silence by saying to the White Queen, 'I invite you to Alice's dinner-party this afternoon.'

The White Queen smiled feebly and said 'And I invite YOU.'

'I didn't know I was to have a party at all,' said Alice, 'but if there is to be one, I think I ought to invite the guests.'

'We gave you the opportunity of doing it,' the Red Queen remarked, 'but I daresay you've not had many lessons in manners yet?'

'Manners are not taught in lessons,' said Alice. 'Lessons teach you to do sums and things of that sort.'

'And you do Addition?' the White Queen asked. 'What's one and one and one and one and one and one and one and one and one and one?'

'I don't know,' said Alice. 'I lost count.'

'She can't do Addition,' the Red Queen interrupted. 'Can you do Subtraction? Take nine from eight.'

'Nine from eight I can't, you know,' Alice replied very readily, 'but — '

'She can't do Subtraction,' said the White Queen. 'Can you do Division? Divide a loaf by a knife — what's the answer to that?'

'I suppose — ' Alice was beginning, but the Red Queen answered for her. 'Bread-and-butter, of course. Try another Subtraction sum. Take a bone from a dog: what remains?'

(illustration by John Tenniel)

Alice considered. 'The bone wouldn't remain, of course, if I took it — and the dog wouldn't remain; it would come to bite me — and I'm sure I shouldn't remain!'

'Then you think nothing would remain?' said the Red Queen.

'I think that's the answer.'

'Wrong, as usual,' said the Red Queen: 'the dog's temper would remain.'

'But I don't see how — '

Next: Queen Alice (cont.)

(800 words)