Alice's Adventures: Lewis Carroll in Popular Culture - Hardcover

[Brooker] covers a lot of ground here, and all of it is fascinating. And he s attuned to how cultural trends have recast our understanding of Dodgson and his work. The Boston Phoenix, 5/7/04-5/13/04 [Brooker] takes the reader through a fascinating and revealing tour of late 20th century popular culture, following Alice and her creator wherever they go. Brooker reveals the ways in which this iconic character has been used and adapted, taking cartoons, movies, computer games, theme parks, heritage sites, novelisations, illustrations, biographies, theatrical performances, toys and other products, websites, fan clubs and much more. The result is a remarkable analysis of how one original creation has expanded over time to symbolize many different things to many different people. PopThought.com, 5/11/04--Tim O'Shea Will Brooker s Alice s Adventures is an exhaustive yet highly readable examination of the myriad cultural manifestations of not only the Alice books, but the characters of Alice and her creator The Guide, 5/04--Michael Bronski isn t just another coverage of Carroll s life; it s a survey of how the characters he created live on in modern times, adapted since his death in 1898. The analysis juxtaposes perfectly with his life and times and creates for more depth in the analysis of Alice s ongoing effected on modern culture, than the modern biography could achieve. The Midwest Book Review, Feb 2005 Will Brooker combines a fan s devotion with an academic s mercurial and precise gaze to create a detailed and excellent cultural study of a figure that many of us have likely overlooked before now: Lewis Carroll s eternal little girl, Alice in Wonderland. Immaculately researched and expertly articulated The result is a thorough but accessible cultural study that any Carroll scholar will consider an invaluable addition to a research collection and that nay Carroll fan will appreciate as an in-depth look at the author s most famous figure. Alice and her creator have thus found the perfect author to pen a study of their own place in the pantheon of 21st-century popular culture The Bloomsbury Review, Jan/Feb 2005 Brooker s witty book gives hope that Alice will always have a role to play in the culture of any age In showing Alice in current culture, Brooker has written an admiring tribute to Carroll and his creation that will have the laudable effect of getting readers to look again at an inspired original. The Times of Acadiana, 5/04 " [H]e grounds his critical work in shrewd common sense, writes clearly and explores an impressive range of Carroll and Alice-related phenomena-biographies, newspaper articles, novels, films, computer games, new editions of the books, tourist sites and fan groups. All these manifestations of Alice are worthy of study, but my favorite section of Alice's Adventures is that devoted to the Lewis Carroll Society. I think that anyone who belongs to a literary society or fan club-whether one devoted to Buffy or William Faulkner, Jane Austen or the Sandman-will recognize the aptness of Brooker's analysis and the accuracy of his reporting."" -Washington Post Book World" Exhaustively researched and minutely argued, this volume provides a reception history of the cultural meaning of Lewis Carroll and Alice in contemporary Western society. The author really hits his stride when he begins to analyze the textual history of Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass: he looks at the illustrations for various versions of the tales, fictional writings, and appropriations of the Alice figure in other cultural contexts such as films, video games, web sites, and even pornography. Whereas the earlier chapters engage directly with biographical studies, and thus will mainly interest Carroll historians and others invested in the pedophile versus sainted don debate, the latter part of the book will engage the curiosity of any reader interested in pop-culture in a variety of disciples. Highly recommended. Choice, 9/04--D.K. Kreisel "CHOICE " "The book itself will become a classic of its genre"--,

Will Brooker, author of Batman Unmasked and Using the Force, turns his attention to Lewis Carroll and Alice. He takes the reader through a fascinating and revealing tour of late 20th Century popular culture, following Alice and her creator wherever they go. Brooker reveals the ways in which this iconic character has been used and adapted, taking in cartoons, movies, computer games, theme parks, heritage sites, novelisations, illustrations, biographies, theatrical performances, toys and other products, websites, fan clubs and much more. The result is a remarkable analysis of how one original creation has expanded over time to symbolize many different things to many different people.