Through The Looking Glass

The Red Queen is a mentor, inspiration, and foil for Alice. She is wise, witty, proper, caring, powerful, authoritative, and judgmental. These positive and negative qualities are shown in her various interactions with Alice. At first, the queen is a helpful guide, giving Alice advice on how to navigate a strange new world of chess moves. Her mentoring both prepares and assists Alice for the next parts of her adventure. Without the Red Queen’s insight, Alice would have had no idea how to reach her goal of becoming a queen like her. Due to the Red Queen’s kindness, wisdom, and instruction, Alice can traverse the looking-glass world with insight, rather than being lost in an unfamiliar place.

The queen also exerts authority and wields her power over others, exhibiting the qualities of being the ruler in her land. For instance, the Red Queen reproaches Alice, showing her authoritative and judgmental side: “‘A hill ca’n’t be a valley, you know. That would be nonsense—’ The Red Queen shook her head, ‘You may call it “nonsense” if you like,’ she said, ‘but I’ve heard nonsense, compared with which that would be as sensible as a dictionary!’” (109). Though she rules a nonsensical world, the queen does not see her kingdom as anything but perfect, clear, and sensible. Later, she chastises Alice (along with the White Queen) in her final examination: “‘Speak when you’re spoken to!’ The Queen sharply interrupted her. ‘But if everybody obeyed that rule,’ said Alice, [...] ‘and if you only spoke when you were spoken to, and the other person always waited for you to begin, [...] nobody would ever say anything’” (180). The Red Queen means well, wanting to teach Alice how to be a proper queen, but she swings from kindness to harshness. She inspires Alice to gain power and be a queen like her, provokes Alice to improve to fit her standards, and acts as a mentor.

The Tweedles challenge Alice’s assumptions about morality and conflict. They are silly, temperamental, argumentative, funny, and competitive, and their banter with Alice provides some of the novel’s most concentrated Explorations of Language, Wordplay, and Meaning. They often argue with each other, offering contrasting ideas and opinions: “‘I know what you’re thinking about,’ said Tweedledum; ‘but it isn’t so, nohow.’ ‘Contrariwise,’ continued Tweedledee, ‘if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn’t, it ain’t. That’s logic’” (123). The Tweedles speak in logical syllogisms—if this, then that—that ironically make no sense. Repeating of words like “Contrariwise” and “Nohow” show them to be at odds with each other, though there is no meaningful basis for their opposition. Rather, they seem to act as mirror images of one another, befitting their home in the looking-glass land. They are exact replicas of each other, reflections with identical twin bodies, but they contrast to the point of physically fighting.

The twin boys act as comrades to Alice in their square, but they also challenge her logic. They use the poem “The Walrus and the Carpenter” to test Alice’s wit, and when she interprets it differently from them, they debate with her. When she says she likes the Walrus because he was sorry for the oysters, the Tweedles tell her he ate more than the Carpenter. But when she changes her mind, saying she likes the Carpenter better, the other Tweedle tells her that “he ate as many as he could get” (129). The Tweedles use this poem, and wordplay back and forth, to confront Alice’s belief that there is a clear right and wrong in any situation. They teach her to analyze and examine things more deeply, to consider not just one side, but the opposite side as well. Thinking through the poem helps Alice become more mature and thoughtful. The twins’ contrasting natures are symbolic of the mirror setting, and their interactions with Alice advance the theme of Reflections on Imagination, Growth, and Maturity.