The Adventures of Alice in Wonderland

Sepia Saturday provided us with a most unusual image this week.  I definitely needed those few words at the bottom,  those words/themes/suggestions to help us feel some empathy for the image and to help us connect to an image or an experience of our own.

It was the word cut-outs which resonated with me. But it took several searches, high and low,  before I found something which I had last sighted more than twenty years ago.  Fortunately I did find it as often I don’t find things until it is  too late for them to be of use for a post.

But find this one I did.  And this one is a book which is full of images which also happen to be cut-outs which can be stood up in place on the page to illustrate part of a story.  This book which very briefly tells the story of Alice in Wonderland  was given to me as a prize for attending Castlemaine’s Christ Cburch Sunday School on 30 Sundays in one year. I don’t know what happened on the other twenty-two Sundays.  I think Canon Vanston may have been Vicar at the time.

 

Down the Rabbit Hole

This book of stand-ups was published in 1934 by the Saalfield Publishing Company of Akron, Ohio with the design by Sidney Sage, who did many books in this style.   My copy has been well used and is in poor condition. Each cut-out is still connected to the book by its base and has a small wing at each side to fold back and hold up the character.  But may of these wings are now missing and  I had to prop up some of the cut-outs with other objects to be able to photograph them. The tale for each tableau is told inside the back and front covers.

In the Duchess’ Kitchen

The King and Queen of Hearts

The Lobster Quadrille

The is the original illustration by John Tenniel in the 1865 edition

Though out of Copyright I can find no courtesy reference to the author Lewis Carroll or the illustrator John Tenniel in this 1934 Stand-Up version of the  book though Saalfield claim to have copyright of this version.

All Saalfield’s tableaux are copies of the original illustrations then coloured.

Who Stole the Tarts

I think my favorite is the Lobster Quadrille.

” The Mock Turtle sighed deeply, and drew the back of one flapper across his eyes. He looked at Alice and tried to speak, but, for a minute or two, sobs choked his voice. “Same as if he had a bone in his throat,” said the Gryphon; and it set to work shaking him and punching him in the back. At last the Mock Turtle recovered his voice, and, with tears running down his cheeks, he went on again:

“You may not have lived much under the sea—” (“I haven’t,” said Alice)—”and perhaps you were never even introduced to a lobster—” (Alice began to say, “I once tasted—” but checked herself hastily, and said, “No, never”) “—so you can have no idea what a delightful thing a Lobster-Quadrille is!”

“No, indeed,” said Alice. “What sort of a dance is it?”

“Why,” said the Gryphon, “you first form into a line along the sea-shore—……………………………..”

You can re-read this story of the Lobster Quadrille at http://www.authorama.com/alice-in-wonderland-10.html

Or you can see how other members have responded to this week’s Sepia Saturday image.