SOURCE: "Satire in the Alice Books," in Criticism, Vol. 12, Winter, 1970, pp. 105-19.

In the essay below, Matthews considers the recurrence of satire and literary parody in the Alice books.

Criticism of Lewis Carroll's works usually runs to extremes. There is a tough-minded school largely made up of psychoanalytical critics who take a no-nonsense attitude toward Carroll's nonsense. Some useful criticism, such as William Empson's characteristically stimulating and unsound essay, has been produced by the tough-minded approach. At the other extreme are tender-minded critics like G. K. Chesterton, who insist that the Alice books were written for children and therefore should not be approached with either reverence or scepticism—in short, that they should not be subjected to literary criticism. Some tender-minded critics seem to try to mask the fact that they are criticising by playing Carroll's own games of fantasy and word-play in their studies. Harry Morgan Ayres...