JABBERWOCKY

Victorian England saw Charles Lutwidge Dodgson as a promising young mathematics lecturer at Oxford with his treatises attracting attention in academic circles. When in an unguarded moment he wrote "Alice in Wonderland," the use of a pseudonym did not serve to veil the identity of the author. He was annoyed at his trivialities attracting public notice--so annoyed that he snubbed the great Victoria when she manifested interest. He did not wish his professional career blighted by a light comedy reputation.

Yesterday the press reported the sale of "Alice in Wonderland" in the original manuscript for more than fifteen thousand pounds. A first edition brought five hundred pounds. Thus does it come about that the fame of whimsical Lewis Carroll dwarfs that of learned Professor Dodgson.

The work was written on a hot summer afternoon in 1862 to amuse a couple of little girls. Today in Harvard it is used, along with "Just So Stories," to illustrate philosophy lectures. Quotations from it head the chapter in a textbook of economic theory. The Mad Hatter and the Cheshire Cat are co-immortal with pious Aeneas and Tom Jones.

Perhaps it is too much to hope that among ten thousand thesis writers at Harvard there may be that Cantabrigian Ed Wynn, that perfect fool who, like another Leacock, will bring nonsense laurels to the American university.