Jabberwocky

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File:Jabberwocky.jpg

The Jabberwock, as illustrated by John Tenniel, 1871

"Jabberwocky" is a nonsense poem written by Lewis Carroll about the killing of a creature named "the Jabberwock". It was included in his 1871 novel Through the Looking-Glass, the sequel to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865). The book tells of Alice's adventures within the back-to-front world of the Looking-Glass world.

In an early scene in which she first encounters the chess piece characters White King and White Queen, Alice finds a book written in a seemingly unintelligible language. Realising that she is travelling through an inverted world, she recognises that the verses on the pages are written in mirror writing. She holds a mirror to one of the poems and reads the reflected verse of "Jabberwocky". She finds the nonsense verse as puzzling as the odd land she has passed into, later revealed as a dreamscape.<ref name="AAW64"/>

"Jabberwocky" is considered one of the greatest nonsense poems written in English.<ref name=" Gardner">Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="NCTE">Template:Cite journal</ref> Its playful, whimsical language has given English nonsense words and neologisms such as "galumphing" and "chortle".

Origin and publication

File:Aliceroom2.jpg

Alice entering the Looking-Glass world. Illustration by John Tenniel, 1871

A decade before the publication of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and the sequel Through the Looking-Glass, Carroll wrote the first stanza to what would become "Jabberwocky" while in Croft-on-Tees, where his parents resided. It was printed in 1855 in Mischmasch, a periodical he wrote and illustrated for the amusement of his family. The piece, titled "Stanza of Anglo-Saxon Poetry", reads:

<poem>

Twas bryllyg, and þ^e slythy toves Did gyre and gymble in þ^e wabe: All mimsy were þ^e borogoves; And þ^e mome raths outgrabe. </poem>{{#if:|{{#if:|}}

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The stanza is printed first in faux-mediaeval lettering as a "relic of ancient Poetry" (in which þ^e is a form of the word the) and printed again "in modern characters".<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The rest of the poem was written during Carroll's stay with relatives at Whitburn, near Sunderland. The story may have been partly inspired by the local Sunderland area legend of the Lambton Worm<ref>A Town Like Alice's (1997) Michael Bute Heritage Publications, Sunderland</ref><ref>Alice in Sunderland (2007) Brian Talbot Dark Horse publications.</ref> and the tale of the Sockburn Worm.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

The concept of nonsense verse was not original to Carroll, who would have known of chapbooks such as The World Turned Upside Down<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> and stories such as "The Grand Panjandrum". Nonsense existed in Shakespeare's work and was well-known in the Brothers Grimm's fairytales, some of which are called lying tales or lügenmärchen.<ref>Carpenter (1985), 55–56</ref> Biographer Roger Lancelyn Green suggested that "Jabberwocky" was a parody of the German ballad "The Shepherd of the Giant Mountains",<ref Name="Lucas">"Jabberwocky back to Old English: Nonsense, Anglo-Saxon and Oxford" by Lucas, Peter J. in Language History and Linguistic Modelling (1997) p503-520 Template:ISBN</ref><ref Name="Hudson">Hudson, Derek (1977) Lewis Carroll: an illustrated biography. Crown Publishers, 76</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref> which had been translated into English by Carroll's cousin Menella Bute Smedley in 1846.<ref Name="Hudson"/><ref>Martin Gardner (2000) The Annotated Alice. New York: Norton p 154, n. 42.</ref> Historian Sean B. Palmer suggests that Carroll was inspired by a section from Shakespeare's Hamlet, citing the lines: "The graves stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead / Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets" from Act I, Scene i.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>Carroll makes later reference to the same lines from Hamlet Act I, Scene i in the 1869 poem "Phantasmagoria". He wrote: "Shakspeare Template:Sic I think it is who treats / Of Ghosts, in days of old, / Who 'gibbered in the Roman streets".</ref>

John Tenniel reluctantly agreed to illustrate the book in 1871,<ref Name="Prickett"/> and his illustrations are still the defining images of the poem. The illustration of the Jabberwock may reflect the contemporary Victorian obsession with natural history and the fast-evolving sciences of palaeontology and geology. Stephen Prickett notes that in the context of Darwin and Mantell's publications and vast exhibitions of dinosaurs, such as those at the Crystal Palace from 1854, it is unsurprising that Tenniel gave the Jabberwock "the leathery wings of a pterodactyl and the long scaly neck and tail of a sauropod."<ref Name="Prickett">Prickett, Stephen (2005) Victorian Fantasy Baylor University Press p80 Template:ISBN</ref>

Lexicon

Template:Quote box {{#invoke:Listen|main}} Many of the words in the poem are playful nonce words of Carroll's own invention, without intended explicit meaning. When Alice has finished reading the poem she gives her impressions:

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This may reflect Carroll's intention for his readership; the poem is, after all, part of a dream. In later writings he discussed some of his lexicon, commenting that he did not know the specific meanings or sources of some of the words; the linguistic ambiguity and uncertainty throughout both the book and the poem may largely be the point.<ref name="Parsons"/>

In Through the Looking-Glass, the character of Humpty Dumpty, in response to Alice's request, explains to her the non-sense words from the first stanza of the poem, but Carroll's personal commentary on several of the words differ from Humpty Dumpty's. For example, following the poem, a "rath" is described by Humpty Dumpty as "a sort of green pig".<ref name="AAW96"/> Carroll's notes for the original in Mischmasch suggest a "rath" is "a species of Badger" that "lived chiefly on cheese" and had smooth white hair, long hind legs, and short horns like a stag.<ref name="Penguin"/> The appendices to certain Looking Glass editions state that the creature is "a species of land turtle" that lived on swallows and oysters.<ref name="Penguin"/> Later critics added their own interpretations of the lexicon, often without reference to Carroll's own contextual commentary. An extended analysis of the poem and Carroll's commentary is given in the book The Annotated Alice by Martin Gardner.

In 1868 Carroll asked his publishers, Macmillan, "Have you any means, or can you find any, for printing a page or two in the next volume of Alice in reverse?" It may be that Carroll was wanting to print the whole poem in mirror writing. Macmillan responded that it would cost a great deal more to do, and this may have dissuaded him.<ref name="Penguin"/>

In the author's note to the Christmas 1896 edition of Through the Looking-Glass Carroll writes, "The new words, in the poem Jabberwocky, have given rise to some differences of opinion as to their pronunciation, so it may be well to give instructions on that point also. Pronounce 'slithy' as if it were the two words, 'sly, thee': make the 'g' hard in 'gyre' and 'gimble': and pronounce 'rath' to rhyme with 'bath'."<ref>Carroll, Lewis (2005) Through the Looking Glass. Hayes Barton Press p. 4</ref>

In the Preface to The Hunting of the Snark, Carroll wrote, "[Let] me take this opportunity of answering a question that has often been asked me, how to pronounce 'slithy toves'. The 'i' in 'slithy' is long, as in 'writhe', and 'toves' is pronounced so as to rhyme with 'groves'. Again, the first "o" in "borogoves" is pronounced like the 'o' in 'borrow'. I have heard people try to give it the sound of the 'o' in 'worry'. Such is Human Perversity."<ref name="HoS"/>

Possible interpretations of wordsTemplate:Anchor

• Bandersnatch: A swift moving creature with snapping jaws, capable of extending its neck.<ref name="HoS">Template:Cite book</ref> A "bander" was also an archaic word for a "leader", suggesting that a "bandersnatch" might be an animal that hunts the leader of a group.<ref name="Penguin"/>
• Beamish: Radiantly beaming, happy, cheerful. Although Carroll may have believed he had coined this word, usage in 1530 is cited in the Oxford English Dictionary.<ref name="ExplanatoryN">Template:Cite book References the Oxford English Dictionary (1530).</ref>
• Borogove: Following the poem Humpty Dumpty says: Template:"'borogove' is a thin shabby-looking bird with its feathers sticking out all round, something like a live mop." In Mischmasch borogoves are described differently: "An extinct kind of Parrot. They had no wings, beaks turned up, and made their nests under sun-dials: lived on veal."<ref name="Penguin"/> In Hunting of the Snark, Carroll says that the initial syllable of borogove is pronounced as in borrow rather than as in worry.<ref name="HoS"/>
• Brillig: Following the poem, the character of Humpty Dumpty comments: Template:"'Brillig' means four o'clock in the afternoon, the time when you begin broiling things for dinner."<ref name="AAW96"/> According to Mischmasch, it is derived from the verb to bryl or broil.
• Burbled: In a letter of December 1877, Carroll notes that "burble" could be a mixture of the three verbs 'bleat', 'murmur', and 'warble', although he did not remember creating it.<ref name="ExplanatoryN"/><ref name="ReferenceA">Lewis Carroll, Letter to Maud Standen, December 1877</ref>
• Chortled: "Combination of 'chuckle' and 'snort'." (OED)
• Frabjous: Possibly a blend of "fair", "fabulous", and "joyous". Definition from Oxford English Dictionary, credited to Lewis Carroll.
• Frumious: Combination of "fuming" and "furious". In the Preface to The Hunting of the Snark Carroll comments, "[T]ake the two words 'fuming' and 'furious'. Make up your mind that you will say both words, but leave it unsettled which you will say first. Now open your mouth and speak. If your thoughts incline ever so little towards 'fuming', you will say 'fuming-furious'; if they turn, by even a hair's breadth, towards 'furious', you will say 'furious-fuming'; but if you have the rarest of gifts, a perfectly balanced mind, you will say 'frumious'."<ref name="HoS"/>
• Galumphing: Perhaps used in the poem as a blend of "gallop" and "triumphant".<ref name="ExplanatoryN"/> Used later by Kipling, and cited by Webster as "To move with a clumsy and heavy tread"<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Gimble: Humpty Dumpty comments that it means: "to make holes like a gimlet."<ref name="AAW96">Template:Cite book</ref>
• Gyre: "To 'gyre' is to go round and round like a gyroscope."<ref name="AAW96"/> Gyre is entered in the OED from 1420, meaning a circular or spiral motion or form; especially a giant circular oceanic surface current. Carroll also wrote in Mischmasch that it meant to scratch like a dog.<ref name="Penguin"/> The g is pronounced like the /g/ in gold, not like gem (since this was how "gyroscope" was pronounced in Carroll's day).<ref name="tlgp">From the preface to Through the Looking-Glass.</ref>
• Jabberwock: When a class in the Girls' Latin School in Boston asked Carroll's permission to name their school magazine The Jabberwock, he replied: "The Anglo-Saxon word 'wocer' or 'wocor' signifies 'offspring' or 'fruit'. Taking 'jabber' in its ordinary acceptation of 'excited and voluble discussion', this would give the meaning of 'the result of much excited and voluble discussion'..."<ref name="Penguin">Carroll, Lewis (Author), Tenniel, John (2003). Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, pp. 328–331. Penguin Classics. Template:ISBN</ref> It is often depicted as a monster similar to a dragon. John Tenniel's illustration depicts it with a long serpentine neck, rabbit-like teeth, spidery talons, bat-like wings and, as a humorous touch, a waistcoat. In the 2010 film version of Alice in Wonderland it is shown with large back legs, small dinosaur-like front legs, and on the ground it uses its wings as front legs like a pterosaur, and it breathes out lightning flashes rather than flame.
• Jubjub bird: "A desperate bird that lives in perpetual passion", according to the Butcher in Carroll's later poem The Hunting of the Snark.<ref name="HoS"/> 'Jub' is an ancient word for a jerkin or a dialect word for the trot of a horse (OED). It might make reference to the call of the bird resembling the sound "jub, jub".<ref name="Penguin"/>
• Manxome: Possibly 'fearsome'; Possibly a portmanteau of "manly" and "buxom", the latter relating to men for most of its history; or "three-legged" after the triskelion emblem of the Manx people from the Isle of Man.
• Mimsy: Humpty Dumpty comments that Template:"'Mimsy' is 'flimsy and miserableTemplate:'".<ref name="AAW96"/>
• Mome: Humpty Dumpty is uncertain about this one: "I think it's short for 'from home', meaning that they'd lost their way, you know". The notes in Mischmasch give a different definition of 'grave' (via 'solemome', 'solemone' and 'solemn').
• Outgrabe: Humpty Dumpty says Template:"'outgribing' is something between bellowing and whistling, with a kind of sneeze in the middle".<ref name="AAW96"/> Carroll's book appendices suggest it is the past tense of the verb to 'outgribe', connected with the old verb to 'grike' or 'shrike', which derived 'shriek' and 'creak' and hence 'squeak'.<ref name="Penguin"/>
• Rath: Humpty Dumpty says following the poem: "A 'rath' is a sort of green pig". Carroll's notes for the original in Mischmasch state that a 'Rath' is "a species of land turtle. Head erect, mouth like a shark, the front forelegs curved out so that the animal walked on its knees, smooth green body, lived on swallows and oysters."<ref name="Penguin"/> In the 1951 animated film adaptation of the previous book, the raths are depicted as small, multi-coloured creatures with tufty hair, round eyes, and long legs resembling pipe stems.
• Slithy: Humpty Dumpty says: Template:"'Slithy' means 'lithe and slimy'. 'Lithe' is the same as 'active'. You see it's like a portmanteau, there are two meanings packed up into one word."<ref name="AAW96"/> The original in Mischmasch notes that 'slithy' means "smooth and active".<ref name="Penguin"/> The i is long, as in writhe.
• Snicker-snack: possibly related to the large knife, the snickersnee.<ref name="ExplanatoryN"/>
• Tove: Humpty Dumpty says Template:"'Toves' are something like badgers, they're something like lizards, and they're something like corkscrews. ... Also they make their nests under sun-dials, also they live on cheese."<ref name="AAW96"/> Pronounced so as to rhyme with groves.<ref name="HoS"/> They "gyre and gimble", i.e., rotate and bore. Toves are described slightly differently in Mischmasch: "a species of Badger [which] had smooth white hair, long hind legs, and short horns like a stag [and] lived chiefly on cheese".<ref name="Penguin"/>
• Tulgey: Carroll himself said he could give no source for this word. It could be taken to mean thick, dense, dark. It has been suggested that it comes from the Anglo-Cornish word tulgu, 'darkness', which in turn comes from Cornish tewolgow 'darkness, gloominess'.<ref>George, Ken. An Gerlyver Meur, Cornish-English, English-Cornish Dictionary. Cornish Language Board, 2009. Part One, Cornish-English, p. 624.</ref>
• Uffish: Carroll noted, "It seemed to suggest a state of mind when the voice is gruffish, the manner roughish, and the temper huffish".<ref name="ExplanatoryN"/><ref name="ReferenceA"/>
• Vorpal: Carroll said he could not explain this word, though it has been noted that it can be formed by taking letters alternately from "verbal" and "gospel".<ref name=AnnotatedAlice>Template:Cite book</ref> It has appeared in dictionaries as meaning both 'deadly' and 'extremely sharp'.<ref>Collins definition</ref>
• Wabe: The characters in the poem suggest it means "The grass plot around a sundial", called a 'wa-be' because it "goes a long way before it, and a long way behind it".<ref name="AAW96"/> In the original Mischmasch text, Carroll states a 'wabe' is "the side of a hill (from its being soaked by rain)".<ref name="Penguin"/>

Linguistics and poetics

File:Humpty Dumpty Tenniel.jpg

Humpty Dumpty who explains to Alice the definitions of some of the words in "Jabberwocky". Illustration by John Tenniel, 1871

Though the poem contains many nonsensical words, English syntax and poetic forms are observed, such as the quatrain verses, the general ABAB rhyme scheme and the iambic meter.<ref>Gross and McDowell (1996). Sound and form in modern poetry, p. 15. The University of Michigan Press. Template:ISBN</ref> Linguist Peter Lucas believes the "nonsense" term is inaccurate. The poem relies on a distortion of sense rather than "non-sense", allowing the reader to infer meaning and therefore engage with narrative while lexical allusions swim under the surface of the poem.<ref Name="Lucas"/><ref>For a full linguistic and phonetic analysis of the poem see the article "Jabberwocky back to Old English: Nonsense, Anglo-Saxon and Oxford" by Lucas, Peter J. in Language History and Linguistic Modelling, pp. 503–520. 1997. Template:ISBN</ref>

Marnie Parsons describes the work as a "semiotic catastrophe", arguing that the words create a discernible narrative within the structure of the poem, though the reader cannot know what they symbolise. She argues that Humpty Dumpty tries, after the recitation, to "ground" the unruly multiplicities of meaning with definitions, but cannot succeed as both the book and the poem are playgrounds for the "carnivalised aspect of language". Parsons suggests that this is mirrored in the prosody of the poem: in the tussle between the tetrameter in the first three lines of each stanza and trimeter in the last lines, such that one undercuts the other and we are left off balance, like the poem's hero.<ref name="Parsons"/>

Carroll wrote many poem parodies such as "Twinkle, twinkle little bat", "You Are Old, Father William" and "How Doth the Little Crocodile?" Some have become generally better known than the originals on which they are based, and this is certainly the case with "Jabberwocky".<ref Name="Lucas"/> The poems' successes do not rely on any recognition of or association with the poems that they parody. Lucas suggests that the original poems provide a strong container but Carroll's works are famous precisely because of their random, surreal quality.<ref Name="Lucas"/> Carroll's grave playfulness has been compared with that of the poet Edward Lear; there are also parallels with the work of Gerard Manley Hopkins in the frequent use of soundplay, alliteration, created-language and portmanteau. Both writers were Carroll's contemporaries.<ref name="Parsons">Parsons, Marnie (1994) Touch monkeys: nonsense strategies for reading twentieth-century poetry, pp. 67–73. University of Toronto Press. Template:ISBN</ref>

Translations

File:Jabberwocky creatures.jpg

John Tenniel's illustration for the poem.

History

"Jabberwocky" has been translated into 65 languages.<ref>Lindseth, Jon A. – Tannenbaum, Alan (eds.): Alice in a World of Wonderlands: The Translations of Lewis Carroll's Masterpiece, vol. I, p. 747. New Castle: Oak Knoll Press, 2015. Template:ISBN.</ref> The translation might be difficult because the poem holds to English syntax and many of the principal words of the poem are invented. Translators have generally dealt with them by creating equivalent words of their own. Often these are similar in spelling or sound to Carroll's while respecting the morphology of the language they are being translated into. In Frank L. Warrin's French translation, "'Twas brillig" becomes "Il brilgue". In instances like this, both the original and the invented words echo actual words of Carroll's lexicon, but not necessarily ones with similar meanings. Translators have invented words which draw on root words with meanings similar to the English roots used by Carroll. Douglas Hofstadter noted in his essay "Translations of Jabberwocky", the word 'slithy', for example, echoes the English 'slimy', 'slither', 'slippery', 'lithe' and 'sly'. A French translation that uses 'lubricilleux' for 'slithy', evokes French words like 'lubrifier' (to lubricate) to give an impression of a meaning similar to that of Carroll's word. In his exploration of the translation challenge, Hofstadter asks "what if a word does exist, but it is very intellectual-sounding and Latinate ('lubricilleux'), rather than earthy and Anglo-Saxon ('slithy')? Perhaps 'huilasse' would be better than 'lubricilleux'? Or does the Latin origin of the word 'lubricilleux' not make itself felt to a speaker of French in the way that it would if it were an English word ('lubricilious', perhaps)? ".<ref name="Hofstadter"/>

Hofstadter also notes that it makes a great difference whether the poem is translated in isolation or as part of a translation of the novel. In the latter case the translator must, through Humpty Dumpty, supply explanations of the invented words. But, he suggests, "even in this pathologically difficult case of translation, there seems to be some rough equivalence obtainable, a kind of rough isomorphism, partly global, partly local, between the brains of all the readers".<ref name="Hofstadter">Template:Cite book</ref>

In 1967, D.G. Orlovskaya wrote a popular Russian translation of "Jabberwocky" entitled "Barmaglot" ("Бармаглот"). She translated "Barmaglot" for "Jabberwock", "Brandashmyg" for "Bandersnatch" while "myumsiki" ("мюмзики") echoes "mimsy". Full translations of "Jabberwocky" into French and German can be found in The Annotated Alice along with a discussion of why some translation decisions were made.<ref>M. Gardner, ed., The Annotated Alice, 1960; London: Penguin 1970, p. 193f.</ref> Chao Yuen Ren, a Chinese linguist, translated the poem into Chinese<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> by inventing characters to imitate what Rob Gifford of National Public Radio refers to as the "slithy toves that gyred and gimbled in the wabe of Carroll's original".<ref>Gifford, Rob. "The Great Wall of the Mind." China Road. Random House. 2008. 237.</ref> Satyajit Ray, a film-maker, translated the work into Bengali<ref>Robinson, Andrew (2004) Satyajit Ray. I.B. Tauris p29</ref> and concrete poet Augusto de Campos created a Brazilian Portuguese version. There is also an Arabic translation<ref>Wael Al-Mahdi (2010) Jabberwocky in Arabic</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> by Wael Al-Mahdi, and at least two into Croatian.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Multiple translations into Latin were made within the first weeks of Carroll's original publication.<ref name="RAZ">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> In a 1964 article, M. L. West published two versions of the poem in Ancient Greek that exemplify the respective styles of the epic poets Homer and Nonnus.<ref>M. L. West, "Two Versions of Jabberwocky", Greece & Rome Vol. 11 No. 2, October 1964, pp. 185–187.</ref>

Sample translations

Sources:<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Bulgarian (Lazar Goldman & Stefan Gechev)	Danish 1 (Mogens Jermiin Nissen) Jabberwocky	Danish 2 (Arne Herløv Petersen) Kloppervok
{{#invoke:Lang|lang}} {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} {{#invoke:Lang|lang}}.	Et slidigt gravben vridrede i brumringen på tidvis plent, og lappingen var vaklig, og det borte grøfgrin grent.	I glummert lys den slyge spæg stod gomrende og glim. I børkens dyb stod mamren fjæg og bungrede i skim.
Esperanto (Marjorie Boulton) La Ĵargonbesto	Turkish (Nihal Yeğinobalı) Ejdercenkname	Finnish 1 (Kirsi Kunnas & Eeva-Liisa Manner, 1974) Pekoraali
Brilumis, kaj la ŝlirtaj melfoj en la iejo ĝiris, ŝraŭis; mizaris la maldikdudelfoj, forfuraj ratjoj vaŭis.	akşamözdü, yavışkan burguleler döndeleyip cermelerken günsatba uyudüşmüş kalmışlardı karpüsler yemizler derseniz ak-ök begirba	On illanpaisto, ja silkavat saijat luopoissa pirkeinä myörien ponkii: surheisna kaikk' kirjuvat lorokaijat ja vossut lonkaloisistansa ulos vonkii.
Finnish 2 (Matti Rosvall, 1999) Jabberwocky<ref>This rendering comes from Rosvall's Finnish translation of Fredric Brown's novel Night of the Jabberwock (Syntipukin yö).</ref>	Finnish 3 (Alice Martin, 2010) Monkerias	French (Frank L. Warrin)
Kyryissä mäiden myryt parvat ripoen kormivat pällyissään. Vilhujen borogrovien karvat talsoivat – ne niin sällyissään.	Jo koitti kuumon aika, ja viukkaat puhvenet päinillä harpitellen kieruloivat, haipeloina seisoksivat varakuhvenet, ja öksyt muvut kaikki hinkuroivat.	Il brilgue: les tôves lubricilleux Se gyrent en vrillant dans le guave. Enmîmés sont les gougebosqueux Et le mômerade horsgrave.
lang}}	German (Robert Scott)	Hebrew 1 (Aharon Amir) Template:Script/Hebrew
{{#invoke:Lang|lang}} {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} {{#invoke:Lang|lang}}	Es brillig war. Die schlichten Toven Wirrten und wimmelten in Waben; Und aller-mümsige Burggoven Die mohmen Räth' ausgraben.	Template:Script/Hebrew, Template:Script/Hebrew, Template:Script/Hebrew, Template:Script/Hebrew.
Hebrew 2 (Rina Litvin) Template:Script/Hebrew	Icelandic (Valdimar Briem) Rausuvokkskviða	Irish (Nicholas Williams) An Gheabairleog
Template:Script/Hebrew Template:Script/Hebrew Template:Script/Hebrew Template:Script/Hebrew	Það leið að stekju, og slýgir greðlar sig snældu og böluðu um slöffruna, og angurvært sungu sópfiðrungar við sífgelt týðmana svíræna.	Briollaic a bhí ann; bhí na tóibhí sleo ag gírleáil 's ag gimleáil ar an taof. B’an-chuama go deo na borragóibh is bhí na rádaí miseacha ag braíomh.
Italian (Adriana Crespi) Il ciarlestrone	Latin (Hassard H. Dodgson) Gaberbocchus	Polish (Janusz Korwin-Mikke) Żabrołak
Era brillosto, e gli alacridi tossi succhiellavano scabbi nel pantúle: Méstili eran tutti i paparossi, e strombavan musando i tartarocchi.	Hora aderat briligi. Nunc et Slythia Tova Plurima gyrabant gymbolitare vabo; Et Borogovorum mimzebant undique formae, Momiferique omnes exgrabuere Rathi.	Błyszniało – szlisgich hopuch świr Tęczując w kałdach świtrzem wre, Mizgłupny był borolągw hyr, Chrząszczury wlizły młe.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>
Portuguese 1 (Augusto de Campos, 1980) Jaguadarte<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>	citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	Portuguese 3 (Ricardo Gouveia) Blablassauro<ref name="algaravia" />
Era briluz. As lesmolisas touvas Roldavam e reviam nos gramilvos. Estavam mimsicais as pintalouvas, E os momirratos davam grilvos.	Era o auge e as rolas brilhantes Pelo ar giravam, giravam. Palhaços davam pinotes, Os montes se amontoava.	Brilumia e colescosos touvos No capimtanal se giroscavam; Miquíticos eram os burrogouvos, E os mamirathos extrapitavam.
Russian (Dina Orlovskaya)	Spanish 1 (Ulalume González de León) El Jabberwocky	Spanish 2 (Adolfo de Alba) El Jabberwocky
Варкалось. Хливкие шорьки Пырялись по наве, И хрюкотали зелюки, Как мюмзики в мове.	Era la parrillhora y los flexiosos tovos en el cesplejos giroscopiaban, vibrhoradaban. Frivoserables estaban los borogovos y los verchinos telehogariados relinchiflaban.	Era la asarvesperia y los flexilimosos toves giroscopiaban taledrando en el vade; debilmiseros estaban los borogoves; bramatchisilban los verdilechos parde.
Spanish 3 (Ramón Buckley, 1984) El Fablistanón	Welsh (Selyf Roberts) Siaberwoci	American Sign Language (ASL) (Eric Malzkuhn, 1939)
Borgotaba. Los viscoleantes toves rijando en la solea, tadralaban... Misébiles estaban los borgoves y algo momios los verdos bratchilbaban	Mae'n brydgell ac mae'r brochgim stwd Yn gimblo a gyrian yn y mhello: Pob cólomrws yn féddabwd, A'r hoch oma'n chwibruo.	Due to no written language in ASL, view video to see translation of Jabberwocky. (Performed in 1994) See this link for explanation of techniques used by Eric Malzkuhn

Reception

According to Chesterton and Green and others, the original purpose of "Jabberwocky" was to satirise both pretentious verse and ignorant literary critics. It was designed as verse showing how not to write verse, but eventually became the subject of pedestrian translation or explanation and incorporated into classroom learning.<ref>Green, Roger Lancelyn (1970) The Lewis Carroll Handbook, "Jabberwocky, and other parodies" : Dawson of Pall Mall, London</ref> It has also been interpreted as a parody of contemporary Oxford scholarship and specifically the story of how Benjamin Jowett, the notoriously agnostic Professor of Greek at Oxford, and Master of Balliol, came to sign the Thirty-Nine Articles, as an Anglican statement of faith, to save his job.<ref>Prickett, Stephen (2005) Victorian Fantasy Baylor University Press p113 Template:ISBN</ref> The transformation of audience perception from satire to seriousness was in a large part predicted by G. K. Chesterton, who wrote in 1932, "Poor, poor, little Alice! She has not only been caught and made to do lessons; she has been forced to inflict lessons on others."<ref>Chesterton, G. K (1953) "Lewis Carroll" in A Handful of Authors, ed. Dorothy Collins, Sheed and Ward, London</ref>

It is often now cited as one of the greatest nonsense poems written in English,<ref name="NCTE" /><ref name="Gardner" /> the source for countless parodies and tributes. In most cases the writers have changed the nonsense words into words relating to the parodied subject, as in Frank Jacobs's "If Lewis Carroll Were a Hollywood Press Agent in the Thirties" in Mad for Better or Verse.<ref>Jacobs, Frank (1968) Mad, for better or verse N.A.L</ref> Other writers use the poem as a form, much like a sonnet, and create their own words for it as in "Strunklemiss" by Shay K. Azoulay<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> or the poem "Oh Freddled Gruntbuggly" recited by Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz in Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a 1979 book which contains numerous other references and homages to Carroll's work.<ref name="Cyberspace">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

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Some of the words that Carroll created, such as "chortled" and "galumphing", have entered the English language and are listed in the Oxford English Dictionary. The word "jabberwocky" itself has come to refer to nonsense language.

In American Sign Language, Eric Malzkuhn invented the sign for "chortled". It unintentionally caught on and became a part of American Sign Language's lexicon as well.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Media

A song called "Beware the Jabberwock" was written for Disney's 1951 animated film Alice in Wonderland sung by Stan Freberg, but it was discarded, replaced with "'Twas Brillig", sung by the Cheshire Cat, that includes the first stanza of "Jabberwocky".

The Alice in Wonderland sculpture in Central Park in Manhattan, New York City, has at its base, among other inscriptions, a line from "Jabberwocky".<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

The British group Boeing Duveen and The Beautiful Soup released a single (1968) called "Jabberwock" based on the poem.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Singer and songwriter Donovan put the poem to music on his album HMS Donovan (1971).

The poem was a source of inspiration for Jan Švankmajer's 1971 short film Žvahlav aneb šatičky slaměného Huberta (released as Jabberwocky in English) and Terry Gilliam's 1977 feature film Jabberwocky.

In 1972, the American composer Sam Pottle put the poem to music.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The stage musical Jabberwocky (1973) by Andrew Kay, Malcolm Middleton and Peter Phillips, follows the basic plot of the poem.<ref name="nla">Template:Cite book</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Keyboardists Clive Nolan and Oliver Wakeman released a musical version Jabberwocky (1999) with the poem read in segments by Rick Wakeman.<ref>Template:Cite thesis</ref> British contemporary lieder group Fall in Green set the poem to music for a single release (2021) on Cornutopia Music.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}Template:Cbignore</ref>

In 1978, the musical group Ambrosia included the text of Jabberwocky in the lyrics of "Moma Frog" (credited to musicians Puerta, North, Drummond, and Pack) on their debut album Ambrosia.<ref>Ambrosia album released by Warner Brothers Records, Inc. "Moma Frog" copyrighted 1974 by Rubicon Music (BMI).</ref>

In 1980 The Muppet Show staged a full version of "Jabberwocky" for TV viewing, with the Jabberwock and other creatures played by Muppets closely based on Tenniel's original illustrations. According to Jaques and Giddens, it distinguished itself by stressing the humor and nonsense of the poem.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

The Jabberwock appears in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland (2010), voiced by Christopher Lee, and is referred to as "The Jabberwocky". An abridged version of the poem is spoken by the Mad Hatter (played by Johnny Depp).<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>Alice In Wonderland Template:Webarchive, profile, Sainsbury's entertainment</ref>

In 2016, the musical group Weezer included the text of "Jabberwocky" in the lyrics of "L.A. Girlz"<ref>Template:Cite AV media</ref> which was included on their tenth studio album Weezer (The White Album).

See also

• Works based on Alice in Wonderland
• Translations of Through the Looking-Glass

References

Sources

• Carpenter, Humphrey (1985). Secret Gardens: The Golden Age of Children's Literature. Houghton Mifflin. Template:ISBN Medievil 1998 sony playstation 1

Further reading

• Alakay-Gut, Karen. "Carroll's Jabberwocky". Explicator, Fall 1987. Volume 46, issue 1.
• Borchers, Melanie. "A Linguistic Analysis of Lewis Carroll's Poem 'Jabberwocky'". The Carrollian: The Lewis Carroll Journal. Autumn 2009, No. 24, pp. 3–46. {{#if:1462-6519|Template:Catalog lookup link{{#if:Template:Trim|{{#ifeq:Template:Yesno-no|yes|Template:Main other|{{#invoke:check isxn|check_issn|Template:Trim|error=Template:Error-smallTemplate:Main other}}}}{{#if:Template:Trim|{{#ifeq:Template:Yesno-no|yes|Template:Main other|{{#invoke:check isxn|check_issn|Template:Trim|error=Template:Error-smallTemplate:Main other}}}}{{#if:Template:Trim|{{#ifeq:Template:Yesno-no|yes|Template:Main other|{{#invoke:check isxn|check_issn|Template:Trim|error=Template:Error-smallTemplate:Main other}}}}{{#if:Template:Trim|{{#ifeq:Template:Yesno-no|yes|Template:Main other|{{#invoke:check isxn|check_issn|Template:Trim|error=Template:Error-smallTemplate:Main other}}}}{{#if:Template:Trim|{{#ifeq:Template:Yesno-no|yes|Template:Main other|{{#invoke:check isxn|check_issn|Template:Trim|error=Template:Error-smallTemplate:Main other}}}}{{#if:Template:Trim|{{#ifeq:Template:Yesno-no|yes|Template:Main other|{{#invoke:check isxn|check_issn|Template:Trim|error=Template:Error-smallTemplate:Main other}}}}{{#if:Template:Trim|{{#ifeq:Template:Yesno-no|yes|Template:Main other|{{#invoke:check isxn|check_issn|Template:Trim|error=Template:Error-smallTemplate:Main other}}}}{{#if:Template:Trim|{{#ifeq:Template:Yesno-no|yes|Template:Main other|{{#invoke:check isxn|check_issn|Template:Trim|error=Template:Error-smallTemplate:Main other}}}}{{#if:Template:Trim|{{#ifeq:Template:Yesno-no|yes|Template:Main other|{{#invoke:check isxn|check_issn|Template:Trim|error=Template:Error-smallTemplate:Main other}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}|Template:Error-small}}.
• Dolitsky, Marlene (1984). Under the tumtum tree: from nonsense to sense, a study in nonautomatic comprehension. J. Benjamins Pub. Co. Amsterdam, Philadelphia
• Gardner, Martin (1999). The Annotated Alice: The Definitive Edition. New York: W .W. Norton and Company.
• Green, Roger Lancelyn (1970). The Lewis Carroll Handbook, "Jabberwocky, and other parodies" : Dawson of Pall Mall, London
• Template:Cite book
• Lucas, Peter J. (1997). "Jabberwocky back to Old English: Nonsense, Anglo-Saxon and Oxford" in Language History and Linguistic Modelling. Template:ISBN.
• Richards, Fran. "The Poetic Structure of Jabberwocky". Jabberwocky: The Journal of the Lewis Carroll Society. 8:1 (1978/79):16–19.

External links

• Template:Librivox book
• Essay: "Translations of Jabberwocky". Douglas R. Hofstadter, 1980 from Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid Template:ISBN, Vintage Books, New York
• BBC Video (2 mins), "Jabberwocky" read by English actor Brian Blessed
• Template:YouTube read by English author Neil Gaiman
• Poetry Foundation Biography of Lewis Carroll
• The Lewis Carroll Journal published by The Lewis Carroll Society.
• Template:YouTube Sam Pottle