Chapter One – Looking-Glass House: Alice is playing with a white kitten (whom she calls
"Snowdrop") and a black kitten (whom she calls "Kitty") when she ponders what the world is like on
the other side of a mirror's reflection. Climbing up onto the fireplace mantel, she pokes at the wall-
hung mirror behind the fireplace and discovers, to her surprise, that she is able to step through it to
an alternative world. In this reflected version of her own house, she finds a book with looking-glass
poetry, "Jabberwocky", whose reversed printing she can read only by holding it up to the mirror. She
also observes that the chess pieces have come to life, though they remain small enough for her to
pick up.
Alice entering the looking-glass.
Chapter Two – The Garden of Live Flowers: Upon leaving the house (where it had been a cold,
snowy night), she enters a sunny spring garden where the flowers can speak; they perceive Alice as
being a "flower that can move about". Elsewhere in the garden, Alice meets the Red Queen, who is
now human-sized, and who impresses Alice with her ability to run at breathtaking speeds.
Chapter Three – Looking-Glass Insects: The Red Queen reveals to Alice that the entire
countryside is laid out in squares, like a gigantic chessboard, and offers to make Alice a queen if she
can move all the way to the eighth rank/row in a chess match. Alice is placed in the second rank as
one of the White Queen's pawns, and begins her journey across the chessboard by boarding a train
that jumps over the third row and directly into the fourth rank, thus acting on the rule that pawns can
advance two spaces on their first move. She arrives in a forest where a depressed gnat teaches her
about the looking glass insects, strange creatures part bug part object (e.g., bread and butterfly,
rocking horse fly), before flying away sadly. Alice continues her journey and along the way, crosses
the "wood where things have no names". There she forgets all nouns, including her own name. With
the help of a fawn who has also forgotten his identity, she makes it to the other side, where they both
remember everything. Realizing that he is a fawn, she is a human, and that fawns are afraid of
humans, it runs off (to Alice's frustration).
Alice meeting Tweedledum (centre) and Tweedledee (right)
Chapter Four – Tweedledum and Tweedledee: She then meets the fat twin brothers Tweedledum
and Tweedledee, whom she knows from the nursery rhyme. After reciting the long poem "The
Walrus and the Carpenter", they draw Alice's attention to the Red King—loudly snoring away under a
nearby tree—and maliciously provoke her with idle philosophical banter that she exists only as an
imaginary figure in the Red King's dreams. Finally, the brothers begin suiting up for battle, only to be
frightened away by an enormous crow, as the nursery rhyme about them predicts.
The Red King dreaming
Chapter Five – Wool and Water: Alice next meets the White Queen, who is very absent-minded but
boasts of (and demonstrates) her ability to remember future events before they have happened.
Alice and the White Queen advance into the chessboard's fifth rank by crossing over a brook
together, but at the very moment of the crossing, the Queen transforms into a talking Sheep in
a small shop. Alice soon finds herself struggling to handle the oars of a small rowboat, where the
Sheep annoys her with (seemingly) nonsensical shouting about "crabs" and "feathers".
Chapter Six – Humpty Dumpty: After crossing yet another brook into the sixth rank, Alice
immediately encounters Humpty Dumpty, who, besides celebrating his unbirthday, provides his own
translation of the strange terms in "Jabberwocky". In the process, he introduces Alice to the concept
of portmanteau words, before his inevitable fall.
The White Knight
Chapter Seven – The Lion and the Unicorn: "All the king's horses and all the king's men" come to
Humpty Dumpty's assistance, and are accompanied by the White King, along with the Lion and the
Unicorn, who again proceed to act out a nursery rhyme by fighting with each other. In this chapter,
the March Hare and Hatter of the first book make a brief re-appearance in the guise of "Anglo-
Saxon messengers" called "Haigha" and "Hatta".
Chapter Eight – "It's my own Invention": Upon leaving the Lion and Unicorn to their fight, Alice
reaches the seventh rank by crossing another brook into the forested territory of the Red Knight, who
is intent on capturing the "white pawn"—Alice—until the White Knight comes to her rescue. Escorting
her through the forest towards the final brook-crossing, the Knight recites a long poem of his own
composition called Haddocks' Eyes, and repeatedly falls off his horse.
Chapter Nine – Queen Alice: Bidding farewell to the White Knight, Alice steps across the last
brook, and is automatically crowned a queen, with the crown materialising abruptly on her head (a
reference to pawn promotion). She soon finds herself in the company of both the White and Red
Queens, who relentlessly confound Alice by using word play to thwart her attempts at logical
discussion. They then invite one another to a party that will be hosted by the newly crowned Alice—
of which Alice herself had no prior knowledge.
Chapter Ten – Shaking: Alice arrives and seats herself at her own party, which quickly turns into
chaos. Alice finally grabs the Red Queen, believing her to be responsible for all the day's nonsense,
and begins shaking her.
Chapter Eleven – Waking: Alice awakes in her armchair to find herself holding the black kitten, who
she deduces to have been the Red Queen all along, with the white kitten having been the White
Queen.
Chapter Twelve – Which dreamed it?: The story ends with Alice recalling the speculation of the
Tweedle brothers, that everything may have been a dream of the Red King, and that Alice might
herself be no more than a figment of his imagination. The book ends with the line "Life, what is it but
a dream?"
