Through the Looking Glass is a satirical work in which Lewis Carroll strongly criticizes Victorian

society by means of disguised characters and absurd events. Throughout the novel, Carroll
makes fun of authority—especially England’s highest authority figures, including the queen
herself. More generally, he also goes after the hypocrisy that seems an inevitable by-product of
the country’s rigid social hierarchy.

Carroll applies the overall conceit of inversion to call attention to the dangers and absurdities of
Victorian society. Alice finds herself in a backward world. One key element of the symbolic
inversion is Alice’s wisdom and maturity, which offer a stark contrast to the foolish behavior in
which the adults—and the nonhuman characters—consistently indulge.

The character of the Queen of Hearts or Red Queen is generally understood to satirize Queen
Victoria. Carroll’s critique partly addresses the queen herself but more broadly applies to the
concept of monarchy as a system of government. The queen’s distance from her subjects and
the daily workings of the kingdom are apparent through her excessive concern with the missing
dessert. This obsession leads to her putting the knave on trial.

The seriousness of the critique of the government is most evident in the trial scene. The jury
members are both ignorant and uninterested in the proceedings. The queen declares that the
sentence must be pronounced first. When Alice sensibly objects to this travesty, she risks her
own life. The queen declares, as she does on other occasions, “Off with her head!” The
relevance of the royalty is dismissed with Alice’s declaration: “you’re nothing but a pack of
cards.”

23.3 Victorian Age

The influence of the Victorian age is very visible on both the Alice books. The most
remarkable features include the Victorian obsessive class consciousness, the obsession with
food and most of all the logical and scientific temperament of the age. The writer is aware of the
fast changing society and the discrepancies in its structure. He could not have been unaware of
the split of the society into two parts – the haves and the have-nots – and the divide between
the two is increasing. Through The Looking Glass touches upon these ideas time and again. But
the tone and the treatment are lighthearted. The growing spirit of realism and the disillusionment
with the romantic ideals that marked the Victorian literature could be seen reflected the way the
two crusader Knights are portrayed as caricatures of their original selves and constantly roll
down their horses. It could also be seen as a critique of the class consciousness prevailing in
the Victorian society since the symbol of the best of elite is turned over its head and quite
literally so when the White Knight suggests a new way of crossing the gate “first I put my head
on the top of the gate – then I stand on my head – then the feet are high enough, you see –
then I‟m over, you see.”

23.5 Theme of Coming of Age

Alice with her Victorian age grooming wants to be the queen ultimately even if she begins as a
pawn. Time and again throughout the text, Carroll makes a critique of the shallow and stern
values of the age and uses the child protagonist’s coming of age, having theme such as, “an
emanation of the strange Victorian obsession with childhood innocence, that identified
immaturity with inviolability”. The Red queen tells her that a white knight will make her the queen
at the end of the game reinforcing the myth with its crusader-colonial implications. Alice has to
learn to conduct herself in a way she can achieve her goal of becoming the queen.
 23.8 Class Consciousness and Social Etiquettes

Alice is now almost nineteen years and so she has to begin to understand the nuances of the
adult world. The first time she comes across the social stratification in the mirror house is when
she enters the garden and finds the Tiger lily the most exclusive and also the most domineering
of the flowers. It shouts at everybody else and assumes a sense of class based on its
exclusivity. The rose on the other hand is stiff and stern and does not socialize a lot. The
common classes are represented here by the daisies that speak together and create a noise
without making much sense. The Red queen constantly remarks on the manners of Alice and
Alice not yet being the queen, listens with polite attention. Another way in which the privileges of
the powerful are pointed out is when the Kings, the Queens and the Knights are allowed to
return through various episodes while the lesser characters do not reappear. The narrow
Victorian social norms are gently made fun of by Carroll without being satirical or provocative. In
the Wonderland Alice was a small girl so it was easy to let her carry the childlike perception of
social relationships, but in Through The Looking Glass she learns to negotiate herself in the
social milieu. It is remarkable that like a Queen in the making, she is not to be overpowered by
any character except the Red Queen though several do reprimand her especially Humpty
Dumpty.

23.12 Violence – verbal and physical

Through the Looking Glass is a lot more grim with many moments of confrontation and hostility.
The hostile attitude of the flowers towards Alice is also found in the way Humpty Dumpty treats
her. In the very beginning, the White Queen pricks her thumb with a pin and begins to bleed.
Another very popular character, Humpty Dumpty, who is engaged in a brilliantly nonsensical
conversation with Alice, suddenly falls down and could not be saved even by the King‟s army,
while the Lion, a very ferocious animal in a child’s perception, and the Unicorn, another creature
with immense size and strength, are engaged in a ferocious battle. The battle is so fierce that
there is a cloud of dust enveloping the two where one cannot be distinguished from the other.
The combat between the two knights also involves brutal violence. The killing is not watered
down in “Walrus and the Carpenter.” Alice herself feels quite disgusted and starts finding the
two characters very offensive but she has learned the lesson to beware of false sympathy.