December's Featured PoetLewis Carroll, pen name for Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832-1898), was born in Daresbury, Cheshire, England. He was a mathematician, a logician, a deacon in the Anglican Church, and a photographer. More important, he penned what has become probably the most famous literary nonsense poem in English, “Jabberwocky.” It was originally part of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and What Alice Found There (1871), which was the sequel to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865). All are among the most well-known and well-loved examples of fantasy literature in English.
Jabberwocky
(Library Staff Note : Read this aloud and with gusto. It'll make perfect sense! )
'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"
He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought—
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.
And as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!
One, two! One, two! and through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker‑snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.
"And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!"
He chortled in his joy.
'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
Further Reading: The Collected Verse of Lewis Carroll
Next Month: Michael Ondaatje
Content developed by local resident and poet Leland Jamieson, author of:
21st Century Bread (2007)
The latter title was recently reviewed by Kirkus Discoveries.
