Defamiliarization In Lewis Carroll’s “Jabberwocky”
Jabberwocky (or The Jabberwocky) is a nonsense poem by Lewis Carroll that appears in the novel Through the Looking Glass (And What Alice Found There) which he published in 1871 (Niki Pollock, 2000). It is a prime example of how language can be used as tool for defamiliarization as he does with his use of nonsense words and imagery.
Jabberwocky is a nonsense poem. That is no accident. It did not get mangled in the printer, it was not jumbled up in editing, and it was certainly not the work of an individual who did not know how to spell. It was purposefully written to not make sense, and yet at the same time make perfect sense. It takes the familiar and turns it on its head, emptying out the …show more content…
In fact, in an argument over which view is right, we may miss a vital detail; that none of them are. And that is once again the point; the poem is not a riddle to be figured out, nor is it another language that needs translating. It is nonsense, plain and simple, and was written with ambiguity as the intention. And so while Humpty Dumpty is right in saying that “slithy toves” are fantastical creatures moving in a lithe and slimy manner (Carroll, 2014), I am equally correct in my interpretation that “slithy toves” are some sort of swampy forest, complete with fog and drooping trees reminiscent of weeping willows. The important thing is that we don’t really know what “slithy toves” are.
And this lack of knowledge forces us to supply our own. It forces us to use our imagination, a thing that even the most resplendent piece of prose cannot make us do. A multitude of adjectives would prove less effective in this regard than a single nonsense word, for even if we know what all those descriptive words should describe, we are, as humans, lazy and therefore simply gloss over them most of the time, choosing to instead substitute a generic image or idea in the place of the highly detailed description the writer has …show more content…
Both the hero and the villain of the poem are not quite what we expect. We know that the Jabberwock is a fearsome creature, for the father warns his son to beware, and the poem states that it has “eyes of flame”, “jaws that bite” and “claws that catch” (Carroll, 2014) and yet it “whiffles” rather than storming, or charging, and it burbles, which is a far less terrifying noise than a roar or shriek, unless you have a phobia of babies or woodland streams. This rejection of the trope of a monster that roars and swoops or charges further reinforces the idea that Carroll is attempting to break away from the old, worn style of
Jabberwocky (or The Jabberwocky) is a nonsense poem by Lewis Carroll that appears in the novel Through the Looking Glass (And What Alice Found There) which he published in 1871 (Niki Pollock, 2000). It is a prime example of how language can be used as tool for defamiliarization as he does with his use of nonsense words and imagery.
Jabberwocky is a nonsense poem. That is no accident. It did not get mangled in the printer, it was not jumbled up in editing, and it was certainly not the work of an individual who did not know how to spell. It was purposefully written to not make sense, and yet at the same time make perfect sense. It takes the familiar and turns it on its head, emptying out the …show more content…
In fact, in an argument over which view is right, we may miss a vital detail; that none of them are. And that is once again the point; the poem is not a riddle to be figured out, nor is it another language that needs translating. It is nonsense, plain and simple, and was written with ambiguity as the intention. And so while Humpty Dumpty is right in saying that “slithy toves” are fantastical creatures moving in a lithe and slimy manner (Carroll, 2014), I am equally correct in my interpretation that “slithy toves” are some sort of swampy forest, complete with fog and drooping trees reminiscent of weeping willows. The important thing is that we don’t really know what “slithy toves” are.
And this lack of knowledge forces us to supply our own. It forces us to use our imagination, a thing that even the most resplendent piece of prose cannot make us do. A multitude of adjectives would prove less effective in this regard than a single nonsense word, for even if we know what all those descriptive words should describe, we are, as humans, lazy and therefore simply gloss over them most of the time, choosing to instead substitute a generic image or idea in the place of the highly detailed description the writer has …show more content…
Both the hero and the villain of the poem are not quite what we expect. We know that the Jabberwock is a fearsome creature, for the father warns his son to beware, and the poem states that it has “eyes of flame”, “jaws that bite” and “claws that catch” (Carroll, 2014) and yet it “whiffles” rather than storming, or charging, and it burbles, which is a far less terrifying noise than a roar or shriek, unless you have a phobia of babies or woodland streams. This rejection of the trope of a monster that roars and swoops or charges further reinforces the idea that Carroll is attempting to break away from the old, worn style of