Contrariwise’s Rejecting Apology; or, Did Lewis Carroll burn his secret collection of Lolicon manga?

Our post on the controversies and pseudo-controversies surrounding Carroll’s character generated some small discussion (“teach the controversy”, as the Kansas School Board might advocate). The folks at Contrariwise continued with a longer reaction. I quote Ms. Karoline Leach at length:

from Alice in the Shadows by Maria Bodmann

[…] we send our sincere thanks to the LCSNA bloggers for so generously giving us the space. We have also linked to you.

Tangentially though, in conjunction with something a commenter here said the other day, the reference to ‘certain questions’ has got Contrariwise thinking.

Suppose you give a false alibi to a man in order to get him acquitted of a crime you know he probably commited – if it later turns out he didn’t do it after all, does that make what you did right?

I don’t think it does, does it? And that’s the weird problem at the heart of Carrollianism right now, that I think needs to be looked at.

[… continue reading…]

The LCSNA blog that features us is headed “Special Report: Was Lewis Carroll a gay Mormon and were the Alice books written by J.D. Salinger?”, referencing some of the many stupid things that have been said about Carroll over the years. It’s a joke, but in its way it makes exactly the point Contrariwise is trying to make.  Because those things aren’t ‘myths’ are they?  They’re just loony ideas no one has ever taken seriously.  The point about the myths we are concerned with (his child-obsession, his avoidance of adult society, his passion for Alice Liddell),  is that  they were promulgated by serious Carroll scholars and believed  by  everyone until very recently. The notion of the man as a pedophile arose out of these myths as an inevitable, and  very reasonable  conclusion. It couldn’t, and can’t be just laughed off as ridiculous,  and taking that line is just Apology again. No one will take you seriously if you sell the image that has been sold  for so long and simply ask people to take your word that  – honestly  –  he wasn’t what you are obviously painting him to have been.

[…continue reading…]

There’s some more interesting comments below that post, and feel free to continue the discussion in the comments here. The shadowy illustration above is from Alice in the Shadows, Maria Bodmann’s Balinese-inspired shadow puppet play.

Share

2 thoughts on “Contrariwise’s Rejecting Apology; or, Did Lewis Carroll burn his secret collection of Lolicon manga?

  1. I think that myths evolve because something sounds like a good story. Since the short time my book MYSTERY OF LEWIS CARROLL has been published, I’ve noticed some myths in the making beginning to circulate. The other day I read that LC gave a quarter of his income to charity all his life long. Well, sure, he was a generous man – but he didn’t. The idea has been picked up from an article that appeared a couple of months ago.

    It’s better than him being Jack the Ripper, of course.
    🙂

  2. That caterpillar image is gorge. What’s Lolicon manga?

    No, I don’t think myths simply evolve out of good stories. But some myths ARE good stories. The creation of myth is deeper and weirder than any one-line summary I think. You can’t really discuss it without talking about Jung sooner or later, unfortunately.

    Aah – Jack the Ripper. We have to do a blogpost about that.

Comments are closed.