The Sring 2008 meeting was held in the Washington DC area. See the agenda.

In a word, the synopsis of our spring meeting is wow! Attendees came from Japan, the UK, and as far away as Canada. Our visit to the Library of Congress was memorable for reasons Carrollian and other. We had the opportunity to see rare Carroll books, correspondence associated with the third purchase of the Alice's Adventures Under Ground manuscript and its return to England, and the Lewis Carroll scrapbook. Mark Dimunation related how two members of the LCSNA, August Imholtz and Edward Wakeling, brought to the attention of the LOC how important a document it was and why it had to be made available to researchers around the globe. We heard how this government agency, convinced of the need, rose to the occassion and speedily digitized the document and has provided not only the images of the pages on the web but also searchable keyed text. Mr. Dimunation also honored our request to see the re-creation of the Jefferson library and provided us with an impromptu talk about that project.

Saturday morning found us listening to the two talks on the meeting agenda, one on Carroll and religion, the other on illustrating Alice. Mark Goodacre's talk relating Carroll's views on religion to those of his contemporaries was stimulating and informative, and prompted a great deal of discussion. His analysis of some of the provocative diary entries, put them in perspective and presented a new interpretation of them. I found the talk absolutely riveting. Oleg Lipchenko, whose lush limited edition of Alice was recently published, gave us great insight into the working of the artist's creative process. We had the enlightening experience of listening to an artist explain how he arrived at his vision of Alice, and it was far from a simple point to point journey. He showed how an illustrator reads the text to glean the author's description of characters and what they do when there isn't much physical information provided. Again we were left with much food for thought.

That afternoon we began our moveable feast. There was certainly food and drink galore, but the feast I am referring to was a feast for the eyes. We shared the privilege of viewing the Imholtz, Salins, and Schaefer collections, where we got to not only see rare items, but were allowed to hold and examine them. As is always the case, our LCSNA hosts were most gracious, and our members were appreciative of the welcome they received. Our auction was a great success. With the aid of my enthusiastic assistant, Lauren Goodacre (age 10), a third generation Carrollian, we managed to entertain and amuse our group, while raising funds for worthwhile LCSNA projects. Our thanks go to all who donated items and all who were lucky enough to buy them. The day ended with a surprise presentation of a brilliant caricature of David Schaefer as the Hatter drawn by Jonathan Dixon and a LCSNA Presidential Proclamation, naming April 26th David Schaefer Day in honor of decades of contributions to the society. It was the high point of a day of high points.

On the last day of our collection tour, we visited the house of Matt and Wendy Crandall. Here we saw a merged collection formed as a result of marriage. Now that's true love. Matt's collection of Alice Disneyana was impressive even to those who are not particularly enamored with Disney's Alice. The extent of the collection was breathtaking. The fact that the couple had many duplicates for sale was not entirely lost on avid collectors, who adeptly climbed all over each other to grasp coveted items. Even I couldn't resist buying an item or two. The non-collectors among us no doubt enjoyed the show we put on. As Matt and Wendy expounded on their collection, I was reminded of something I have been known to say; What is the use of a collection if there aren't people who appreciate it around to see it? The afternoon ended with a visit to the National Gallery in Washington to see the Victorian photography exhibition curated by Roger Taylor.

I doubt that Lewis Carroll often got to mark three consecutive days with a white stone.

To share in the festivities, take a look at our photo montage.

Previous Meetings