Cathy Rubin has posted a lovely article in her “Global Search for Education” blog on the Huffington Post about the Alice150 exhibition at Columbia. It contains a link to her YouTube video interview with Jennifer B. Lee (Curator, Performing Arts Collections of the Butler Library at Columbia and this exhibit) and Mark Burstein. For those of us who were at Dayna Nuhn’s opening lecture for Alice150 and heard a short recording that Alice Liddell Hargreaves made there and was played for the first time, it is on the video as well.

The 150th Anniversary Deluxe Edition of Martin Gardner’s The Annotated Alice was the subject of a long, thoughtful review by Adam Gopnik in the “Page-Turner” column on The New Yorker’s website. Click here.

Today is the official release date of the long-awaited 150th Anniversary Deluxe Edition of Martin Gardner’s The Annotated Alice, the first update in 15 years. Edited and art-directed by Mark Burstein, it features more than a hundred new or updated annotations, many by Gardner himself (some, but not all, from the Knight Letter). The “deluxe” part refers to this being the first edition in full, glorious color: more than a hundred new illustrations and images have been added (new to the book, not necessarily to the world): Salvador Dalí, Beatrix Potter, Barry  Moser, Ralph Steadman, and Sir Peter Blake among the truly global set of artists. (Yes, the Tenniels have been retained.) Not to mention a color portrait of Carroll’s mother, his handwritten corrections to the Looking-Glass table of contents, Alice Liddell’s carving on the door of a church, the page from The Train with the first published occurrence of the pseudonym “Lewis Carroll,” and the like. Also all of Carroll’s writings on Wonderland (“Easter Greeting” etc.) and all of Gardner’s. The Filmography and Reference sections have been updated, and a new section on Illustrators added.

Put simply, this anniversary edition of The Annotated Alice is the most comprehensive collection of Alice materials ever published in a single volume, and is indispensable to all lovers of Carroll.

“It is a wonderful tribute … and will enter the short list of classic works on ALICE. It would have been a shame not to gather together Martin’s last thoughts, notes, even scribbles, and I for one am delighted. The addition of all the supporting material makes for a superb book of reference as well.” – Morton Cohen

At long last!!! It is no longer necessary to pay five figures for a copy of the super deluxe edition of Wonderland illustrated by Salvador Dalí in 1969. A trade edition has just been published by Princeton University Press, along with the National Museum of Mathematics (aka MoMath; no “outgrabing” jokes, please) – and it lists for just $24.95! Featuring an introduction by our president emeritus, Mark Burstein, and mathematics professor Thomas Banchoff, a friend of Dalí’s, which discusses surrealism, Dalí, and mathematics rather than the usual recap of Carroll’s life and works, it is a take on Alice no lover of the book should be without.

“How appropriate for this volume to appear as part of the celebration of the 150th anniversary. … Burstein and Banchoff give us insights into the genius of both Carroll and Dalí, and then we have Dalí’s illustrations, which are far distant from any suggestion of realism. Altogether, it is a remarkable voyage through Wonderland on a new plane—an enlightening and pleasurable adventure.” – Morton N. Cohen, author of Lewis Carroll: A Biography

“To those of us brought up on John Tenniel’s iconic illustrations, it seems unbelievable that anyone else would dare to attempt the task. Yet hundreds have done so, though none is as distinguished and few as imaginative as Salvador Dalí. This attractive 150th anniversary edition, which describes Dalí’s mathematical interests and presents his illustrations (previously published only in a rare limited edition), is greatly to be welcomed.” – Robin Wilson, author of Lewis Carroll in Numberland

“Engaging the text side by side with the artwork yields a myriad of interesting tonal effects in both the words and the pictures. It’s an entirely different approach to the notion of illustration. … This book succeeds in scratching the itch many admirers of Carroll and Dalí have felt for too long.” – Megan Volpert, PopMatters

Even more publishers are getting in on the Alice150 celebrations! Here is an updated list of books that have or are about to come out this year. Since the original post, the list has more than doubled: 16 have been published in English, 13 in other languages or orthographies, and 11 more are forthcoming.

Please feel free to email Mark if you know of others or have suggestions or corrections.