Alice in Wonderland

A book is a very quiet thing, especially on a hot afternoon, when the grass smells of dust, and the river moves as slowly as spilled syrup. On just such an afternoon, a young girl named Alice sat on a grassy bank, leaning against her older sister's shoulder. She peeked over at the pages her sister was reading, but there were no drawings in the volume, and not a single line of conversation. Alice thought, with a sigh that felt as heavy as the summer air, that a book without pictures or voices was hardly worth the effort of keeping one's eyes open. The heat made her feel delightfully sleepy and hopelessly dull. She was just beginning to wonder if the pleasure of weaving a chain of daisies was worth the trouble of standing up to gather them, when something entirely extraordinary occurred. A rabbit with pink eyes and fur as white as fresh milk, screed right past her. Now, in the countryside of England, where this story was first told over a century and a half ago, and where people have always loved tales of hidden worlds just beneath the soil, a rabbit is a common sight. Had the creature merely screed into the bushes, Alice would have gone back to her day dream. But this particular rabbit did not behave like a proper English bunny. It stopped. It reached into its waist coat pocket. It pulled out an elegant pocket watch, stared anxiously at the dial, and muttered that it was terribly, dreadfully late. Alice sat up straight. Her sleepiness vanished like morning mist. She had never in her life seen a rabbit wear a waist coat, let alone possess a watch to tuck inside it. Driven by a sudden burning curiosity, she scrambled to her feet and chased the white rabbit across the meadow. She was just in time to see him pop down a large hole beneath a thick hedge. Without pausing to think about how she might ever get back out, Alice plunged in after him. The rabbit hole did not slope downward like a normal tunnel. It plunged straight down, so suddenly that Alice had no time to stop herself before she found she was falling. Yet, it was the strangest fall imaginable. She did not plunge like a stone. Instead, she drifted downward, as if she were a feather, floating through a very deep, very slow well. As she drifted, she realized the sides of the well were not made of rough dirt, but were lined with cupboards, bookshelves, and pegs for coats. Here and there, she passed maps and framed paintings hanging on the walls. She even managed to snatch a jar from a shelf as she floated past. The label read orange marmalade, but to her great disappointment, the jar was entirely empty. Not wanting to drop it and hurt anyone below, she managed to tuck it neatly into another cupboard as she drifted lower and lower. Down, down, down she went. Would the fall ever come to an end? She began to wonder if she might fall right through the center of the earth and come out on the other side, where people walked with their feet pointing upward toward the sky. That would be quite awkward, she decided, and she was glad there was no one around to hear her voice as she rehearsed her polite introductions to these upside down strangers. Just as she was beginning to feel she might drift off to sleep right there in midair, her feet met a heap of dry leaves and twigs with a soft, dry thud. The fall was over. Alice jumped to her feet and looked up, but all was dark above. Ahead of her was another long passage, and far down it, she could see the white rabbit scurrying away, still whispering about how late his ears and whiskers were getting. Alice ran after him like the wind. She turned a corner, and the rabbit vanished. She found herself standing in a long, low hall, lit by a row of lamps hanging from the ceiling. There were doors on every side, but when Alice went from one to the…

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