Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

adapted from Lewis Carroll by Jocelyn Clarke

For Alice's Adventures in Wonderland Blue Raincoat Theatre Company teamed up with Sunday Tribune Theatre Critic and Dramatist Jocelyn Clarke to produce a staged adaptation of Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland. Clarke’s adaptation tells the story through the eyes of the author, whose friendship towards a young girl – Alice Liddell – gave rise to this classic tale.

Lewis Carroll is the author’s name for Charles Lutwidge Dodgson who was born in 1832. Dodgson was a lecturer in mathematics and was also a clergyman, though he never held a benefice and rarely if ever preached.

The origin of the story of Alice in Wonderland is quite simple. On July 4 th 1862 Dodgson along with a friend brought the Liddell sisters – 3 young girls with Alice Liddell among them – on a boat trip. Dodgson entertained the children with a somewhat spontaneous made up tale he called Alice’s Adventures Underground. The story was developed and appeared in print as Alice In Wonderland in 1865.it was followed by Through The Looking Glass in 1872 relating the further adventures of Alice . At the same time Dodgson wrote and published several mathematical treatises of which Euclid And His Modern Rivals in 1879 was the mst influential. Dodgson died in 1898 making last year the centenary of his death.

Jocelyn Clarke has also written an adaptation of Alice’s Adventures Underground which was staged by SITI, an American theatre troupe based in New York , under their artistic director Anne Bogart. The production was staged in November / December of 1998.