(Photo: Lincoln Cathedral)
Recent discoveries at Lincoln Cathedral have unveiled intriguing historical documents, including a letter penned by the renowned author Lewis Carroll. These documents provide fresh insight into the inspirations behind Carroll’s celebrated work, Alice in Wonderland.
Among the documents is a letter addressed to Henry Ramsden Bramley, who held the position of Precentor of Lincoln between 1895 and 1905. The letter serves as an invitation to a dinner party, complete with a detailed seating plan and a menu featuring dishes such as clear soup, turbot, black curry, lamb cutlets, apple soufflé, and apricot cream.
The seating plan intriguingly includes a Shakespearean quote from The Tempest: “The cloud-capped tower,” a line delivered by the character Prospero, reflecting on the transient nature of human achievements:
“The cloud-capp’d towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Ye all which it inherit, shall dissolve.”
The dinner guests also included Oxford mathematician Professor Bartholomew Price, famously nicknamed “Bat” due to his lectures often being incomprehensible to many students, and William Ranken, Vicar of Sandford-on-Thames and an Oxford mathematician as well.
Professor Price is believed to have inspired the Mad Hatter’s recitation of “Twinkle Twinkle, Little Bat” in Carroll’s narrative. Meanwhile, Ranken, who frequently played chess with Carroll, might have influenced the chess-themed sequel, Through the Looking Glass, where Alice’s journey mirrors a chess game.
Alice’s adventure in this sequel is depicted as a grand chess match, with Alice acting as a white pawn vying to become a queen, surrounded by other chess piece characters.
Fern Dawson, Curator at Lincoln Cathedral, expressed excitement about the discovery, stating, “This is an amazing find, which we are delighted to have in the collection here at the Cathedral, but it has raised more questions than answers.”
She added, “For example, it is not known where Bramley and Carroll met; it may have been at Oxford University, or through the mutual acquaintance of famous composer and organist Sir John Stainer, who played the organ at Westminster Abbey for the wedding of Alice Liddle – the inspiration for ‘Alice in Wonderland’.”
The discovery has inspired a new production of Alice in Wonderland scheduled for December at the Lincoln Arts Centre, a collaborative effort by the Lincoln School of Creative Arts and the University of Lincoln.
This article was originally written by www.christiantoday.com
