PROFILE: August A. Imholtz, Jr. Augusts interest in the Alice books and then in Lewis Carroll's other works de- veloped rather late in life and in a rather indirect, though not wholly un-Carrollian, manner. He had been working on the first draft of an article on translations o[Jabber- wocky into the Latin and ancient Greek, when his wife purchased for him a used copy of Lewis Carroll Observed. Much impressed with the level of scholarship displayed by the essays edited by Ed Guiliano, he was even more intrigued to learn that there was a Lewis Carroll Soci- ety of North America and that the Soci- ety's secretary lived in Silver Spring, Mary- land, only about five miles from his house. He wrote a letter to the secretary at the listed address and a few days later was invited by David and Maxine Schaefer to their home to examine their collection of Carroll books and talk about his work — more of the former than the latter. He finished the article, which was pub- lished after about eight years, (even though Horace cautions that one should keep one's manuscripts for nine years before publication), in the Rocky Mountain Review and began coming to the semi- annual meetings of the Society and has missed only one or two in the past nine years. At first he and his wife Clare were only interested in the text and looked upon the sometimes frantic efforts of the Carroll collectors as a curiosity. But slowly they began to be intrigued by the various editions, different illustrations, and finally the peculiar pleasure of the collector — the search. Things have gotten to such a stage Continued on Page 2 Sylvie and Bruno Featured at Pierpont Morgan Library Meeting On Saturday, October 21, 1989, the LCSNA held its Fall meeting in the stately Pierpont Morgan Library in New York City. The main part of the program fo- cused on the 100th anniversary of the publication of Sylvie and Bruno, but it was also the anniversary, or very nearly so, of the founding of LCSNA at Princeton University fifteen years ago. It was especially fitting that so many of the founding members were present for this anniversary celebration. In those fifteen years the Society has grown to 300 members, published a highly respected series of books and pamphlets on Lewis Carroll, and has conducted almost thirty meetings at libraries and universities around the country. After a delicious lunch at Le Grenadin restaurant, arranged by our Program Coordinator, Janet Jurist, a short walk led us to one of the Morgan's paneled meeting rooms. In our traditional short business meeting before the formal pro- gram. President Edward Guiliano thanked the Morgan for inviting us once again and thanked Morton Cohen for helping to make the meeting possible. (We were last at the Morgan in 1982 in conjunction with the Library's splendid Carroll exhib- ition commemorating the 150th anniver- sary of the birth of Lewis Carroll.) Pro- fessor Guiliano also expressed the thanks of all the members to Maxine Schaefer for her work as secretary, to treasurer Ray Wapner, and to the editor of the Knight Letter, Stan Marx. Adolph Green Ed then reported on the soundness of our Society's financial condition and announced that the first volume in the Lewis Carroll pamphlet series, covering the Oxford pamphlets, edited by Edward Wakeling, will be published in 1990 by the University of Virginia Press. Charles Lovett next briefly summarized his impressions of the First International Lewis Carroll Conference held at Christ Church, Oxford last summer. (See Spe- cial Supplement). Planning has already begun, he said, to hold the second inter- national conference in the U.S. Finally, Ed introduced John Wilcox-Baker, the creative force behind the Lewis Carroll Birthplace Trust at Daresbury, who spoke briefly about the need to raise funds for the Trust. At the conclusion of the business meet- ing. Dr. Robert Park, Curator of Manus- cripts at the Morgan, formally welcomed us to the library. Stan Marx then warmly introduced Adolf Green who was already known to us all for his wonderful songs and musicals such as "New York New York, " "Bells Are Ringing, " "Subways Are for Sleeping," "Singing in the Rain," "Make Someone Happy," and others. In his talk, entitled "My Lifelong Passion for Lewis Carroll" and delivered in his beautiful voice, he recounted something Continued on Page 2 Library Meeting Continued from Page l of wliat Lewis Carroll has meant to him throughout his life. For 19 cents, at the young age of eight years, he bought his first copy o[ Alice's Adventures. Wv did not know anything about the work, before he bought it, but on a sweltering July day many }ears ago he disccnered Alice and her topsy-turvy world. "vSoup of the Even- ing" reduced him to tears. He recalled a few more passages that left lasting impres- sions on him and then pointed out some of the similarities between the humor of Groucho Marx and Lewis Carroll. He also noted how his famous collaborator, Leonard Bernstein, and he often quoted Carroll to each other as they worked! In concluding, he recited Humpty Dumpty's message to the fish and, once again, succeeded in "making someone happy." Pat Griffin Pat Griffin, who entertained us when wc were last in New York, gave the first of two dramatic readings from the Sylvie and Bruno books. The text she chose for her first reading was the charming "The Little Man Who Had a Little Gun" which she rendered beautifully. Our academic speaker. Professor Ed- mund Miller of C.W. Post College, turned his Frye-forged guns of literary criticism on the style and structure of the Sylvie and Bruno books. His thesis was that the booLs should be read in the tradition of Menippean satire. But who was Menippus? Wliat in the world is Menippean satire? And what relevance docs it have for the Sylvie and Bruno books? Professor Miller, with much learn- ing and wit, answered those c}uestions and thereby radically changed this writer's view of Sylvie and Bruno. Menippus of (radara, a Greek slave in the first half of the third century B.C., invented the serio-comic literary form that bears his name. It is a form of satire written largely in prose but containing interspersed verse passages. Although only fragments of his works survive, he influenced many later authors, including the (ireek Lucian, the Roman Varro, and, according to Professor Miller, Lewis Carroll. Satire itself pokes fun at the human condition and seeks to effect social im- provement. Among the Romans Horace is gently mocking while Juvenal is stri- dently so. In the preface to Sylvie and Bruno, Carroll quotes lines from Horace, though from the Odes rather than the satires, and in spite of the fact that they are not exactly ver>' easy Latin, he does not translate them. Omnes eodcm cogimur, omnium versatur urna serius ocius sors exitura et nos in aeternum exilium impositura cumbae James Michie rather freely translates as: Sheep driven deathward. Sooner or later Fate's urn shakes, the lot comes leaping for each of us And books a one-way berth in Charon's Boat on the journey to endless exile. Dcx's this quotation, Professor Miller wondered, prefigure the death of Arthur Forester in the novel? Carroll say that he cannot be responsi- ble for the moral judgments of the charac- ters in Sylvie arid Bruno and this is quite in the tradition of Menippean satire. Furthermore, the third person narrator is never identified, though Bruno calls him Mr. Sir. He functions sometimes like a chorus in Greek drama as for example when he expresses the feelings of the lovers Lady Muriel and Eric Lindcjn. Not only does Menippean satire com- bine prose and verse, but also high lan- guage (which to the ancients ahva\s meant Teapot into KAhhh-Comfmter Art by j ill Gottesman epic) and colloquial vulgar language. This is true of Sylvie and Bruno. Wliat other similarities are there between these books and Menippean satire? Menip[)ean satire begins, like epic, iti medias res and so do the no\els. Menippean satire also contains numerous digressions and is nonsystematic in its structure. Finally, the Sylvie and Bruno works share with Menippean satire "ambiguity of closure" — a sort of oj)en- ended end of the tale. Professor Miller cited other evidence for his thesis, raised many interesting questions, and succeeded in placing Sylvie and Burno squarely in the Menippean tradition. Pat Grifiln ended the meeting by bring- ing us back to the incredible liveliness of some of the passages of the books with a brilliantly expressive and sympathetic reading of "The Little Foxes" from Sylvie and Bruno. . , a t i , r August A. Imholtz,Jr. Editor's Embarrassment Debt. In the last issue, we stated that "our' Byron Sewell wrote the article in the Conclc Nast Traveller The article was actually written by Brian Sewell, the art critic of the London Evening Standard. Fran Abeles Delivers Two Dodgson Papers On August 8th, Dr. Fran Abeles delivered a paper at the XVIIIth International Con- gress of the History of Sciencc-On Science and Political Order, at the Deutsches Museum in Munich. The paper covered aspects of Charles L. Dodgson's work that reflected the responsibility of a scientist to state and society. A month later, Dr. Abeles delivered a paper at the Charles S. Peircc Sesquicentennial International Congress, at Harvard. The paper dealt with some of Dodgson's work in logic and its connection with Pierce's existential graphs. She will expand the paper for inclusion in a volume of selected proceedings to be published in 1990-1991. Ms. Abeles, presently working on the mathematical pamphlets of LC, is anxi- ous to obtain a copy of A Budget of Para- doxes by August De Morgan published by Longmans, London, in 1872. Send infor- mation to Fran, c/o Knight Letter. Profile C onii nil fd from Page 1 that their two sons, weary and somewhat puzzled by ])arents with 700 Alice and other Carroll books, threatened to form a society unto themselves - SAAW, or. Sons Against Alice in Wonderland. August was educated at Washington University in St. Louis, the University of (kjttingen in West Germany where he was a fellow for two years, and Johns Hopkins University and Baltimore. He is employed as an editor with the microfilm and mic- rofiche publishing firm of Congressional Information Sei"vice, Inc., and recently returned from a week in Moscow where he conducted publication negotiations with one of the institutes of the Soviet Academy of Sciences. Kmgjit Letter Special Supplement vS' ■*■ ■'•■'- AUTUMN-WINTER 1989 On Thursday, July 27, those fortunate enough to be delegates to the First Inter- national Lewis Carroll Conference were elevated from the hoi polloi (who must be content merely to wander about Christ Church meadows or to peep into the cathedral) and were cordially ushered in by the formerly fierce porter. The dramatically sudden drop in noise and activity as tourist-packed Oxford gave way to the still quads and rooms of the House helped the century of years to fall away, and in fact, the sense of being in another world was the beginning of a very intense state of mind, a three-days' absorption with Lewis Carroll. Although registration was to have begun at 2:00, by noon a number of people had already checked in at the conference office, located just down the hall from LC's best-known suite of rooms, at the north-west corner of Tom Quad. On arrival, delegates received a packet full of items of interest and useful information, including a program of events featuring charming Macmillan- likc medallions on the covers by Brian Partridge, and a copy of the new Austra- lian Snark. The conference organizers, Catherine and Mark Richards and Ed- ward Wakeling, who cannot be named or praised too often or too highly, had ar- ranged tours of Christ Church and exhib- itions of various LC and Alice materials to occupy the delegates until the formal opening of the conference at 6:00. The Von Herkomcr portrait of LC which normally hangs in the Great Hall was moved to the McKenna Room (where LC lectured in mathematics), to look upon the opening reception and many subsequent events. Here Philip Dodgson Jaques declared the conference begun, and over sherr>' we were able to examine the model of the proposed Daresbury LC visitor's center and artwork by Charles Blackman and Frank Hinder, brought by Giyphon Gallery' of Australia. After we were initiated into the proce- dures of eating in Hall (the b>^'ords are Promptness in arrival and Speed in eat- ing), the conference truly began with a talk by Morton Cohen. Although not billed as a keynote address. Prof. Cohen's Report from the Oxford Conference STEPHANIE LOVETT examination of the acquisition and na- ture of LC's personal faith, especially the influence of F.D. Maurice and S.T. Col- eridge, established the atmosphere of serious yet warmly human inquiry which was to inform the conference. A report on the official proceedings follows; of course, many exciting exchanges occur- red in private conversation, and most of the lighter moments have, with regret, been filed under "You had to be there." Our days began at 8:15 with breakfast in Hall and were filled with programs until at least 10:30 p.m., and the confer- ence office was open beyond that, with port and conversation for night owls. Friday morning's initial program was two talks; in the first, Selwyn Goodacrc, accompanied by piles of Macmillan Alices, outlined the revisions made in the Alice text by LC and considered the difficulties of choosing a definitive text. Brian Sibley, dressed rather like Tenniel's Wliite Rabbit, bounded in, dazzled us with his evaluation of LC as poet (pre- eminent in parodies, rhymed riddles, and acrostics, not a great serious poet, yet capable of some lovely moments when he's distracted, as by an acrostic), high- lighted by his all-out declamations, and promptly bounded away. A coffee break followed in the room where, as Edward Wakeling later in- formed us, LC must have written A/fc«', directly below his better-known rooms, and we reconvened at 11:00 for two more talks. Edward Wakeling shared the results of his investigations into LC's life at Christ Church, including the locations of his rooms and the schema for the Look- ing-Glass illustrations. Next, Charles Lovctt related LC's efforts to have Alice dramatized, such as his fruitless collabora- tion with Arthur Sullivan, previous to the eventual 1886 Savile Clarke production. After lunch, we had a meriy outing to Nuneham, destination of many river trip/ picnics for LC and friends. We were able to wander about the grounds before pro- ceeding to Abingdon, where the party scattered in search of ice cream, soft drinks, and pubs while waiting for the boat back to Oxford. We skidded into Hall just in time to avoid censure, and after dinner assembled in the lecture room for Film Night. A separate program was issued detailing the A&^-related films (including a 1932 newsreel of Alice Hargreaves in New \brk) from the Schaefer and Wakeling collections. We were not able to see the new Swiss Phantasmagoiia, due to projec- tion problems, and hope it will be a fea- ture of a future conference or meeting. Saturday began with a superb talk by Anne Clark Amor on the relationship between LC and Alice, her conviction being that LC did make some proposal to the Liddells and that he was able to have a happy life adjusted to his disappoint- ment, but never had another true love. There followed 45 minutes of lively dis- cussion, and not in the usual euphemis- tic sense of "an argument." The effect of a hypothetical marriage on their per- sonalities and careers was debated, as well as many other what-ifs and why-nots. Selwyn Goodacrc concluded the session with some very nice remarks about Anne Clark Amor, and we adjourned for coffee. The rest of the morning was hardly enough time to inspect the stupendous exhibit of LC material arranged by Ed- ward Wakeling in the Upper Library. Exhibit notes were distributed entertain- ingly describing these items from both the Christ Church and Wakeling collec- tions, which included printed and manu- script items relating to LC's published works and to his Christ Church respon- sibilities. Also on view in the Upper Library was a startlingly beautiful illumi- nated text of Alice by Eric Freeman, who was there himself to explain his project. (over) Lunch was held at The Perch in Binsey, to which tliere was both a coach party and a walking party. The latter was led by members of the Alice Society (Mark, and Jonathan (ioodacre and Peter Morgan), who lent a good deal of energ>' and exper- tise to the conference. From The Perch we had a short walk to Binsey Church's holy well, long known as the Treacle Well. One of the pair of BBC Radio gentlemen who had been about this morning bicy- cled with us to Binsey, and the various people he had earlier interviewed later expressed gladness at not having known at the time that he was Humphrey Car- penter, well known as Tolkien's biog- rapher, etc. Delegates were given a separate pro- gram for the remainder of the afternoon, which included a map and suggested places to visit and featured a choice of four guided tours. Brian Riddle, whose article on LC and the Pre-Raphaelites appears in the latest J abberwocky, led a Pre-Raphaelite tour to the Ashmolean and other points of interest. Maggie Bowman's visit to Oxford was traced by Mark Goodacre's group, with readings from LC's poem "Maggie's Visit to Ox- ford" held at appropriate sites, while Peter Morgan led a group to places vis- ited on Isa Bowman's visit to Oxford, including the famous dodo remains in University Museum. Edward Wakeling, whose Christ Church graduate student necktie was a passport to such normally inaccessible sites as LC's rooms and Tom Tower, took his group to several signifi- cant Christ Church locations and illumi- nated them as to the Three T's. The evening program began with a reception at which John Wilcox-Baker re- ported on the LC Birthplace Trust, and after dinner, we settled into the lecture room for "LC Around the World. "John Paull (greeted by a chant of "How does it feel to be right-side-up?") spoke on a topic new for most of us, the history of Alice and other children's books in Aus- tralia, where publishing began in earnest after World War II ended the supply of books from the UK. He also introduced us to the Carroll Foundation, started to promote appreciation oi Alice and chil- dren's literature in general, and which hopes to celebrate 1990's 125th anniver- sary of Alice with 125 translations and 125 artists. The first Australian Hunting of Left to Right: Panelists Ed Wakeling, Sehvyn Goodacre, Charles Lovett, Mark Richards Morton Cohen as the Mad Hatter the Snark, illustrated by Frank Hinder, was also a feature of the evening. \bshiyuki Momma gave a succinct report on Alice's life in Japan, where she was recently the rage among teenaged girls, and on his hopes that Japanese scholar- ship will be translated and become better known. In answer to a question, he said that he thought that girls like Alice "be- cause they would like to be a dream child too." Other speakers reported briefly on Alice activities, or lack thereof, in their countries. These included Andrej Togni of Switzerland, who has staged Alice using mime; Christina Bjork, who re- marked that in Sweden Alice is consid- ered at least as much an adult book; Joe Brabant, who said that virtually nothing is being done in Canada, as they are swamped with books from the UK and USA, and briefly mentioned his spectacu- lar new Alice; and EUie Luchinsky, who announced the fall meeting of the LCSNA and described its publishing plans. After breakfast on Sunday, Anashia Plackis spoke on her research into the connection between the Oxford reforms and the subversion of authority in the Alices, and John Hanna presented his theory that some of the neologisms in "A Stanza of Anglo-Saxon Poetry" (the first stanza of Jabberwocky) were taken from Scots dialect. Following a coffee break, a BBC documentary film, A Don in Wonderland, was shown, and then Edward Wakeling outlined his press cuttings project. He is assembling copies of any and all references to Carroll, Alice, etc. and filing them in notebooks by category' for research use, and is anxious to receive clippings with a source citation for inclusion. To close the conference, we assembled in the McKenna Room, which had been arranged with tables for a panel of six of the speakers and Mark Richards as mod- erator and with the chairs in a broad semi-circle to encourage discussion. Our purpose was to evaluate past LC work and to consider future directions. Topics covered included the need for an ex- panded two-volume edition of the letters, as well as the planned volumes of letters on specialized subjects, a compilation of LC's contributions to periodicals, a de- finitive catalogue of his photos, and of course, the complete diaries. David and Maxine Schaefer were asked to comment on the effect of the LCSNA's publication oiThe Wasp in a Wig, and replied that apart from the value of having the chap- ter, the huge publicity generated no lasting effect on the Society. Mark Richards commented on the difference between greater public interest and bet- ter quality scholarship and turned the discussion to Jabberwocky, the quality of the content and production of which was debated at some length. The need for communication among the LC Societies was brought up, and an annual newslet- ter rounding up the year's LC activities was suggested. After a too-brief hour, we had to close for lunch with Maxine Schaefer's thanking the conference or- ganizers, paraphrasing Alice's words from the newsreel, that we had had as interest- ing a time at the conference as Alice had had down the rabbit-hole. Our final lunch was followed by the Vision of the Three C's: Coffee, Cake (elaborately decorated with LC's portrait framed by the Lion and the Unicorn), and the Chairman's closing remarks. {Knight Letter readers get a bonus confer- ence postscript, as your correspondent pressed on to the Daresbury LC Society's meeting the next night, where John Paull presented a version of his talk 'Alice in the Antipathies" and the very knowledge- able Shirley Corke of the Guildford Muni- ment Room gave an excellent address on the history of LC's connection with Guildford.) Delegates were then left to drift down from the heights and out into the stunning reality of a world not Car- rollcentric, where someone could say at the Christ Church gift shop "Look, there's a picture of Alice- I didn't know she was a real girl." This shock of re- emergence was the only hangover after this symposium, speaking in the original sense of a drinking and philosophizing party, where in place of rich wine we had the above-mentioned exhilarating atmos- phere bringing out everyone's brightest ideas and sharpest wit. In fact, the com- bination of exacting scholarship and light-hearted humor, remarkable both in the conference events and in the indi- vidual delegates, presents a notable re- flection on Lewis Carroll himself. KINGS The Limited Editions Club Alice and its Origin. Editor's Note: In 1940, the Limited Edi- tions Club published a book for mem- bers Ten Years and William Shakespeare, giving a deseription of all the books published by the Club since its founding. The following, written by George Macy, the founder, describes how their unique edition oi Alice came about: "Wlien I heard that Mrs. Alice Har- greaves had accepted the invitation of Columbia University to come to the Lewis Carroll celebration which the University was planning, I wrote to her at her home in England, to ask whether she would autograph the copies of our edi- tion oi Alice In Wonderland while here. I got a letter from her son in which he said that his mother had never autographed copies of the book, but that the sugges- tion appealed to her, now that she was of so advanced an age, to sign copies of our edition before her God took her to his bosom. He therefore agreed that his mother would do this job when she came to New York. ...He then stipulated the payment of a stiff fee for each signature. Since our budget did not permit the payment of this fee by us, I sent a letter to the members of the Club, making the offer that Mrs. Hargreaves would autog- raph each copy for which that member paid a fee. She signed nearly twelve hundred copies, at considerable effort to herself. The check in payment could not have displeased her. When our books appear for sale in the resale market, or in the auction rooms, a copy of Alice in Woyiderland, signed by the original Alice, usually fetches thj; highest prices. I think this was because Fred Warde made an exquisite book of it; because the illustrations were badly printed in the early editions, and we were sensible enough in having them re-engraved in wood so that they were printed properly, in our edition, for the first time." Selected Letters of Lewis Carroll to be published shortly by Macmillan The second edition oiThe Selected Letters of Lewis Carroll, drawn from the two-vol- ume edition of 1978, will be issued in late 1989 or early 1990. It will contain a new preface by Morton Cohen, compiler and editor of the original work, and will be published by Macmillan (London) in both hardcover and paperback. Also by Dr. Cohen is an essay on the Christ Church Common Room, which appear in \blume 7 of the History of Oxford Univer- sity, due in 1990. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Lewis Carroll. Edited by Cooper Eden. Bantam: New York 1989. $19.95. An unusual edition of Alice, in that it contains illustrations not by one artist, but by twenty five, from Tenniel to artists of the 20's and 30's. There are 150 illust- rations in both black and white and full color. Sandor Burstein, indefatigable contributor to the Knight Letter and former LCSNA president, wrote the introduction. Joel Birnbaum has a few author- autographed copies. Write to him at 2486 Brunswick Circle, Woodridge, IlHnois 60517. I Author's Query ■ For a bibliographical listing of songs about the works of Lewis Carroll, please send any information you may have. Only songs with lyrics are being considered. Send list to Editor, c/o the Knight Letter. Contributions will be acknowledged. Alice a Long-Time Favorite in Japan Yoshiyuki Momma, one of the keynote speakers at the Oxford Conference, was kind enough to send us the transcript of his talk. It contains a wealth of informa- tion about Alice's popularity in Japan — and — along with other information that Yoshi sent us, wc are happy to pass along to our readers a summary of his remarks: • TTLG was translated into Japanese in 1899 — ten years before Alice! • Between 1977 and 1988, there were new translations of Alice's Adventures Underground, The Nursery Alice. Sylvie &' Bruno, The Wasp in the Wig, The Game of Logic, Pitloiv Problems, A Tangled Tale, as well as Alice and TTLG. • Critical and bibliographic works, some known to Western readers and some not, have also been published in Japan. • Lastly, don't expect any bargains in out-of-print and rare Carrolliana. Prices are equal or above Western ones. The first edition of Underground brings over $1,000, while inscribed copies of the Sylvie and Bruno booLs list for $4000.00. -Author's Query — Anyone with an extra copy of Martin Gardner's The Snark Puzzle Book will make the author extremely happy if he wishes to dispose of it. Write to Martin Gardner at: 116 Glenbrook Drive Hendersonville, NC 28739 (Incidently, Martin is also looking for unusual parodies of The Night Before Christmas, for a new annotated edition. Please get in touch with him, as above). SAFE HAVENS BILL HOLBROOK T/te lo'/^SAitAJdrTz>Aj /^^sr SfSPr/S. m9 r»> from our far-flung correspondents The Mad Gardener's Song— Revisited In our last issue, we dared our readers to come up with some new verses in the metre and style oiThe Mad Gardener's Song from Sylvie and Bruno. The follow- ing are selections from our contributors: The Mad Gardener's Second Song. by Joe R. Cristopher. He thought he saw potato chips, And onion rings, to boot; He looked again and saw it was Of minus one, the root. "How fair the lemon flower," he said, "How bitter grows the root." From J. A. Brabant. He thought he saw a Wapiti That drove an SST; He looked again and found it was His bill for VAT. "I thank my lucky star," he said, "It's high on LSD. From Ross Heath, who sent words and music. He thought he saw a runny nose Above the LA smog; He looked again and saw it was A thermos of eggnog. "When Thursday comes, or maybe noon, I'll have to show my dog." Take my Alice. . . Please! ^^'^ Burstem wntes Does the 1865 edition o{ Alice's Adventures in Wonderland have some mystical power over its owners? Strange things have happened at the Newberry Library in Chicago since they obtained a copy. The Library's charter specifies that they collect books on printing and as such, they don't have a children's literature collection. They obtained the Alice as part of the Silver Collection because the collection was bought as a unit. They now use Tenniel illustrations on many of their advertisements, because they're so popular. This has elicited numerous questions about their children's book collection (which they don't have). In 1985, a meeting of the LCSNA was held there and a member of their staff gave a talk on Carroll's illustrators. This year they held a three-day symposium on children's literature, where the question again was raised about their collection. The symposium had noted speakers addressing the history of children's literature, creating children's books, and building children's libraries. The symposium culminated with an excellent performance of readings from Alice by the City Lit Theatre Company. I wouldn't be surprised if a children's literature collection resulted at the Newberry because they purchased an 1865 Alice that they didn't even want! Joel Birenbaum The concept of "artificial" or "virtual" realities should be a familiar one to Car- roUians. Today, it's the hottest idea in computer science. It involves the crea- tion of artificial "worlds" in which the participant (not just the viewer), by wearing special color 3-D goggles called "eyephones", headphones, and a "data glove" can seem to move around, become different sizes, and interact with the inhabitants. Although expensive ($250,000) and cartoony at this early stage, a commercially available version was announced in August at a computer trade show in Boston by VPL (Video Programming Languages) of Redwood City, California. The "reality" used for its demonstration at the show was, of course. Wonderland, complete with mad tea party. The recent San Fransisco earthquake had its affect on Alice, also. Extensive damage to the Geary theatre effectively stopped performances oi Right Miyid, a play based on Alice and Lewis Carroll's life. To meet losses and help recovery to continue the production, the Geary is appealing to LC lovers for contributions. The theatre will send a cassette tape and a poster to all who contribute. We think a minimum contribution of $20.00 would be suitable. Send them to: George Coates Performance Works, 110 McAllis- ter St., San Fransico, CA 94102. For assistance in preparing this issue, we would like to thank Mark Burstein, Sandor Burstein, Lucille Posner, the contributors of the Mad Gardener poems and Otto Lennel Ubu. The Knight Letter is the official newsletter of the Lewis Carroll Society of North America and is distributed free to all mem- bers. Subscriptions, business correspondence and inquiries should be addressed to the Secretary, LCSNA, 617 Rockford Road, Silver Spring, MD 20902. Submissions and editorial correspondence should be sent to: Stan Marx, 15 Sinclair Martin Drive, Roslyn, NY 11576 Designed and produced by Jack Golden, Designers 3, Inc. Lewis Carroll Society of North America 617 Rockford Road Silver Spring, MD 20902. isni' Dr. Sandor G. Burstein 2233 Post Street San Francisco, CA 9 4115