Richmond School

Biography

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, also known as Lewis Carroll (his pseudonym), was born in 1832 and educated at Rugby College and Christ Church, Oxford. Although a lecturer in mathematics there from 1855, Dodgson achieved international fame as the author of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1866) and Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found there (1871). A boat ride with the three daughters of H. G. Liddell, dean of Christ Church -- Alice, Edith, and Lorina -- inspired him to write these tales, which include much of his extant verse. He published poetry as well in Phantasmagoria and Other Poems (1869), The Hunting of the Snark (1876), and Rhyme? and Reason? (1883). He died in 1898. For a biography, see Donald Serrell Thomas's Lewis Carroll: A Portrait with Background (London: John Murray, 1996; PR 4612 T48 1996 Robarts Library). Roger Lancelyn Green edited his diaries (2 vols., 1954) and co-edited with Morton M. Cohen his letters (2 vols., 1979). See also The Annotated Alice, introduced by Martin Gardner (New York: Clarkson N. Potter, 1960; PR 4611 A55 1960 Robarts Library).

  • Cohen, Morton N.. “Dodgson, Charles Lutwidge [Lewis Carroll] (1832-1898).” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Ed. H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison. Oxford: OUP, 2004.