Not to evoke shades of Tim Burton's latest
offering, but I found aspects of the following poem, as well as the Tenniel art that accompanies it, to be extremely creepy. Something about the drawing of the monster was horrifying and hypnotic to me at once. Those claws were evocative of the chelicerae of a spider, and radiate a palapable menace; the face looks as if it has elements, however distorted, of an oriental dragon and an ancient catfish of some sort. It obviously houses an evil intellect, and not just the mind of a savage brute. I'd be quite afraid that the Jabberwock might torture its prey with who knows what atrocities. Worst of all, though, is that damn waistcoat. It is so incongruous, so bizarre. I wonder if Carroll directed Tenniel to add that, or if this was a detail conjured soley by the artist?
-Jimmy
[h1]JABBERWOCKY[/h1]
[h2]Lewis Carroll[/h2]
(from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, 1872)
[SIZE=+2]`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"
He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought --
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.
And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!
One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.
"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
He chortled in his joy.
`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.[/SIZE]
