Alice au Pays des Merveilles

Lewis Carroll narrates the impossible with a perfectly straight face. A potion tastes of cherry tart and roast turkey and hot buttered toast all at once; a crowd of soaked creatures runs a Caucus-race in which everyone wins and all must have prizes; a blue Caterpillar smokes a hookah atop a mushroom and asks the plainest, hardest question of all—"Who are you?" Alice, who admits she can't quite explain herself "because I'm not myself, you see," keeps her manners through it, chattering to herself, reasoning with the unreasonable, growing and shrinking by turns.

The delight is in the logic that loops back on itself and the wordplay that never stops: a Duchess and a baby that will not stay a baby, a grinning Cheshire Cat who fades away tail-first and leaves its smile hanging in the air. There are tea parties that never end and croquet played with live flamingos, all told as calmly as a walk to the shops.

Underneath the nonsense runs something tender—a child working out the rules of a place that makes no sense by trying to be polite to creatures who have none. Where it all leads is left for the riverbank and the reading. The door is small, and the garden beyond it is bright.