Imagery in Lewis Carroll's classic book, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland - like the imagery in all great literature - is richly woven into the fabric of the story, and makes the story come to life in ways that spark the imagination of the reader. Imagery in this book brings the plot into focus and greatly enhances Alice's narrative. And though it is a cliche, it is true in this work that "things are not always what they appear to be." That's part of the fun, and the adventure of Alice.

             Alice is falling, but slowly, very slowly; she has the time to pick up a jar of "Orange Marmalade" from a shelf, and the image of her slowly, painfully slow-motion-like, observing and then plucking a jar of jelly from a cupboard which also had maps (foreshadowing that she would be traveling somewhere mysterious perhaps?) paints a strong picture in the mind of the reader. But the fact that there is nothing in the jar, is disappointing, and one can sense that this may be a foreshadowing of how much of the book will go; that is, confusion, deception, the problem of time (the rabbit's watch shows that he is late) - and of course, of reality vs. fantasy. .

             The beginning of this story is worth taking a close look at in terms of imagery, for it sets the tone and leads the reader comfortably into what will follow.

             Alice's falling itself is a sensory experience, since everyone has fallen at least off a chair, if not out of a tree, and hence all readers, children and adults, know the sensation is both exhilarating and frightening. But to fall so very far, and slowly, creates dream-like images in the reader's mind. The dream-like experience for the reader is amplified by Alice as she "began to get rather sleepy, and went on saying to herself, in a dreamy sort of way, 'Do casts eat bats? Do cats eat bats?'.

             This image is almost beyond sleep and into a drug-like state, a psychedelic kind of fantasy world where one is falling yet also desirous of falling to sleep.