jabberwocky

Jabberwocky
by Lewis Carroll
'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 hast 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.


From Through The Looking Glass and What Alice Found There, 1872.



1: So What On Earth Was Carroll Talking About.....?

It has puzzled poets and philosophers worldwide, since this legendary poem was first penned by the illustrious Mr. Carroll: What on earth was he talking about in the first (and last) stanza?

Let us examine the first stanza for a moment…

In this special place the poet (so movingly) describes, it was apparently "brillig". What was "brillig"? Let us assume for a moment that brillig was a special festival in those days, such as Easter, Passover or Potato Shouting Day (where I come from). But it is a casual or little-known kind of festival/celebration that needs no capitalization of the first letter. Then suddenly the next three lines fall into place. It was "brillig", so the "slithy toves" were celebrating wildly. They "gyred" and "gimbled" like mad in the "wabe"; and most probably suffered for it sorely the next day. The "borogroves" were so glad to see that "brillig" had arrived that they had come over all "mimsy", which must have been very exciting for them. The "borogroves", of course, were small areas of living brush land in the "wabe" area, comprised of small shrubs and nettles with legs and arms, which could mince about in a particularly camp, "mimsy" kind of way. Many of us have seen this phenomenon in car parks, after closing time at the local drinking establishment (or perhaps it is only me).

Who did the "mome raths" think they were, however, that they should presume to "outgrabe"? Mr. Carroll does not explain why they gatecrashed this particular celebration, but there they were all the same, outrageously "outgrabing" all over the place, with all their collective might. From the sound of their name, the "mome raths" might have been wrathful gnomes, or rebel pixies of some kind. The beauty of it is that all of us will see them slightly differently in our mind’s eye. (I see little sniggering, bearded men in jester hats, but that actually has nothing to do with this poem.)

So here we have the mystery of that enigmatic first stanza unravelled at last. Carroll was writing of a legendary rural celebration in the wabe area, where various excitable flora and fauna were frolicking about in great merriment, unaware of the terrible, monstrous beast that was soon to descend upon them: The Jabberwocky.


2: And So To The Jabberwocky Itself…

We are introduced to the infamous Jabberwocky in the second stanza, which seems to be the voice of the beamish boy’s father, giving a stern warning:

This second stanza is much easier to comprehend than the first and last stanzas. We are not sure what the "Jubjub bird" looks like, but we can imagine that the name of the bird describes the noise it makes as it flies in to attack. The "frumious Bandersnatch" is far more difficult to imagine, but the word “frumious” makes it sound angry, because it resembles the word “furious”. It may be possible that the "Jubjub bird" and the "frumious Bandersnatch" are friends of the Jabberwocky, or evil guardians that flank its lair. It is certainly apparent that, while the Beamish Boy dispatches the Jabberwocky, he overlooks the duty of dispensing with these two other menaces. Perhaps he stood too long in “uffish thought” and they sneaked away while he wasn’t paying attention.

All we know about the Jaberwocky at this point is that the ‘y’ is optional, and that it has vicious snapping jaws and claws that can catch you. After we gingerly emerge from behind the sofa to examine the facts, we are not given very much information about the monster at all, but the imagination can fill in the blanks in a uniquely terrifying way, especially in the middle of the night, when no special friends are on hand to pass the comfort blankey.

The next stanza brings us bouncingly to the beamish boy and his vorpal sword.

What is a "vorpal sword", you may well ask? If one has a sharp enough brain, one can glean a little information about what vorpal might be, from the very sound of it, when uttered, especially one spits it out in a very emphatic way. Why, the very letter “V” itself has a sharp point on it, so that gives us a clue. "Vorpal" means very, very, sharp indeed, perhaps even as sharp as the breeches-wettingly-sharp beak of the "Jubjub bird".

He sought the "manxome foe" for a long time. By "manxome", I am certain that Carroll meant that the Jabberwocky had a tail, for in those ancient days, manxome meant the opposite of “manx” as in Manx cats. We can also see, from the famous drawing of the Jabberwocky, that it does, in fact, have a tail. He also paused to rest by the Tumtum tree, which has sadly become extinct. Being immortal, and very, very old, I can report that back in those days, they were very beautiful trees, which bore long, pendulous tum fruits, which resembled the gentlemen’s appendages of bears. The blossoms had an amusing hallucinatory narcotic effect when boiled with rosewater for three days and nights. It was this narcotic effect, along with over-rigorous harvesting of the blossoms in spring, which caused the extinction of the Tumtum tree. There were rumours in recent years that one might be still in existence, somewhere in Africa. No-one has ever been able to locate its exact whereabouts to this day (and believe me I’ve tried).


3: The Climax of the Poem
"Uffish thought" is, of course, thoughts one has while peering thoughtfully up at the sky, in a lofty kind of way, like the way poets do, or people with unfeasibly-large eyebrows, who are trying to look past them towards the heavens.

“The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame” – what a terrifyingly-dramatic image that conjures up in the mind’s eye! Strong men have fainted like big jessies at the thought of it. It came whiffling through the tulgey wood…. How it managed to "whiffle" and burble at the same time is anyone’s guess, since both require use of the vocal chords. I wish I could demonstrate whiffling through the magic of multimedia sound, but sadly it is a lost art that requires the exquisite, pinched vocal warblings of a soprano castrata. There are many things a Tuber poet might do to suffer for his art, and I must emphatically expostulate that becoming a soprano castrata is not one of them.

In the next stanza the climax of the poem actually reaches its shuddering pinnacle. The vorpal (fearsomely-sharp) blade went “snicker-snack” (an adorable piece of onomatopoeia) – neatly dispatching the Jabberwocky to the realm of Hades.

Taking the head as a trophy, the beamish boy went galumphing back, which gives us an interestingly galumphy kind of description about the sound his boots made against the path, as he went galumphing along (I did, in fact, have an interesting video clip of a polar bear demonstrating this lost art of forward-movement, but it was on a CD which has since accidentally been dropped into the back vent of my microwave, which subsequently exploded. Fortunately I was not in the kitchen at the time, but the video demonstration was tragically lost forever).


4: The Resolution of the Poem
After a climax there is always resolution. As a kind of metaphorical afterglow / cigarette, if you will, the beamish boy arrives back home in triumph - to show his father the head of the Jabberwocky. We are not told about his father opening the front door to receive him, but we assume he is not bellowingthough the letterbox in the next stanza, when he says:

“frabjous”, of course, is a very early forerunner of the word “fabulous”. “Callooh” and “Callay” are early exclamations from the days before the Tumtum tree became extinct. “Callooh!” means “by the warts on my belly I am so enormously happy!” and “Callay!” can be loosely translated as: “Well blow me over with a big blowy thing!” These short words obviously saved a lot of rambling on at times of extreme elation.

Which brings is finally to the final stanza, which is simply a repetition of the first, precluding the need to repeat it here. It reaffirms our belief that we are there (at least in our imaginations) in that mysterious land with the beamish boy and his father, now that it has become a safer place for them to live in. We are reassured that those slithy toves are still blissfully gyring and gimbling in the wabe, as though nothing had ever been amiss; those camp old borogroves are as mimsy as ever, while the mome raths continue to outgrabe in their usual outrageous manner. In this finite life, the continuation of this strange little place, if only in the mind’s eye, is strangely comforting somehow, by the repetition of that final stanza. And we all love a happy ending, dear readers.


5: Conclusion

Lewis Carroll's whimsical poem Jabberwocky continues to enchant and baffle scholars, poets and philosophers to this day. Some might wonder whether this genius storyteller was in his cups, or indulging in some recreational chemical abuse of some kind or other, when he wrote this poem, such is their confusion on reading it.

I would rather believe that Mr. Carroll actually visited the place he describes so vividly, and that we have all been there at one time or other, in our dreams, or in the half-forgotten dreams of childhood.

© ~ The Potato of Terror ~, May 2006

Potato Tarquin Orbisfleur Terror III is a professor of New Tuberism and a pioneer of Vegetarianism in New Formalism. See below for links to websites of interest...

Read the Poetry Life & Times Interview with The Potato of Terror, December 2006

Read Excerpts from The Potato of Terror's Spudscrit translations from The Lost Book of Tuberlantis

Visit The Home Page of The Potato of Terror

Visit The Potato of Terror on AuthorsDen

The Potato of Terror would like to thank David Shaw of www.jabberwocky.com for making the Jabberwocky poem text and illustration freely available online, and for his dedication to nonsense poetry and the work of Lewis Carroll.

earthgoddess


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