The White Rabbit
From Carroll’s copy of a real bunny to Tenniel’s scurrying figure
Carroll’s early sketches
Carroll’s earliest drawings filled sheets of letter-writing paper. Here, he begins with a sketch of a real rabbit, which evolves over the first page into a fully anthropomorphized form. (A study of Alice in profile appears upside-down on the left.) On the second page, Carroll begins working out Alice’s first meeting with the White Rabbit.
Lewis Carroll (1832–1898)
Preliminary sketches of the White Rabbit
Preparatory drawings (graphite and pen-and-ink on paper), 1862-1864
Photography: Christ Church Library
© Governing Body of Christ Church, Oxford
Carroll’s final drawing in the manuscript
In Carroll’s finished illustration, the White Rabbit is essentially a human figure that has donned a full suit. Carroll depicts the exact moment just before Alice’s encounter with the White Rabbit, when she leans down for her first conversation in Wonderland.
Lewis Carroll (1832–1898)
Alice’s Adventures Under Ground
Illustrated manuscript, completed 13 September 1864
© The British Library Board, Add MS46700
Tenniel’s final drawing
Tenniel’s original drawing—which he later hand colored, presumably at the request of a collector—shifts the emphasis to the moment after Alice first speaks to the White Rabbit, and shows the startled creature, now more rabbit-like and no longer in a full suit, scurrying away.
John Tenniel (1820–1914)
The Rabbit Scurried Away into the Darkness
Final drawing (watercolor over graphite on paper), 1864-1865
Private Collection, Photo © Christie's Photo / Bridgeman Images
The first edition
Carroll oversaw every aspect of the design for Alice. He selected the scenes for Tenniel to illustrate and ordered the precise size (down to eighths of an inch) and placement of each picture in the book. Closely attuned to the relationship between word and image, the text below this illustration also functions as a caption.
Image credit:
Lewis Carroll (1832—1898)
John Tenniel (1820—1914), illustrator
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
London: Macmillan, 1865
The Pierpont Morgan Library, New York. PML 352027.
Photography by Graham S. Haber 2014.
Tenniel’s later drawing
In the decades following the book’s immediate success, Tenniel was frequently requested to make drawings of his own illustrations for collectors. This fine example was commissioned some time after the book appeared in 1865.
John Tenniel (1820–1914)
The Rabbit Scurried Away into the Darkness
Post-publication drawing (graphite on paper), 1865 or later
Henry W. and Albert A. Berg Collection of English and American Literature, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations