Books - The Hunting of the Snark

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	Books - The Hunting of the Snark

Lewis Carroll's The Hunting of the Snark (An Agony in 8 Fits) is a nonsense poem about a group of adventurers hunting a legendary beast. It borrows occasionally from Carroll's short poem "Jabberwocky" in Through the Looking Glass, (especially the poem's creatures and portmanteau words), but it is a stand-alone work, first published in 1876 by Macmillan. The illustrations were by Henry Holiday.

Cast of characters

The group is led by a Bellman as explained in Fit the First, third verse, and consists otherwise of a Boots, a maker of Bonnets and Hoods, a Barrister, a Billiard-marker, a Banker, a Butcher who can only kill beavers, a forgetful Baker, a Broker, and a Beaver. Care was also landed with the crew (as indicated in the first stanza). Hope, necessary for the pursuit of the elusive snark, also came along. The Boots is the only character who is not shown in any illustration, and is thus the most mysterious member of the crew (see below). As an alternate theory, some have suggested that the character identified as "Care" below is really the ship's figurehead (as shown in the first illustration), and that "Hope" is actually the Boots. Andrew Lang, who reviewed the book in 1876, suggested that "Hope" might be the Bonnet-maker. But this is clearly incorrect, since a shadowy figure making bonnets can be seen on the ship in the second illustration.

Plot summary

After crossing the sea guided by the Bellman's map of the Ocean — a blank sheet of paper — the hunting party arrive in a strange land. The Baker recalls that his uncle once warned him that, though catching Snarks was all well and good, you must be careful; for, if your Snark is a Boojum, then "you will softly and suddenly vanish away, and never be met with again." With this in mind, they split up to hunt. Along the way, the Butcher and Beaver become fast friends, the Barrister falls asleep, and the Banker loses his sanity after being attacked by a frumious Bandersnatch. At the end, the Baker calls out that he has found a snark; but when the others arrive he has mysteriously disappeared.

Structure

The poem has some aspects characteristic of much of Carroll's poetry; it utilizes technically adept meter and rhyme, grammatically correct phrasing, logical chains of events — and largely nonsensical content, frequently employing made-up words such as "Snark". It is by far his longest poem — unlike Alice
which is prose with occasional poems within the text, the Snark rhymes from start to end. The poem is divided into eight sections or "fits" (a pun on the archaic word "fitt" meaning a part of a song, and "fit" meaning a convulsion):

:The Landing :The Bellman's Speech :The Baker's Tale :The Hunting :The Beaver's Lesson :The Barrister's Dream :The Banker's Fate :The Vanishing

Intended audience

It is disputed whether Carroll had a young audience in mind when he wrote the book. The poem has no young protagonists. It is rather dark and does not end happily. In addition to the disappearance of the Baker, the Banker loses his sanity, an event that is described in detail. Similarly, Henry Holiday's illustrations for the original edition are caricatures with disproportionate heads and unpleasant features, very different from Tenniel's illustrations of Alice.

However, Carroll definitely thought the book was suitable for some children. Gertrude Chataway (1866-1951) was the most important child friend in the life of the author, after Alice Liddell. It was Gertrude who inspired The Hunting of the Snark, and the book is dedicated to her. Carroll first became friends with Gertrude in 1875, when she was aged nine, while on holiday at the English seaside. The Snark was published a year later. Upon the printing of the book, Carroll sent eighty signed copies to his favorite child friends. In a typical fashion, he signed them with short poems, many of them masterful acrostics of the child's name.

Origins

In composing the poem Carroll started from its last line. This is how he explained it in 1887: "I was walking on a hillside, alone, one bright summer day, when suddenly there came into my head one line of verse — one solitary line — 'For the Snark was a Boojum, you see.' I knew not what it meant, then: I know not what it means, now; but I wrote it down: and, sometime afterwards, the rest of the stanza occurred to me, that being its last line: and so by degrees, at odd moments during the next year or two, the rest of the poem pieced itself together, that being its last stanza."

:In the midst of the word he was trying to say ::In the midst of his laughter and glee :He had softly and suddenly vanished away ::For the snark was a boojum, you see.

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