As he escorted the three young daughters of a colleague on a trip up the river Isis, Lewis Carroll invented ALICES ADVENTURES IN WONDERLAND , the story of a little girl who tumbles down a rabbit hole. Full of such wonderfully eccentric characters as the Queen of Hearts, Tweedledum and Tweedledee, the Cheshire Cat, the Mock Turtle, and the Mad Hatter. The book is simultaneously a political allegory, a parody of Victorian childrens literature, a fairy tale, a dream, and a childs chronicle of growing up.