Alice in Wonderland Books

I was truly pleasingly surprised when I received this book. It was much more than I expected for the price I paid. It is definitely a book I will pass down to my children.

This was a gift so I didn't read it, but the recipients of the book were delighted with it. The cover was beautiful and would make an excellent coffee table book. The delivery was speedy.

I grew up reading Martin Gardner in Scientific American, and although I didn't get interested in Lewis Carroll until I saw the original "Alice" manuscript in a display at the British Library, I've been a fan of children's stories all my life. Having Gardner expound Carroll is (dare I say it?) pure genius. I have a number of annotated works, but I think this is the only one where the notations come close to outweighing the actual text being explained. That goes to show not only how deep the rabbit hole goes, but how much deeper someone like Gardner can dig, and how many rewards can be granted by the author who invites his readers to dig deeper. As I've noted in my other reviews of these annotated works, this one is very attractive on the shelf, easy on the eyes, and thoroughly enjoyable. Pick this up and start throwing out expressions, like, "If you don't jabberwock, I'l smack you in the lobster quadrille!"

If you really want to go beyond the "children's story" side of "Alice in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There", this is an excellent resource. With the help of the notes, the "nonsense" of this tale makes more sense. And you get all that along with reproductions of John Tenniel's fantastic illustrations, including a section in the back with his preparatory pencil sketches. Buy it, and smile like the Cheshire Cat.

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, along with its sequel, Through the Looking Glass and what Alice found there, where done by a person ahead of his time. His name was Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, pen name, Lewis Carroll.
Both are in this modified annotated version combined with the original illustrations by John Tenniel, but not only that, also have the suppressed episode "The Wasp in a wig" in Through the looking glass. Intended for children, this particular book will delight adults as well because it has annotations and information making this even more enjoyable. The information and comments given mostly by Carroll's biographers/scholars/researchers help you understand the meanings behind the puns, word plays, poems, conversation and situations going on behind Carroll's mind (though nobody knows in fact the purpose of the author's intentions, but the annotations or comments were made by hard research or extracted from the author's original manuscript, so they are quite accurate). Mind that this is very useful because most of AAIW and TTLG were made from private jokes, puns, word plays and Victorian manners that not all people knows about. Some were made for England native people, and even further, only friends and collegues of Carroll can understand them. This books are the essence of imagination and fantasy, opening doors to a LOT of authors that in some way or the other included in their works some of Carroll's ideas/themes... so having explanations alongside the story will definately help you to have a better grasp of such masterpiece that had transcended over the centuries.
This book is the one to go, unless another updated version comes along. It has everything you want... both books included with explanations and Tenniel's illustrations... it can't get better than that! :-).
Oh!... btw... handle with care. The book is a bit fragile, specially the dust cover jacket.

~ Life, what is it but a dream~

I wasn't really sure what to expect when I purchased The Jungle Books. I am familiar with Disney's story of Mowgli, but was very unfamiliar to all the volumes and the other stories. These stories were very interesting and moving -- the stories of Mowgli were exciting, and I loved The White Seal, Rikki-Tikki, and all of the others as well. What a great collection.

The Jungle Book (1894) and The Second Jungle Book (1895) are collections of children's stories and related poems by Rudyard Kipling, the Briton who was born in and loved India, and who wrote these stories while living in Vermont. The stories are written as fables, and teach some moral lessons. They are probably Kipling's best-known works.

Many of the stories in both volumes feature Mowgli, the child raised by wolves who becomes master of the jungle (the first three stories in The Jungle Book are very obviously the inspiration for the 1967 animated Disney film). Most of the other stories are also set in India, although "The White Seal" in The Jungle Book and "Quiquern" (which is about Inuits) in The Second Jungle Book are exceptions. In nearly all instances, Kipling anthropomorphizes the animals; they speak, and are always prominent characters.

Kipling does a good job of writing in the fable style, although he doesn't always keep things moving at a good pace, and so some stories are more engaging than others.

There is a subtle racism throughout both volumes. Kipling was a staunch imperialist (he wrote the poem "The White Man's Burden" - this phrase has been used by imperialists since to justify imperialism as noble), and when humans feature in these stories, English whites are often presented as culturally and intellectually superior to the native Indians. This racism is still relevant, as it indicates a popular attitude of the day.

Ultimately, the Jungle Books are well worth reading. They have, perhaps deservedly so, achieved a prominent place in the pantheon of children's literature.

Since it appears that Amazon is combining the reviews for several versions of this book under one, I want to stipulate that I've read the Barnes & Nobel Classic version.

Actually comprised of 2 books, The Jungle Book and The Second Jungle Book, this is a collection of stories surrounding the jungles of India. A central character is Mowgli - a boy left in the jungle when his parents are frightened away and who is raised by wolves. His adventures as he grows up in the jungle are intriguing, frightening, enchanting, and certainly adventurous! This is NOT Disney! The way Kipling presents this material, it is easy to suspend belief and one could believe a boy was raised amongst the animals.

There are a host of other stories in each books that have nothing whatsoever to do with Mowgli, and that is fine. A couple even take the reader out of the jungle and into the frozen north - talk about a change of scenery! Still, Kipling keeps the reader fully engaged with the lives of animals and the effects of their environment.

A book of true escapism, but certainly not "just" for adults or children. Though the language might be a little more difficult to follow for younger children, older children should be able to stretch their imagination. And adults can fully appreciate the language of Kipling, which is rich and descriptive.

A thoroughly enjoyable read!

Rather than being raised by apes, it is wolves that fulfill for the family role for the young boy Mowgli after he escapes being tiger snacks.

Shere Khan will continue to be his antagonist, and he will gain advice and assistance from other jungle denizens as he grows to manhood.

This also has the pretty cool heroic mongoose tale Rikki-Tikki-Tavi.

"The Jungle Books" by Rudyard Kipling are adventures of Mowgli and friends. Mowgli is a boy who is kidnapped as a baby by a tiger. He is raised by wolves and taught the laws of the jungle by Baloo the bear and Bagheera the black panther. Mowgli is then kicked out of the wolf pack because of Shere Khan the tiger who swore to kill Mowgli one day. Mowgli learns all the ways of the jungle. He eventually kills Shere Khan. Baloo is a lovable bear who teaches Mowgli the ways of the jungle and how to respect it. Bagheera is a feared and wise black panther who befriends Mowgli in all situations. In "Kaa's Hunting", Mowgli is kidnapped by the Bandar-log monkeys. Monkeys are not highly respected in the jungle community because they have no leader. Baloo and Bagheera seek the help of Kaa the Python to rescue Mowgli. The stories "Rikki-Tikki-Tavi" and "The White Seal" have nothing to do with Mowgli and his adventures, but they offer valuable lessons. The lesson in "Rikki-Tikki-Tavi" is to trust yourself and the loyalty in friends.
The story "The White Seal" is about Aleuts coming to Novastoshnah every year and skinning hundreds of seals. The only white seal ever born on the island, Kotick, wants to find a new island to stay on, so that the people will not know where to look for the seals. This way no more seals will be killed. Kotick wanders for many years in search of a new island to live on. Once he finds one, he goes back to tell the rest of his herd, but they don't believe him. He challenges one of the other males to a fight and if he wins, they will go with Kotick to the new island. In the end, all the other seals die because none of them would go with him, so he taught them all a lesson.
In "Rikki-Tikki-Tavi", a curious mongoose wanders into a garden. He meets a cobra named Nag. Because mongooses naturally eat snakes, Rikki-Tikki kills Nag. Nagina, Nag's wife gets mad at Rikki-Tikki-Tavi and threatens to bite his owners. Rikki-Tikki crushes all of his eggs in the nest. I liked this story, but didn't like how it didn't tie into the adventures of Mowgli.
In "Toomai of the Elephants", a young boy falls asleep on his elephant. The elephants then march off to a hill far away. Here the boy wakes up to find thousands of elephants all stomping in the same pattern, at the same time. The boy has seen the dance of the elephants. When he returns to his father, he tells him that, but he doesn't believe him. I disliked how that this story also had nothing to do with Mowgli and his adventures.

I love this whole series. I think it (the series) makes for a great "escape reading". Get away from it all and sink into the adventures of this young girl in Echo Falls. I would recommend it to both kids and adults.

This "mystery" is incredibly simplistic. Any reader over the age of 10 will probably figure it out long before the end. It's also pretty unrealistic. How many things can happen to one kid...and her parents NEVER find out?!? There are much better books out there for young adults. Skip this one.

I normally don't read many mysteries, but this one just grabbed hold and wouldn't let go. I was a bit bothered by some of the main character's behavior, but on the whole I really enjoyed it.

Established author Peter Abrahams' first foray into YA literature, DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE, is a White Rabbit worth chasing -- intelligent, mysterious, and just plain fun. As you would expect with a murder mystery, the plot is a strength, but Abrahams knows better than to leave it at that. He uses mood to work in some great descriptive scenes and deftly draws the reader in to protagonist Ingrid Levin-Hill's little Connecticut world by providing excellent characterizations of the 8th grader, her family, and the townspeople of Echo Falls.

In addition to the Lewis Carroll allusions, Abrahams drops many E. Conan Doyle references as well. Ingrid's favorite character is Sherlock Holmes, you see, which is awfully convenient considering that she meets Cracked-Up Katie, the town eccentric, only hours before she is murdered (inconveniently, Ingrid leaves her soccer cleats at the murder scene). When Ingrid returns to the scene of the crime to retrieve the shoes, she solves nothing and only gets in deeper (elementary, my dear reader).

As the murder investigation plays out on two fronts (Police Chief Strade's and Ingrid's own), Ingrid tries out for the role of Alice in a local production of ALICE IN WONDERLAND. Curioser and curioser, it seems the murder victim herself was once into acting (and at the theater in question, too). With all manner of loose strands to work with, Abrahams keeps the reader guessing until tea party's end (at which point the book practically becomes un-put-downable).

You'd be Mad as a Hatter to miss this one. Go ahead. Jump down the rabbit hole and enjoy...

Ingrid Levin-Hill is a middle school soccer player, actress, and magnet for trouble. When a town character is murdered soon after Ingrid meets her, Ingrid is unwittingly drawn into the mystery. (Doesn't hurt that her hero is Sherlock Holmes.) The author writes adult mysteries, so he knows how to plot, and he turns his abilities to a likable, resourceful, and often befuddled protagonist with a host of the usual teenage problems, but with current computer skills. A fun fast read for adults and teens.

This book reminds me of watching Henry Kissinger being interviewed by William F. Buckley, Jr. on FIRING LINE. Poor Henry spoke so deliberately and so s-l-o-w-l-y that I genuinely couldn't follow what he was saying. His cannonballs could barely make it out of the barrel of his cannon.

Up until reading this book I thought I would never again have to experience that excruciating pain. This volume is an excellent edition of esoterica and historical trivialties. Whatever "magic" one might hope to find in "Alice's ..." is almost immediately lost in trying to read the copious notes in the margins. (My bad?) I had hoped for something less pedantic and sterile. (My bad? ... doesn't some slang just make you wince?)

Anyway, be advised - if you're having trouble getting to sleep, this book is for you. (wink, wink)

Perhaps no other set of works in literature benefits more from annotation than "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Class." Martin Gardner, the author of a regular monthly column on recreational mathematics for "Scientific American," provides expert commentary on all the jokes, games, puzzles, tricks, parodies, obscure references and other curiosities with which Lewis Carroll saturated his writing. That means that you will find out who was the original model for the Chesire Cat and how the "Jabberwocky" poem translates into French. Actually, the definitions of all of those strange words in "Jabberwocky" is quite a load off of my mind. Besides, this edition also contains the full text of each tale, together with all of the original Sir John Tenniel illustrations in their proper places. The annotation runs concurrently with the text and Gardner also provides an introduction that covers both the story of how the books came to be written and some of the most interesting analyses of Carroll's works, such as those always fun Freudian interpretations. The bottom line is that either one of these books gets 5 stars by itself, so when you put the two of them together and add all this annotation, there is nothing to complain about. This is the perfect book for re-reading these books; I would never send anybody here for their first exposure to Alice, but once they are hooked on Carroll's sublime nonsense this will open up a whole new dimension or two (or three) of his work for them.

I was given this as a birthday gift as a child, and find it is one of the few gifts I can remember receiving. And probably the only one I still use, nearly 30 years later. If you enjoy Alice, you will love to know more of the background, and inside jokes that you will no doubt miss without this book.

Victorian-era readers of Lewis Carroll's delightful fantasies knew the poetry and song and public figures referred to; we moderns need to have the jokes explained to us, and Martin Gardner does a masterful job of it. We're fortunately past the more bizarre Freudian and Marxist interpretations of Alice that Gardner takes to task in his preface, but Gardner's annotations survive, as they should. The White Knight's encounter with Alice is heartbreaking when you know the background information, the lyric the White Knight's doggerel alludes to. By all means, give this to children at risk of being pithed by exposure to a certain indigo reptile; as children, they'll appreciate the story, and as they mature, they'll appreciate the commentary, and you'll have saved a budding intellect.

In this case the foreign country is in time and space. This book appears to be stand alone logic and fun on the surface. Some may even think it is a children's book. If so why all the courses and scholarly writings on the story?
Some things are self evident as being so short that you can touch your toes. Others may take some time as the reason hatters are mad is the process includes mercury. Still when was the last time you used a bathing machine? Knowing some of information can enhance the enjoyment of reading the story.
You get the original illustrations to boot. So when you are finished perusing this book it can be used as a coffee table conversation book.

The story continues after Alyss Heart, Queen of Wonderland ascend the throne after overthrown her aunt Redd. Not so long after peace and white imagination has come back, the old army of Redd began to rise. Again, the story still mainly develops in life of Alyss and her on-leave body guard Hatter. This book is nowhere close to the original story of the wonderland, but if you enjoy the Looking Glass War, Seeing Redd would be the good way to go find out what happen after that.

SEEING REDD, the second book in THE LOOKING GLASS WARS series, continues off from where the last book ended.

Twenty-year-old Alyss is now queen of Wonderland. Her aunt, Redd, has disappeared into the Heart Crystal along with her sidekick, The Cat, and everything is starting to calm down.

But soon glass eyes start appearing out of nowhere and causing mayhem. Everyone believes that Redd has somehow come back and that they're all doomed. Little do they know that these aren't Redd's glass eyes. Someone else is having them made. And that someone else is the King of Boarderland, Arch.

King Arch has plans to take down Wonderland and all of the surrounding cities. And he is determined to do so. He has Molly (the Queen's bodyguard) captured and intends to have her father, Hatter Madigan, come rescue her.

Meanwhile, Redd and The Cat find their way to Earth and Redd gets a whole new group of followers. She is determined to get back to Wonderland and kill Alyss so she will finally be Queen.

Alyss and Dodge come to terms with the fact that they are meant to be together. But Dodge is still set on killing the beast that killed his parents. Nothing will get in his way -- besides Alyss, that is.

Wonderland is in a world of trouble with King Arch and Redd doing all they can to finally get Alyss out of the picture once and for all.

Full of violence and mayhem, SEEING REDD is an intense read. It's a pretty good second book to the series; parts were a bit slow but, overall, it was a good read. I definitely liked THE LOOKING GLASS WARS much better; for some reason it didn't seem as wordy as SEEING REDD. But this was still a good book. I especially liked the way it ended, and it should definitely be read by those who enjoyed the first book in the series.

Reviewed by: Breanna F.

Not as good as the first. Their was a point in which I contemplated shutting the book for good. Yet I suffered through it to find a bearable ending. It did not 'hook' me whatsoever, which may have been the ending that the author was looking for.
Alyss and friends have rebuilt the Heart Castle and undid most of the damage done by Redd. The first part of the book seemed like a segment from an action movie. It was entirly about Alyss fighting off the glass eyes. The next two parts of the book were just boring.
I don't know weather or not i'll read the next one.

Not as good as the first book but still a great read. If you liked book #1 then you have to continue reading the story.

Great book. Excellent sequel to the Looking Glass Wars. Want to read it again. Great character development that makes you want to root for the other side. Couldn't put the book down once it was picked up. Not going to give too much away, but if you loved Looking Glass Wars, you must get Seeing Redd.

They have done a wonderful job of recreating the origninal feel of the work using beautiful illustrations, quality paper. A wonderful gift for any child, or for a grandparent to read to a child.

Through the Looking Glass by Louis Carrol is a great book if you like imaginary places and mixed up things as well as little kid stories I would recamend this book to kids 11 and under because it seems like a really little kid book!The main place the character goes is the looking glass and she finds a magical world where everything is backwards! The first thing Alice see's is the garden and not just any old garden with any old flowers in it. It was a magical garden with talking flowers. Alice is now strolling through the flower jungle when all of a sudden she bumpes into Tweedle-dee and Tweedle-dum. After that they take her to meet the white queen. Will Alice meet the white queen? If she does will the white queen be as polite as nice as Alice expected? After Alice got out of the flower forest she wan'ts to meet the white king so Tweedle-dee and Tweedle-dum take her to see the white king and while Alice was talking to him the king took her to the castle to meet some of the people he knows and really the things wern't really people they were................?


The next part of my paragraph that I wan't to talk to you about the characters of through the looking glass. The main character is Alice she is so smart and so pretty and so young. The next two people I want to talk to you about are two idiots who are not so- smart and not so-small that are Tweedle-dee and Tweedle-dum they are so loud and rude they make a slob look neat. Another character is the white queen she is such a vrat she is ro rude Alice thinks she will explode if she said one more word. The white king is the last character that I want to talk to you about he is nice to Alice and not even as close to rude as the white queen is!

Illustrations are plenty, and the introduction is a nice addition. The best illustrated version I have ever seen, great for fans of Carroll and Peake both.

I read some of the reviews here... and there was a comment in one of them that says: "it's NOT QUITE a sequel to Alice In Wonderland because although Alice is older, she doesn't recall her past experience in wonderland."

Well... isn't that to be expected? How many dreams to you remember for the long term? None?

Alice DID change by the end of the first book -- but she may have forgotten exactly WHY she changed... because dreams just don't stay with people very well.

Also keep in mind that the author was a wierd drugged up stoner. So -- yeah... on all accounts -- I think this can be expected.

It's a good read.

I just finished reading this classic children's story to my younger son. It is just SO weird. Of course I - and both my sons - had been introduced to Alice via Golden Books as so many children have been for so long. So there are recognitions all the way through. But the strangeness seems intensified because of that. Some of it is the dated language (looking glass instead of mirror), the dated social customs (like the telling of stories in poetry). But the humour is not of the 'ha ha' type, it is definitely of the peculiar type.

Despite those reservations my son enjoyed the book, as he did 'Sylvie and Bruno' which we read earlier (even weirder and certainly less familiar - but it might be more inventive too).

Even from the reviews I read, I was expecting more pictures than there are. The illustrations are just like what are in the original Alice book and are very detailed. I have a 4 and 5 year old, and this book is not one that I leave laying around - they only get to color in it as a special treat. I've colored a few myself, and some of them are really pretty difficult! Very nice change from a plain Jane coloring book, though. We use colored pencils, which probably work best for this type of picture.

This is an odd product. It's a terrific little book, a nice abridgement of Alice's adventures, complete with enlarged illustrations of Tenniel's wonderful work. As such, it is a valuable book to me. But at the same time, it was made to be a coloring book, and is printed on coloring book-type paper--cheap, gray and almost pulp. Perhaps there should be two versions--a better-quality publication for those who love the story and the illustrations, and this one, for little children to desecrate. That said, the illustrations alone make this worth more than it costs. As others have said, buy at least two.

I have purchased this book for both of my grandaughters.They are very familiar with the Disney version,that came out as a movie when I was @ 5,which helped to develop my imagination. Later,as an adult I read the original "Alice" novels by Lewis Carroll,which I also enjoyed. This is a nice combination of both a special coloring book, that also tells a timeless story.My grandaughters now can appreciate the original story because they are coloring each page as we read the book.

I received this book as a gift and it is too pretty to color in, I had to buy one I could color in! Take my advice, buy more than one!

This is a perfect read-aloud introduction to Alice in Wonderland. It seems a shame to call it a coloring book! The original illustrations are stunning in black and white, and challenge the colorist to use her greatest skills. My three-year-old listened attentively to the entire story. Warning - do not use markers, as they will bleed through. My highest recommendation.

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is a very good book in my opinion. I feel that it is just like you are in a dream and the author does a very good job at writing the book so it seems like that. I think it is a good book because it really keeps you focused on what is happening because it is a complicated story. There are a lot of twists and turns in the book, especially in the beginning. I think that it is also a good book because the author, Lewis Carroll, includes things that you would never even think about until you read to book. I also like the book because it is very entertaining to understand how Alice (the main character) tries to deal with and interoperate all of the strange circumstances that happen in wonderland. All of the characters that are in the book are very strange and tell very bizarre stories. The stories have no point what so ever and it gets quite frustrating to Alice because she really wants to know what happens, but they just wont say it and go on and on. All of the events that happen in the book that need trial do not seem very savvy and are unjust and unfair which is quite interesting to read about because Alice gets accused of a lot of things and it is very gallant of her to stand up for herself. With all of the facts that I just stated, my conclusion is that Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is a very good book and I would recommend it to any readers that would like to know about a little girl and her bizarre and exciting adventures in wonderland.

Alice in Wonderland with color photos from Hallmark TV movie, and also color photos from it on the dust jacket.

One think that frustrates me is when Amazon reviews ignore the medium that the stories are presented in. My review is about this specific Hallmark Edition book.

It's difficult to find a nice hardcover version of both stories complete with the original illustrations. the illustrations are either poor quality, or are reduced in number. This book doesn't use them at all, so if that's important to you, look elsewhere. Instead it includes beautiful photographs of the scenes from the NBC TV movie. In my opinion this is better than the original, but it lacks the historical signifigance.

In my opinion, get this book. It has the stories you want and the photos are very pleasing to look at. This book is bound nicely and will make a great addition to any library or collection.

This book takes place in Alice's living room and through her looking glass.(Her mirror) Alice is a sweet little girl whose cat just had kittens. She was talking to one of them, and then thought about what it would be like to live through the looking glass. While she is thinking she falls asleep.She has a very strange dream about going to looking glass land. She almost makes her dream seem real!

Lewis Carroll provides us with a twisted view of our worldthat provokes hours upon hours of thought. This novel may seem like anovel for children, however, it is filled with more literary devices than a truck-load of Hawthorne! Beautiful imagery, puns, malapropisms, possible drug innuendoes and grammatical devices make this a masterpiece to be reckoned with. Be prepared for deep thought upon a close examination of this seeming children's novel, because it is certainly a work for the more experienced reader. By far my favorite book!

I wanted to read Alice in Wonderland to my 3 year old daughter. She will listen to stories, but has a much better attention span if they are illustrated. This book has illustrations on every page. I know some people hesitate because the illustrations are not all by the same artist, so depictions of Alice are not consistent. I certainly didn't mind that, and my little girl didn't, either. She was ENRAPTURED.
We LOVE this book. It's become nightly reading at bedtime. It's large, easy to share with a little listener. It's also beautiful enough for a keepsake. Highly recommended for anyone who wants to share this story, or wants to see all the glorious illustrations done over the years, by many talented artists.

So far, I have read "Alice's Adventures" twice with my daughter... The first time was a standard edition with black-and-white illustrations, and that was fun, though it took a while to get through. Revisiting the story with this ornate and wildly creative edition, which combines dozens of vintage illustrations from a number of different versions of the book, was a lot more fun... Although it can be mildly disconcerting to have the images and representations of Alice and the Wonderland menagerie change so much from panel to panel, at its heart this is a wonderful way to see the story -- you not only get a sense of how many different ways a story can be depicted, you also absorb a little bit of magic from each artist. Consistently surprising and evocative, this book breathes new life into a timeless tale. Highly recommended! (ReadThatAgain)

This is about the 12th classic children's story that I have read to my pre-schooler this year. It has been his least favorite to date. I agree that the writing is excellent, how many writers could capture the true esscence of a dream? But it was not the best story for a 4-year old. He just never really got into it. Some of the chapters were better than others and I will try reading it to him again when he gets older, but for now I'll give it a 3* rating.

Children familiar only with the classic illustrations by John Tenniel will be introduced to a wide variety of artistic interpretations of Lewis Carroll's immortal "Alice in Wonderland", compiled by Cooper Edens. This unabridged edition brings together the works of over thirty illustrators from the late 19th to early 20th centuries. The book is aesthetically balanced with both black and white and color pictures. It is interesting to see how each artist has visualized Alice and the rest of the eccentric characters. Some, such as A. E. Jackson's and Margaret Tarrant's, I found right on target, while others, like A.A. Nash's Shirley Templesque Alice, I found off the mark. But this is simply a personal opinion. My favorite interpreter though is still Arthur Rackham, whose art is featured prominently. All in all a very satisfying purchase.

"Alice", as a story alone, is fantastic. This edition, with pictures by various artists, is a treat for any "Alice" lover, and especially any "Alice" collector. The illustrations are generously strewn throughout the book; the size and heft make it a pleasure to read without overwhelming. What a fun job Cooper Edens must have had in compiling this edition! The picture on the back cover of the little girl reading with her head pillowed on a stack of books, and many characters from the story standing by, is my favorite.

Let me state right of the bat that this book is head-deep in psychoanalytic terminology and to me represents the best confrontation (way better than anti-oedipus and a thousand plateaus) of Deleuze's philosophy with psychoanalysis. I think many readers of Deleuze get caught up in Deleuze's originality and forget that he didn't try to describe a completely new system of everything, but rather wanted to describe more precisely the logic of a creative ontology. For a serious critique of psychoanalysis, the logic of sense is the book to go to, not anti-oedipus. It is for this reason - his desire to confront lacanian psychoanalysis head-on that I consider this to be his boldest book.

Also let me mention that it is in the appendix of this book that Deleuze deals with an extremely important problem which is almost completely overlooked by most Deleuze scholars - the problem of the other. This problem is inextricably linked with lacanian psychoanalysis and hence any critique of psychoanalysis must rigorously understand the ontology of the other. Deleuze here says that the ontological status of the other is that of a "possible world" which complicates things a bit because of his earlier critique of the concept of the possible in difference and repetition.

In contrast to one of the previous reviewers, I consider the idea that Deleuze is or was ever a post-semiotic theorist is completely wrong. In many interviews when asked about what he tried to do, he answers that he tried to come up with a theory OF signs (this is even his answer after he worked with guattari, which is very curious)... This is evidenced quite clearly in that one of his earliest books is on proust and signs, and that in Difference and Repetition, signs repeatedly come up as being the "flashes" as Deleuze describes them, that connect intensive differences. A book coming out called "the primacy of semiosis" uses a synthesis of Deleuze's ideas about univocity and signs with other theorists and will probably provide useful reading for this problem.

You can certainly read this book for fun, but I think the more "fun" of Deleuze's books are the works with Guattari, which I am sorry to say, are also his worst books. All of the genius in them (mostly stylistic, not conceptual) relies on the genius of his early work (the concept creation). The concepts were created very early, and as Badiou claims, Deleuze just found different names for them in different contexts. Not to bash Guattari, I think his "Three Ecologies" is quite good (not his earlier stuff though), but the combined work is more interesting than it is philosophically serious. lets not forget something quite crucial: Deleuze states guattari saved him from psychoanalysis - which is why this book is so important since it is the only and last confrontation Deleuze ever has WITHIN psychoanalytic terminology.

Again, I can't stress it enough, to understand this book, you need to read Lacan since much of the book is most obvioiusly a response to and a re-internalization (through "buggery") of lacan (the chapter titles make this quite obvious).

I also recommend as a supplement to this:
1) The Lacanian Subject - by Bruce Fink... Incredibly clear book on lacan's theory of the subject.
2) Difference & Repetition (Deleuze's Masterwork)
3) The Anti-Oedipus papers: Deleuze and guattari's letters to each other in the production of anti-oedipus. Here the problems become more obvious and the genesis of the style explicit.

This was the first book of Deleuze's that i read. The book begins with an analysis of Lewis Carrol's "Alice in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Glass". The often playful style of writing is deceptive; the concepts explored are often extremely complicated. Furthermore, i personally found it difficult to link together the various concepts, although of course Deleuze is not trying to write a unified whole. The first section of the book in which Deleuze deals primary with Carrol discusses, amongst other things, paradox, "pure becoming", and explores the relationship between the "surface" and the "murky depths". Somwhere a little after half way through "The Logic of Sense", Deleuze begins the "pyschoanalytic" portion of the book, applying several of the concepts developed previously, especially the relationship between "surfaces" and "depths". Personally, I enjoyed the first half of the book, and all of the talk about phallus' and orality seemed to come out of nowhere; there is no transition or preparation for this shift. The essays including in the appendix provide added (and helpful) insights into the main text and into Deleuze's thought in general. Overall, i found the "surface" of the Logic of Sense not too difficult to grasp, but the inner workings are indeed elusive.

Logic of sense is a very difficult book to get in toto. I'm not sure that it's even meant to be read that way. The book is arranged in a series of paradoxes that each take on a concept or problematic through which Deleuze undoes the hermeneutics of "meaning" in order to replace it with one built around "sense." What makes this book rewarding is its importance to an understanding of expression and imagination in Anti-Oedipus, and various images and signs in his two cinema books. But it almost takes having read his books on Spinoza, Nietzsche, and Bergson first to get the most out of Deleuze's strange and non-subjective ideas of sense and event. I will agree with the reviewer above that the book leans hard on the Stoics, but to stop there would be to miss Deleuze's project here. He wants to create a logic that establishes sense neither in speech nor in language, neither in sign systems nor in structures. He wants to place the production of sense in a philosophy that has restored its grasp of movement and becoming, has shaken its dogmatic belief in concepts and abstractions, and that creates and affirms through virtual qualities and events that, while communicating in fact and through the repetition of the familiar (order), still relate to and express pure qualities. This is really the companion piece to the cinema books but on literature. I don't know that his theory of sense carries well to performance and social convention. Which is frustrating, because we need a some good theories of social convention and language that can take us past linguistics and speech act theories. This is a fantastic book and one of his most inventive.

this century will be known as Deleuzian..................

The Logic of Sense is a deceptive book, for you feel after the first 30 pages or so that you kinda grasp what's going on, only to put it down, take a breath and go: "Eh?" A reviewer once famously called it 'dry as a biscuit' or something to that effect, but I don't think it's dry so much as weird. Weird, that is, that it comes off so calm and *logical* when it's really so insane and delirious. Compared to Deleuze, the majority of postructuralists are like so many Fregeans.
All of which is not to say that the book is as inefficacious as he claims sense is. See, the book works almost as sense comes to by the end---at first shimmering but sterile, and then fecund and obscure. But rest assured, you do find your zone of clarity.
It is difficult, but nowhere near as difficult as the companion piece, Difference and Repetition. One will find many of the arguments there updated and clarified here.
Logicians and the analytic minded might find it annoying that Deleuze keeps referring to sense (which they might read "Sinn") but seems to be completely oblivious to the great Gottlob and his ilk. 'Tis true, after all, that Deleuze sleeps with the enemies in this one; namely, the Stoics and that evil ontological hyperinflationist Meinong.
Which brings me to a word to the wise: it can only help you to have a good understanding of Stoic physics, logic, and ethics before coming to this book of Deleuze's. He may jump from place to place a bit, but--and this is my reading--this book remains fundamentally Stoic. Basically, change "God" to "the aleatory" and endow "sayables" with a potency they were often denied in Stoic logic, and you got yourself a pretty good grasp of the material you'll find here. Or at least a start. IMO, it really does help to just slap your mind into Stoic mode and think about his approach from that angle, rather than simply trying to wrestle Anti-Oedipus or Cinema 2 into the Logic of Sense rubric.
I agree with one of the other reviewers, and believe me it pains me to say it, that the six or so series (chapters) on psychology and dynamic genesis pretty much blarney. They're boring and seem to stop the motors of the book by needlessly colliding with Freud. And since they take us away from the interesting Stoic stuff, and bring us to the other psychology stuff, one can't help but feel they're at least obsolete with respect to Anti-Oedipus and the Fold.
Other than that, it's mega.