Lewis Carroll, the famed author most notably known for his Alice in Wonderland book series, created a poem, "Jabberwocky," to be included in Though the Looking Glass.  Down the rabbit hole, Alice sees things completely differently.  Her experiences and surroundings are inevitably scarier and more intimidating than the world she is used to.  To further prove this point, he uses the poem to intensify the distinct difference between Alice's worlds. The gibberish words used to create the poem on their own would make no sense, but together create an accurate image in the reader's mind of what the poem is trying to say. Carroll's use of a harsh tone, stanza repetition, and gibberish conveys a feeling of uneasiness and dread. With the combination of all of these elements, the reader feels disconnected and confused about the poem; the same feeling that Alice is most likely feeling at the bottom of the rabbit hole.

Through Carroll's use of tone, we are able to understand the poem's meaning.  Diction is the most important component of this poem. While some of the text is in plain English, most of the poem is in a form of gibberish.  This creates a certain disconnect with the reader, but even with the disconnect the audience has a sense of what the poem is trying to convey.  Even though most of the words do not make any sense, this poem takes an incredibly dark turn from the very beginning.  Immediately one is able to pick up on the harsh tone and word choice meant to create an intense, fearful air around the stanzas.  Carroll uses the phrase "slithy toves (Carroll 31)" in the very first line.  Obviously, these words are not real, but they create a feeling of slyness and nervousness that comes with an intense poem.  He uses words like this throughout the poem to further drive into the reader the feeling of dread and apprehension that the characters in the poem are feeling.  Every word that is chosen has an angry feeling about it.  When Carroll does use proper English, he uses phrases like "Beware the Jabberwock, my son (31)" or "He left it dead, and with its head (31)".  None of these sentences have a happy feeling about them.  He reiterates this feeling of dread over and over again making one feel uncomfortable until the very end of the poem. His use of alliterations further drives home this point. In each stanza he has at least one alliteration present. The repetitions of these alliterations helps create a harsh sound to better convey the conflict in the poem. In the line " the claws that catch" an alliteration is used to bring the attention to the fight scene at hand. An altercation is about to happen and Carroll is showing how ferocious this beast is and how the reader, along with Alice, should be scared of it. She has challenges upon challenges to face before she will make it back home  if she makes it back home. This poem is meant to make the audience feel for Alice. It causes feelings of being afraid and confused, much like Alice is feeling. "Jabberwocky" is the tying emotional element of the story to the reader. Based off the tone alone, one gets a firm sense of the way Alice is feeling and can feel that for her.

Repetition is a major factor in the poem "Jabberwocky."  For example, the ending of the poem is repeated from the first stanza.  This repetition brings about an air of mystery around the meaning of the poem.  This can be taken one of two ways.  It can be seen as a foreshadowing of the killing of the Jabberwocky taking place or as the killing itself.  Neither outcome is pleasant, but both show signs of fear in the characters of the poem.  This again creates a mystery surrounding the killing. In the latter form, the repetition of the first stanza, "'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves/Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;/All mimsy were the borogoves,/And the mome raths outgrabe (31)" is meant to confuse the reader. It can mean that even though one Jabberwocky is killed, there could be many more out there. This symbolizes the struggles that Alice is about to face. She will have challenges upon challenges upon challenges to face in her time in the hole and as soon as she completes one, she will have one more to face. Or, in the case of the former, she could have completed the hardest of the challenges and is able to see the light out of her situation. Based on the tone of the poem though, it leads readers to believe that the Jabberwocky is coming back, and he was not killed to begin with.  This leads back to the sense of the unknown and fear of what is going to happen in the story.  This is shown through cutesy language, but it has a dark meaning behind all of the fake words. 

The use of gibberish causes confusion and annoyance while still giving a somewhat clear meaning.  The combination of some of these "gibberish" words were in fact made up of common, everyday words to give readers a hint of what the words could mean. For instance, the word "chortled (31)" is meant to meant to be a cross between "chuckle" and "snort". After this poem and book became popular, this word was brought into everyday use and is now in the English dictionary. Another example of combined words are "frumious (31)" which is a combination of "fuming" and "furious". Being able to combine the words is a way for the author to not only come up with new words, but to be able to leave the meaning of the words up to personal interpretation. Carroll is very wise in the word choices he created by manifesting words that could be perceived in meaning by how the reader choses to read the poem. Though no matter how it is read, the majority of the lines had an ominous undertone to them. The audience can tell that there is a sinister thread going on through the poem. The use of the Jabberwockys symbolized that something evil is afoot. There is no way to see positivity in the light of the Jabberwocky. 

The dark nature of the poem makes the reader feel uncomfortable. Carroll achieves this with his wide use of repetition, alliterations, and word choice. Carroll demands one's attention and points the focus toward the dark themes of the story and defines how we should feel about them. He creates an air of mystery about what is going on, but we are able to infer that it is not good. Carroll uses these varied methods to illustrate the importance of the poem within the story.

