"'Oh, you foolish Alice!' she answered herself. 'How an you learn lessons in here? Why there's hardly room for you, and no room at all for any lesson-books'" (Carroll 42).
A Victorian child did not grow up in a loving environment, like how many families are today. Despite the supportive, kind parents there are today, Victorian parents raised their children to be disciplined and proper. Victorian children worked hard to please their parents, because if they didn't they knew they would be punished. The relationship between Victorian parents and children would be more formal, rather than friendly.
Childhood today is very different, because a parent and child relationship is informal, along with many parents being more understanding than Victorian parents. Also, present day children are focused more on school, sports, and other extracurricular activities rather than always worrying to satisfy their parents. Today's children are given more freedom to have a childhood filled with imagination and fun.
Similar to a Victorian child, Alice is illustrated as a disciplined child, as well as being kept away from being given any love from her parents. She is portrayed as a Victorian child through this quote, which expresses an answer from her parents when she talks of her curiosity and her strange thoughts and ideas. Instead of going on and continue imagining different things, she stops herself and thinks of her "lesson-books". Her statement of her calling herself foolish shows that her parents wouldn't except "foolish" behavior from her. Also, her lack of control over her imagination of living in Wonderland and writing a story about it would be punished for. Alice often yells at herself to stop thinking of outrageous ideas, because she knows that her parents wouldn't approve.
Ashley M.
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