Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter in Alice in Wonderland
Did many children truly love Lewis Carroll's Alice books? Did they embrace the absurdities and antique wordplay of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass with the same rapt fervor they invested in other favorite stories, or did they find the Carroll works dry and remote? Couldn't it be that kids were listening out of politeness to the big person sitting by their bed? Martin Gardner, author of the 1960 The Annotated Alice , thought so. "It is only because adults scientists and mathematicians in particular continue to relish the Alice books," he wrote, "that they are assured of...
