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Caucus

The Lory is seen at the left next to Alice.

The Lory is a character appearing in Chapter 2 and 3 of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, a reference to Lorina Liddell, Alice's older sister. Lorina also appears, unnamed, as herself at the beginning of the book.

In this passage Lewis Carroll incorporated references to everyone present on the original boating expedition of July 4, 1862 during which Alice's Adventures were first told, with Alice as herself, and the others represented by birds: the Lory was Lorina Liddell, the Eaglet was Edith Liddell, the Dodo was Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, and the Duck was Rev. Robinson Duckworth.

According to The Annotated Alice, Carroll had originally had the characters dry off by having the Dodo lead them to a nearby house for towels. As they walked, only Alice, the Lory, and the Eaglet could keep up. This was a reference to a boating outing Carroll had with the three girls and their family. It began to rain and the group left for a nearby house. Carroll and the sisters got there first, as they walked the fastest. Carroll ultimately replaced this scene in the book with the Caucus race, as he felt that it would only have been funny to the people familiar with the incident.

Biography[]

Almost nothing is known about Lory's biography, except that he is older than Alice (it is not specified how much). In the Soviet audio concert "Alice in Wonderland" (1976) by Vladimir Vysotsky, Lory talks about his youth.

By Vysotsky's version, Lory was born in the early 16th century (he just said "in some one thousandth and more year", but from the context it is clear what time talking about) in the jungles of Central America (possibly Cuba or Mexico). When he was young, he was caught by Hernan Cortez. Cortez also insulted Lory's father, but father could not answer him because he could not speak. For many days, while on Cortez's ship, Lory was learning the words "Karamba", "Corida" and "Damn it" to avenge his father's humiliation.

Then Cortez's ship was boarded by British privateers, and Lory was captured as a trophy. They were feeding him and trying to teach him to greet them in English, but he wasn't telling them anything except "Karamba", "Corida" and "Damn it". For about 100 years he sailed on pirate ships around the world, until one of the sailors sold him to the Turkish pasha. Pasha was very surprised when he found out that by this time Lory had learned not only to speak, but also to write, sing, count and dance. By the time he met Alice, Lory had already traveled all over the world, in particular, he mentions that he had been to India, Iran and Iraq.

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Alice's Adventures in Wonderland Characters

Alice The Mad Hatter The White Rabbit The Queen of Hearts The King of Hearts The Caterpillar The March Hare The Knave of Hearts The Cheshire Cat The Dormouse The Lory The Eaglet The Duck The Dodo Bill the Lizard Mary Ann Dinah Alice's Sister The Duchess The Cook The Executioner Father William Frog Footman Fish Footman The Pig Baby The Gryphon The Mock Turtle Tortoise The Playing Cards The Puppy

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