The White Knight sliding down the poker — Illustrations for Through the Looking Glass by John Tenniel

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The White Knight sliding down the poker

Sir John Tenniel

1871

Wood-engraving by Dalziel

Illustration for the first chapter of Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass

"Alice took hold of the end of the White King's pencil and placed the words 'The White Knight is sliding down the poker. He balances very badly' in his memorandum." [See below for commentary; mouse over the text for links.]

Commentary by Ray Dyer

This particular depiction of a central Through the Looking Glass character has occasionally been subjected to over-interpretations of a quasi-psychoanalytical hue, which do not merit any citation, and which misinterpret supposed "symbolic" aspects of a poker-qua-sexual organ. Whilst such sensation-seeking views are readily generated, they bear little true derivation from either Krafft-Ebing's Psychopathia Sexualis or Freud's Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality, and are more reminiscent of the jocular pre- and early-adolescent playground.

Rather more pertinent is the question of why this particular White Knight - active, young and doubtless virile - is later allowed to morph into the more widely-perceived, decrepit White Knight, of both the frontispiece of Through the Looking Glass and the later chapters. The question will be taken up again when discussing the "aged, aged man," with attention then directed to Carroll's early fixation upon his own age — a mere forty-years old in 1872.

Related Material

The Knight and the "aged aged man"

Student assistants from the University Scholars Program, National University of Singapore, scanned this image and added text under the supervision of George P. Landow. [You may use this image without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the site and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]

Last modified 15 April 2021