I decided to watch "Alice in Wonderland," the 1915 version on Youtube last night. What ginned it was watching Jefferson Airplane's WHITE RABBIT video and realizing that much of the video used footage from that movie. And, the wonderful wonderland that is on Youtube--it was available--several version. I chose the one which looked the best (59minutes) and which acknowledged the difficulties in putting together an authoritative version. Still, there were gaps (missing footage). But yet--it was inspirational. And what it inspired was thus:
I started to realize what a debt JRR Tolkien owed to Lewis Carroll. For example, the scenes in the Old Forest, Fangorn, and Tom Bombidil--living trees constituting an ancient society, fantastic creatures which seem psychodelic, recitation of rhymes as a form of enchantment. parodies of popular culture which are now lost on the rest of us. The idea of there and back again--leaving home, having adventures, and returning safely but changed. And I won't even get into the fantastic costumes (well-done whomever) and the jaw-dropping scenery (the Dutchess' garden). Like MGM's Oz, Alice's world is an ordinary shire. Once in Wonderland--it is wondrously wonderful.
And then I wondered--how revolutionary is the idea of girls having adventures? LOTR is a patriarchal society. Few females available. Yes, Galadrial. But she is an exception. Eowyn briefly wanders in, upstages everyone, but then goes willingly back into the accepted feminine role. Arwen obeys her father Elrond--wait until Aragon proves himself worthy. Rosie Cotton stays behind. Pippen's sisters don't even exist, unless you read the appendices. Everyone has fathers--but we never see the mothers. (And, btw, Arwen's end was tragic. Aragon dead. Her sons grown to manhood. She returns to Rivendell and dies. Apparently, all the ages she lived without a man taught her nothing. Like Sylvia Kahn, Arwen was a one man woman and couldn't imagine a life apart).
After Alice, of course, there was Dorothy Gale, who blew into Oz and had adventures, and then returned. Again, we have the fantastic creatures and the society of trees. Unlike Alice, Dorothy requires mentors in order to return. Alice saved herself.
And then I wondered--was Wonderland the first example of a female having adventures and saving herself? I thought back--what about Bronte? What about Austen? Well, Austen's females never had adventures--perhaps, Lydia, in PRIDE AND PREJUDICE--but we never see her POV. And in the end, Lydia accepts the patriarchy buying her into marriage.
The majority of females, both in Austen's day and in her novels, had no economic surety without men. Emma doesn't have adventures, per se. She attends to her father and dispenses alms to the villagers, as would be expected from a grande dame. There are picnics and rambles--but she never ventures outside her rather narrow theory of mind, always returning to the rightness of the rigidity of the established patriarchy and her class entitlement.
But Bronte? Jane Eyre has adventures. Jane Eyre has anger. Jane Eyre is okay with being angry--someone slaps your cheeks, you hit back even harder to teach them the error of their ways. Jane Eyre after leaving school, goes to Thornfield Hall and when Rochester fails to meet her standards, she leaves and ends up living with missionaries on her own terms. With the help of mystical events, she returns to Thornfield and finds it a dystopian wasteland. That is when she decides that marriage to Rochester is acceptable--he now is truly single and she is the one rescuing him.
Is Jane Eyre the first example of a female having adventures and rescuing the male? Rescuing the male is truly revolutionary. THE MYSTERIES OF UDOLFO--the female doesn't really have adventures because she is abducted (by men) and cannot successfully escape without the aid of other men. I'll have to do a think over a period of time to conclude that Jane Eyre is the first in this genre.