Alice in Wonderland - Summary by Paragraphs

Chapter 1. Down the rabbit hole
Alice sits impatiently by her sister who’s reading a book. She is distracted by a white rabbit taking out a watch out of his coat pocket and runs down into a rabbit hole after him, falls for some time into a deep well, wakes up later in a small room. She finds doors, but the key is too small. She finds a small door, unlocks it with the key, but she’s too large to fit in it. If only she could shot up like a telescope. She turns and finds a bottle on which is says Drink me, beautifully printed letters. She drinks it, gets really small, but then she’s forgotten the key to open the door and can’t get out. Starts crying, finds cake “eat me”, eats it.

Chapter 2. The pool of tears
But Alice grows too much. The rabbit is frightened by her and leaves his gloves and fan next to her, then runs away. Alice starts crying and puts on one of the rabbit’s gloves, takes the fan and notices she’s chin deep in the water – she had shrunk. She starts crying again, when she sees a little mouse swimming next to her. She scares him by talking about Dinah and her dog, who both catch and kill mice. She almost scares the mouse away, but starts swimming along his side towards safety.

Chapter 3. A caucus race and a Long tale
Alice gets to the bank and meets birds and other animals of the land. They are all wet, and so one of them suggests they to a Caucus race, which is run in a circle until they’re all dry. Alice gives everybody comfits and the mouse offers her a thimble – it was her own; in a very solemn manner. The mouse starts saying why he hates cats and dogs – but if offended by Alice who was not paying attention. Alice starts talking about Dinah and her dog and is left consequently alone.

Chapter 4. The rabbit sends in a little bill
But the white rabbit comes again – and confuses her for his housemaid. He orders her to fetch him his gloves and fan. And alice does so, goes into his house, takes a pair of his gloves and a fan and when exiting, sees a bottle – unmarked this time. And she drinks it all, finding herself at huge dimensions once again. Shortly after, the rabbit comes, tries to get in and sees and his housemaid is picking apples. Alice is now one hand out the window, against the entrance door. The rabbit becomes upset and calls for help – along with some friends he tries to send a lizard inside the house through the chimney – Alice kicks it and throws it quite far. They then try to hit her with rocks – but the rocks turn into cakes. And Alice decides she can eat one of those cakes and see what happens. She shrinks and runs away, encounters a dog, a puppy which is still too big for her. She runs away and considers biting from a mushroom and see what happens – but there was a caterpillar smoking a hookah on the mushroom.

Chapter 5. Advice from a caterpillar
She has a not so enlightening conversation with the caterpillar with regard as to who she is. Upon leaving, he tells her that one side of the mushroom he was sitting on will make her big, the other shrink her. Alice bites from one side, shrinks rapidly then from the other and grows way too fast – and scares a pigeon and her nest. She manages to come down to her usual height – but decides to get taller when she reaches a tall house.

Chapter 6. Pig and pepper
A fish servant and a lizard servant. The fish one brings the second a huge letter which says that the duchess is invited by the queen to a croquet match. Alice goes inside, meets the duchess who is holding an ugly baby in her arms and the cook, who is throwing pottery at everybody. The baby sneezes because the air strongly smells of pepper. The Duchess puts the baby in Alice’s arms and leaves to play croquet at the court. There is also a Cheshire cat, who grins. All Cheshire cats grin, of course. He tells her that everybody’s mad – and offers her a strong argument to that. He appears and disappears at his will, often leaving his grin behind.

Chapter 7. A mad tea-party
She comes across a bifurcation – she can either go towards the Hatter’s house or to the March mare. She ought not be mad, it was April after all. So she goes in the march mare’s direction and encounters the very Hatter And the March Mare, between the two of them being a little mouse, asleep; both their elbows resting on his back. Alice says hello and seats herself at their tea party, without waiting for their acceptance. They suggest telling a story but she refuses – and so they wake up the mouse and ask him to tell a story. Alice keeps interrupting the mouse’s story, for it was absurd from her point of view. The mouse plays with words and twists meanings, offending and confusing Alice. So she left, and when she last looked back, they were trying to shove the mouse in the teapot. She again came across a door and a little key – but she had understood the process – she first unlocked the door, then shrank herself. And then, she found herself in a brilliant garden with cool fountains.

Chapter 8. The queen’s croquet ground
Queen and King of Hearts, “off with her/his head”, curious game of croquet. The ball was a live hedgehog, the maller a live flamingo, soldiers stretched to make the ark. But then the Cheshire cat appears – and the King wants to cut off its head. The executioner argues that there has to be a body in order to behead something, the king says that if there is a head, the head can be severed off, the queen threats to have everybody beheaded. The court is grave and silent. Its owner, the Duchess, is brought forth from the prison – she had offended the Queen and was up for beheading.

Chapter 9. The mock turtle’s story
The Duchess is curiously nice to Alice – it must have been the pepper that made her twitchy. Just like sugar-barley makes children sweet natured and salt people sour. When the two arrive, the Duchess is saved from beheading, the Queen asks Alice to follow her and play some more croquet. All from the Queen’s party were sentenced to beheading – until there was the king, the queen and Alice unsentenced to death. Everybody received a pardon and Alice is sent by the Queen to the gryphon to see the Mock turtle and listen to his story. The mock turtle is a turtle who is no longer a turtle – that is he no longer swims in the sea. He begins by saying how it was like when he went to school. He was taught many classes and objects when Alice confronts him with simpleton questions. The lessons lessened. He sobs incessantly.

Chapter 10. The lobster Quadrille
The gryphon and the lobster perform a dance for Alice, throwing lobsters into the sea and jumping around in the sand. Then they ask of her to recite two poems – she gets them all wrong, her memory is inexact. She then proceeds to telling them her adventures. The gryphon hears in the distance “trial starts”, takes her hands and they run together to the court.

Chapter 11. Who stole the tarts
The Knave of hearts had stolen the queen’s baked tarts – and he was now on trial. Everybody was summoned at court to listen to the hearing. The hatter, March Hare and the Dormouse were witnesses – and Alice was to follow. The king was the judge, the queen ordered beheadings and some creatures jurors. Alice had began to grow. She was called by the white rabbit to stand.

Chapter 12. Alice’s evidence
The trial is equally absurd – the court is willing to sentence him to death based on preposterous accusations. Alice disturbs the jurors, destabilizing their chairs and all of them fall down. Order is restablished once she sets them to their proper places. Alice offends the Queen and is sentenced too to beheading – but she had grown way too much and she feared no one now. Just when the Queen wants to have her arrested everybody around her turns into packs of cards and they come tumbling down over Alice – who wakes up to find herself in her sister’s arms. She tells her the dream she’s had and runs off to tea. Her sister remains a little longer and tries to imagine Alice’s dream.