Red Queen (Through The Looking-Glass) - Confusion With The Queen of Hearts

Confusion With The Queen of Hearts

The Red Queen is commonly mistaken for the Queen of Hearts in the story's predecessor, Alice in Wonderland, but in reality shares none of her characteristics other than being a queen. Indeed, Carroll, in his lifetime, made the distinction between the two Queens by saying:

“
I pictured to myself the Queen of Hearts as a sort of embodiment of ungovernable passion - a blind and aimless Fury.
The Red Queen I pictured as a Fury, but of another type; her passion must be cold and calm - she must be formal and strict, yet not unkindly; pedantic to the 10th degree, the concentrated essence of all governesses!
”

—Lewis Carroll, in "Alice on the Stage"

The 1951 animated film Alice in Wonderland perpetuates the long-standing confusion between the Red Queen and the Queen of Hearts. In the film, the Queen of Hearts delivers several of the Red Queen's statements, the most notable being based on her "all the ways about here belong to me". Both characters say this to suggest importance and possible arrogance, but in the Red Queen's case it has a double meaning since her status as a Chess-queen means that she can move in any direction she desires.

In both American McGee's Alice and Tim Burton's film adaptation of the books, the characters are also combined, leading to further popular misconception. Also, Jefferson Airplane's song "White Rabbit" contains the lyric "and the Red Queen's off with her head", another instance of the two characters combined or mistaken for one another.

Read more about this topic:  Red Queen (Through The Looking-Glass)

Famous quotes containing the words confusion, queen and/or hearts:

    “A woman’s beauty is a storm-tossed banner;
    Under it wisdom stands, and I alone
    Of all Arabia’s lovers I alone
    Nor dazzled by the embroidery, nor lost
    In the confusion of its night-dark folds,
    Can hear the armed man speak.”
    —William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)

    “Ah petal, dust and wind-fall
    on the ground queen awaiting queen.”
    —Hilda Doolittle (1886–1961)

    “Some of the greatest and most lasting effects of genuine oratory have gone forth from secluded lecture desks into the hearts of quiet groups of students.”
    —Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)