Jabberwocky
by Lewis Carroll

’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
      Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
      And the mome raths outgrabe.
 
“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
      The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
      The frumious Bandersnatch!”
 
He took his vorpal sword in hand;
      Long time the manxome foe he sought—
So rested he by the Tumtum tree
      And stood awhile in thought.
 
And, as in uffish thought he stood,
      The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
      And burbled as it came!
 
One, two! One, two! And through and through
      The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
      He went galumphing back.
 
“And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
      Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!”
      He chortled in his joy.
 
’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
      Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
      And the mome raths outgrabe.


“Jabberwocky” by Lewis Carroll. Public Domain. (buy now)

It’s the birthday of Wolfgang Mozart (works by this artist), born in Salzburg in what was then the Holy Roman Empire (1756). He was a true child prodigy. His father, Leopold, was a successful composer and court musician who pushed his two young children — Wolfgang and his sister Nannerl — to excel in music. Young Wolfgang began playing pieces from Nannerl’s keyboard lessons when he was four years old, and wrote his first compositions at the age of five. That same year, he gave his first public performance, at the University of Salzburg.

When Mozart was seven years old, his father took the family on a three-year tour of European cities, where the children played for kings and queens. They spent a year in London, and there the eight-year-old boy befriended 28-year-old Johann Christian Bach, the son of Johann Sebastian. The younger Bach was one of the most famous and respected composers of his time, and had recently been appointed Music Master to the Queen. Nannerl wrote in her diary:

“Herr Johann Christian Bach [...] took Wolfgang between his knees. He would play a few measures; then Wolfgang would continue. In this manner they played entire sonatas. Unless you saw it with your own eyes, you would swear that just one person was playing.”

The two became close. Mozart flourished under Bach’s mentorship and remained loyal to his teacher for the rest of his life. In a letter to his father in 1777, Mozart complained about a fellow composer who insulted Bach to his face; Mozart wrote, “I thought I should have to seize his front hair and pull it hard.”

When Mozart was 13, he and his father took a trip to Italy. Mozart performed for nobility and worked on his own compositions. In Rome, they visited the Sistine Chapel for a performance of Gregorio Allegri’s piece Miserere. It had never been published, but after hearing it once, the teenage Mozart was able to write out the entire nine-part choral piece from memory. He made only a few minor errors.

For several years, Mozart worked as a court musician in Salzburg, but his relationship with the archbishop was difficult; he felt confined by the archbishop’s limited musical tastes. To the dismay of his father, he eventually left Salzburg permanently for the city of Vienna, where he struggled to make a living but had more artistic freedom.

Mozart lived just eight more years, and despite long trips, his home base remained near or around Vienna — despite Leopold’s wishes, he never returned to live in Salzburg. Mozart died in poverty of unknown causes at the age of 35, but he had already written more than 600 pieces of music.

On this day in 1302, the great Italian poet Dante Alighieri (books by this author) was exiled from Florence for his political sympathies. Dante was a leading supporter of the White Guelph party, which was opposed to extreme papal power. When the Black Guelph party seized power in Florence in 1302, they immediately expelled Dante from the city. He spent the next two decades wandering from place to place in northern and central Italy, estranged from his wife and kids and often living in poverty. His only solace during his exile was writing. He wrote his greatest work, The Divine Comedy, an epic poem about a journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise. Just before his death, his children visited him in Ravenna; it was the first time he had seen them since he left Florence almost 20 years before.

It's the birthday of the man who wrote Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking-Glass (1871), Lewis Carroll (books by this author), born Charles Lutwidge Dodgson in Cheshire, England (1832). When he was 24 years old, a new dean arrived at the school where Carroll worked, and the dean brought his three daughters, Lorina Charlotte, Edith, and Alice. Carroll befriended the three girls and began spending a lot of time with them. In July of 1862, while floating in a rowboat on a pond, he came up with the story of a girl's adventures in a magical world underground, and told it to the three girls. Carroll always remembered that day. Late in his life, he wrote:

"I can call it up almost as clearly as if it were yesterday — the cloudless blue above, the watery mirror below, the boat drifting idly on its way, the tinkle of the drops that fell from the oars, as they waved so sleepily to and fro, and (the one bright gleam of life in all the slumberous scene) the three eager faces, hungry for news of fairy-land ..."

Alice begged him to write the stories down, and a few months later, he did. The book was illustrated by a well-known cartoonist named John Tenniel, and it was published in 1865. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, along with its sequel, Through the Looking-Glass. They became two of the most popular children's books in the world.

Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.^®

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