Alice in Wonderland as a guide to college

“Be what you would seem to be’- or, if you’d like to put it more simple- ‘Never imagine yourself not to be otherwise than what I might appear to others that what you were or might have been was not otherwise than what you had been would have appeared to them to be otherwise.’”

As whimsical and quirky as this quote (Annotated Alice 93) was, I found it truly meaningful and especially applicable to our voyage as leaders and beyond. Throughout the novel, Alice is faced with the question of who she really is. She encounters multiple characters including the Chesire-Cat and the Caterpillar who all spark a budding curiosity in the young girl. Alice is forced to shape shift and change in accordance to her environment from shrinking to a terrifying size and then reaching mile-high heights. Just when she begins to adapt to her surroundings, she is once again forced to endure another transformation. Similar to Alice, we have all entered a “new world” of unfamiliar faces, customs and lifestyles. Granted, it is not to the extent of Carroll’s fictional fantasy, but embarking on the adventure of college has had its fair sort of new experiences.  And just as Alice, we have all learned to acclimatize and transition to this unknown frontier.

During this particular quote in the tale, the grotesque Duchess offers her ounce of advice to Alice in regards to morals we encounter in life. Although the Duchess is portrayed as he antagonists on this scene, Alice finds her quite consolatory for a brief moment. The duchess explains to Alice that she should be simply who SHE thinks she should be. Throughout the plot, “Alice shows an obsession with identity- who am I? - the young girl wonders, and later declares, “I’ll stay down here till I’m somebody else”  (198 Anthology).  The duchess says one should never portray oneself in the light of someone else or to what seems like the most pleasing to others.

            I found this quote most applicable to college because in reality, we all aspire or hope to become someone. To me, I viewed high school as one mini ecosystem. Every student had some proclaimed “niche” or role they contributed to the school. However in this instance, our niches were usually based on shallow stereotypes of each other. Upon entering college, we still engage in a system similar to an ecosystem but we are freer to choose what our role is in this community. Our identity, similar to Alice’s, should not be based off of the assumptions and associations made by others, but rather off of how we would like to see ourselves.