Character of the Red Queen in “Through the Looking Glass”

 “I don't know what you mean by your way, all the ways about here belong to me…”— The Red Queen, Through the Looking Glass.

An amalgam of the Queen of Hearts, and even sometimes the Duchess from the previous book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865), the Red Queen is portrayed as a domineering, puritanical, officious and matronly woman in Lewis Carroll's 1871 fantasy novel Through the Looking-Glass. Civil but yet unpleasant, she brings Alice into the chess game as the White Queen’s pawn and is often seen to hound her about her lack of etiquette and general knowledge like a quintessential Victorian governess.

Though viewed as an antagonist in the story for her being in the side opposing Alice, their initial encounter besides the flowers is a cordial one, with the Red Queen explaining the rules of Chess concerning promotion to Alice in that she is able to become a queen initially by starting out as a pawn and ultimately reaching the eighth square. Alice finds herself running faster and faster but staying in the same place. Eventually, the Queen stops running and props Alice up against a tree, telling her to rest. It is through the schooling by the Red Queen that Alice gets to learn an important life lesson that is left unheeded.

The Red Queen has the exceptional power to move all around the chessboard quickly. Alice greatly admires the Red Queen at first, and tries her best to follow all of her rules regarding conduct and etiquette. The queen is the first to confirm for Alice that in Looking-glass World, things are opposite to what they are in Alice's world. For example, one must run quickly to stay in one place. When Alice runs into the Red Queen in the Eighth Square, however, the Red Queen begins to look horribly dismissive and, in some cases, silly. She scolds Alice for not being able to perform math, for example, but the problems she gives are riddles rather than math problems—and in several cases, they do not have a single right answer. At the dinner party, the Red Queen continues to tell Alice how to behave properly and politely, but she does so rudely that makes Alice feel as though she cannot do anything right. Alice finally loses her temper with the Red Queen when she sees the queen’s head in a tureen of soup.

Like the vast majority of the characters in Through the Looking-Glass, the Red Queen makes definitive statements with little regard for an abiding logic that would support them. Her assertions are often arbitrary recitations of strict behavioral advice, such as, “Speak when you’re spoken to!” When Alice reveals the inadequacy of the logic behind the Red Queen’s statements, the Red Queen asserts her arbitrary position of authority as a justification. The Red Queen’s constant badgering of and competition with Alice indicates profound feelings of antagonism. She fits into the framework of Alice’s dream as representative arbitrary authority, serving as a caricature of an overbearing governess figure at odds with her young charges.

Later, in Chapter 9, the Red Queen appears with the White Queen, posing a series of typical Wonderland/Looking-Glass questions such as “Divide a loaf by a knife: what’s the answer to that?”, and then celebrating Alice's promotion from pawn to queen. When that celebration goes awry, Alice turns against the Red Queen, whom she “considers as the cause of all the mischief”, and shakes her until the queen morphs into Alice’s pet kitten. In doing this, Alice presents an end game, awakening from the dream world of the looking glass, by both realizing her hallucination and symbolically “taking” the Red Queen in order to checkmate the Red King.

To conclude, however, contrary to the Queen of Hearts from the story’s predecessor, the Red Queen in Through the Looking Glass does not actually abuse her power, keeping violence to a minimum and trying to help events unfold as smoothly as possible. The Red Queen’s pragmatism about the battle being fought between the chess pieces reminds us that all conflicts are somewhat arbitrary.