intro: i know MY own story can't be as good as alice underground but... i can make HIS great story easier to read. credit to the author carol =dodgeson for an amazing story. i will edit to deal with the issues that as a child were difficult for me, to make the story simpler. if you know the story you will see that the idea is his idea and notice the edits: additions and mostly deletions for simplification.
part ONE: Alice was... a blond haired girl the same age as you. her smooth long golden hair always hung straight down on her soft cotton shirt. it usually reached her shoulders. on a hot day, in the month May, she was sitting sleepily on a light green sheet and was feeling the soft dark green grass in the shade under a tree. her younger brother gracefully gave her cake. she gratefully thanked him for the cake. its aroma was coffee. next he greedily jammed his piece in his mouth because he rarely got cake. next he joyfully ran home. her older sister sally silently sat beside her and was thoughtfully reading a book. Alice asked politely, "please read me a story."
"Not now," replied sally vaguely. Al listened lazily to the various sounds around her and chewed her sweet cherry cake. the clear water gently sloshed as it flowed slowly around brown rocks in the nearby stream. a shepherd called shrilly. she also heard the sounds of sheep, sounds of farm animals [last chapter] and of bell on cows. she really felt bored, bored enough even to look briefly into her sister's book. those pages did not have pictures.
she waited impatiently until sally finally turned the paper page. Alice again began looking. those pages also sadly lacked any pictures. desperately, she looked for conversation but it didn't have any conversations in it. she considered that book bad due to lacking pictures and conversations. [editor note: surprisingly, despite author demanded conversation, this chapter lacked it. he missed an opportunity with sister so i fixed that. i replaced black sketches by using words to add colors as pictures.]
soon, she started feeling VERY bored. her eye suddenly noticed something moving nearby. it was a rabbit with white fur and pink ears. it rushed hurriedly past. that was also still boring, but at least it was something to watch curiously. it stopped abruptly. she easily heard it say loudly to itself "dear, dear! I will come late!" when it quickly pulled a shiny watch out from its waistcoat-pocket, al unusually felt SURPRISED. it precisely looked at the time. it worryingly added to itself, "oh my ears and whiskers! i am late!"
this was the first time she had ever seen either a rabbit with a watch or with a pocket. it majesticly wore colored clothes. the color of the waistcoat was red. it almost completely covered its shirt that was a gay garment colored pale blue. it fashionably wore white pants but a different shade of white than its fur. it hurriedly resumed rapidly running. Alice promptly chased it. she saw it swiftly rush down a large rabbit-hole under a bush. Alice bravely continued chasing after it... crawling straight... until suddenly her hand didn't have support.
she helplessly toppled forward and wildly fell face down. the deep hole was too dark to see anything below. gems on the walls shined brightly like magic... red rubies and green emeralds. she saw that she was falling very slowly passing them. in their light she saw cupboards and book-shelves. as she slowly fell, she foolishly took a jar off one of the shelves. its label deceptively said "Orange jam" but she could feel the smooth inside that it had never been filled. while she fell, she calmly put it into one of the cupboards. she fell slowly and quietly for a long time.
Down, down, down.
air whooshed. she could see that she was falling faster past the jewels. the hole was very deep. what would happen next? down down down. she started singing. it was the only thing she could think of doing. alice wrongly said "I must be near the center (centre) of the earth." she playfully tried dancing while falling. imagine trying to dance while falling in air. Alice did not know what Longitude meant, or Latitude either, but she thought they were nice grand words to say. so she blissfully said, "i am probably the same latitude and longitude" which was true. she began talking again: "I will fall far and through the earth! and walk on the land while my head is downwards," which was true.
Down, down, down.
while Alice was remembering her pet cat she landed softly on a huge heap of leaves. she speedily chased the rabbit along a long corridor. it was hastily hurrying so she ran quicker. it turned a corner. She chased more and boldly turned. she entered a long, low hall. the rabbit had surprisingly vanished. the chamber was lit by a row of oil lamps that were hanging heavily from the ceiling. She knew that the oil had been burning for a long time and would continue burning never needing new oil. ever. ["Illustration" the author had a picture here and others in his book as mentioned before. some were drawn by carol and others by other people]
doors surrounded the hall. she thoroughly checked, starting from the door on her right all along the hall and found that they were all locked. Alice turned left and after checking both doors immediately turned left again. when she reached the last door and found it was locked she walked sadly in the middle, away from the turn corner. She worried how she would ever get out. suddenly she came near a small three-legged table, all made of solid glass. nothing except a tiny golden key was on it.
Alice excitedly tried the key in each lock of every door and found it did not fit because either the locks were too big, or the key was too small. either way it did not open any locks. when she was almost finished this second orbit around, returning to the glass table, she came to a low violet colored curtain. it was decorated with a large red heart, cut perfectly from fabric and attached. also scattered on it were fake green emeralds that were smooth green glass each shaped in an elongated diamond shape.
behind the curtain she found a low door about "eighteen inches high" [editor's note the author in u.k. used inches, and considering the author was a math expert we should follow him to prefer that over the metric system] she tried the tiny key in the keyhole. she smiled jubilantly and felt joy that it perfectly "fitted" [in modern english we now say fit even for past this is called "sic"]. Alice joyously opened the low door outward and saw beyond the passageway a flower garden.
it was the loveliest garden you ever saw. She wished badly to go out of that sunless hall, to walk among those bright flowers and those cool fountains, at the bottom of a hill which had a stream flowing down. she tried hard to daintily crawl in, but the door was too narrow even for her head, that did not fit. Alice miserably said aloud to herself, "even if my head would go through, my shoulders would not fit. Oh, how I wish I could slide together like a long multi-tube telescope. my shoulders would fit if I knew how."
my illustration:
the open door eyed her mockingly. Alice remembered that she had fallen slowly and how she had found the tiny key on a table that had not been in the hall. certainly here she could also slide together. here very few things were impossible. she left the door open and walked mechanicly to return the key to the glass table. She found "a little bottle" on the glass table. she felt certain that this bottle had not been on the table before. it was clear glass deceivingly filled with orange juice.
she wondered if the taste was also orange or only the color. she solemnly decided not to taste it because it may be poison... she wisely knew to be careful while cooking because fire can hurt and burn. She was always careful with a knife ever since she saw her mother's finger bleed due to accidently cutting it. her parents had warned her not to drink from a bottle marked "poison," because if you would then it can make you ill. she generally gave herself very good advice, therefore wise little Alice checked to see whether the bottle was marked "poison" or not. this glass bottle was not marked poison.
she read the big paper label that hung reassuringly from its neck, on a thin brown thread: "Alice drink me." the large letters were merrily colored each word a different color. her name was Blue same as her dress. drink was pink [which rhymes] and me was orange same as the fluid. She smelled its aroma which was not orange. it smelled like roast turkey and hot buttered toast. She tasted the fluid and felt its thick texture like bisque. its flavor tasted sweet like a mix of cherry, custard, pineapple, and toffy. it was very nice, so she drank more, until she soon finished all of it. the fluid helpfully caused her to actually shrink. drinking caused shrinking
she had shrunk physically to only ten inches tall. she joyfully smiled extremely happily seeing she could fit perfectly through the low narrow door, into that flower garden. she wanted badly to enter so she +did not wait. she instantly turned to immediately enter even skipping the daily eating of supper. she joyously walked to the door ready to victoriously enter. oh poor alice! she found +the door closed and locked. the tiny golden key was on the table.
she could not possibly reach it due to her short height. she plainly saw it through the glass. she tried hard to climb up one of the legs of the table, but the glass was too slippery. she continued trying many times until she fell exhaustedly. her eyes sorrowfully wept tears. she tried powerfully to stop fruitlessly crying but this poor "little" girl cried uncontrolably. she sometimes scolded herself severely and again scolded herself for futilely crying, and for feeling sadness that didn't help, but the tears mournfully filled her eyes due to her frustration to enter the wonderful garden.
to be continued... at
https://thinkforyourselfn8.blogspot.com/2023/01/alice-under-ground-easier-reading-part.html
there.
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