"'Tis the Voice of the Lobster" is apoem byLewis Carroll that appears inChapter 10 of his 1865novelAlice's Adventures in Wonderland. It is recited byAlice to theMock Turtle and theGryphon.
"'Tis the Voice of the Lobster" is aparody of "The Sluggard", a moralistic poem byIsaac Watts[1] which was well known in Carroll's day.[2][3] "The Sluggard" depicts the unsavory lifestyle of aslothful individual as a negative example. Carroll's lobster's corresponding vice is that he is weak and cannot back up his boasts, and is consequently easy prey. This fits the pattern of the predatory parody poems in the two Alice books.
As published inAlice's Adventures in Wonderland (1867):
[After the Gryphon and the Mock Turtle have sung and danced to the Lobster Quadrille, Alice mentions the poems she has attempted to recite, and the Gryphon tells Alice to stand and recite"'Tis the voice of the sluggard", which she reluctantly does] "but her head was so full of the Lobster Quadrille, that she hardly knew what she was saying ..."
'Tis the voice of the lobster; I heard him declare,
"You have baked me too brown, I must sugar my hair."
As a duck with its eyelids, so he with his nose
Trims his belt and his buttons, and turns out his toes.
[The Gryphon and the Mock Turtle interrupt with a brief exchange about what this unfamiliar version of the poem means, and then insist that Alice continue:]
I passed by his garden, and marked, with one eye,
How the owl and the oyster were sharing a pie—
[Alice's recitation is cut short by theMock Turtle, who finds the poem "the most confusing thing I ever heard".][4]
In 1886, Carroll wrote an altered and expanded version of the poem for the first theatrical adaptation ofAlice. In this version, a panther replaces the oyster. A manuscript signed and dated 31 October 1886 reads:
'Tis the voice of the Lobster, I heard him declare
"You have baked me too brown: I must sugar my hair."
As a duck with its eyelids, so he with his nose
Trims his belt & his buttons, & turns out his toes.
When the sands are all dry, he is gay as a lark,
And will talk in contemptuous tones of the Shark:
But, when the tide rises and Sharks are around,
His voice has a timid & tremulous sound.
I passed by his garden, & marked with one eye
How the Owl & the Panther were sharing a pie:
The Panther took pie-crust, & gravy, & meat,
While the Owl got the dish as his share of the treat.
When the pie was all finished, the Owl, as a boon,
Was kindly permitted to pocket the spoon:
While the Panther received knife & fork with a growl,
And concluded the banquet by [eating the Owl].[5]
