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Red Queen (Through the Looking Glass)
Encyclopedia
The Red Queen is a fictional character
in Lewis Carroll
's fantasy novella
, Through the Looking-Glass
.
, the Red Queen could be viewed as an antagonist
in the story as she is the queen
for the side opposing Alice. Despite this, their initial encounter is a cordial one, with the Red Queen explaining the rules of Chess concerning promotion
— specifically that Alice is able to become a queen by starting out as a pawn
and reaching the eighth square at the opposite end of the board. As a queen in the game of Chess, the Red Queen is able to move swiftly and effortlessly.
Later, in Chapter 9, she appears with the White Queen, posing a series of typical Wonderland/Looking-Glass questions ("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 upon 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.
in the story's predecessor, Alice in Wonderland
, but in reality shares none of her characteristics other than being a queen. Indeed, Carroll, in his lifetime, made the distinction between the two Queens by saying:
The 1951 animated film Alice in Wonderland
perpetuates the long-standing confusion between the Red Queen and the Queen of Hearts. In the film, the Queen of Hearts delivers several of the Red Queen's statements, the most notable being based on her "all the ways about here belong to me". Both characters say this to suggest importance and possible arrogance, but in the Red Queen's case it has a double meaning since her status as a Chess-queen means that she can move in any direction she desires.
In both American McGee's Alice
and Tim Burton
's film adaptation
of the books, the characters are also combined, leading to further popular misconception. Also, Jefferson Airplane
's song "White Rabbit" contains the lyric "and the Red Queen's off with her head", another instance of the two characters combined or mistaken for one another.
, Red Queen, "Red Queen's race" or "Red Queen Effect" is an evolution
ary hypothesis
. The term is taken from the Red Queen's race in Lewis Carroll
's Through the Looking-Glass
. The Red Queen said, "It takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place." The Red Queen Principle can be stated thus:
The hypothesis is intended to explain two different phenomena: the advantage of sexual reproduction
at the level of individuals, and the constant evolutionary arms race
between competing species. In the first (microevolution
ary) version, by making every individual an experiment when mixing mother's and father's gene
s, sexual reproduction
may allow a species to evolve quickly just to hold onto the ecological niche
that it already occupies in the ecosystem
. In the second (macroevolution
ary) version, the probability of extinction for groups (usually families
) of organisms is hypothesized to be constant within the group and random among groups.
The paradox of sex — the "cost" of males
Science writer Matt Ridley
popularized the term "the red queen" in connection with sexual selection
in his book The Red Queen. In the book, Ridley discussed the debate in theoretical biology over the adaptive benefit of sexual reproduction
to those species in which it appears. The connection of the Red Queen to this debate arises from the fact that the traditionally accepted theory (Vicar of Bray
) only showed adaptive benefit at the level of the species or group, not at the level of the gene
(although, it must be added here that the protean 'Vicar of Bray' adaptation is very useful to some species that belong to the lower levels of the food chain). By contrast, a Red-Queen-type theory that organisms are running cyclic arms races with their parasites can explain the utility of sexual reproduction at the level of the gene by positing that the role of sex is to preserve genes that are currently disadvantageous, but that will become advantageous against the background of a likely future population of parasites.
Sex is an evolutionary puzzle
. In most sexual species, males make up half the population
, yet they bear no offspring
directly and generally contribute little to the survival of offspring. In fact, in some species, such as lions, males pose a positive threat to live young
fathered by other males (although this could be viewed as a manifestation of Richard Dawkins
' so-called selfish gene, whose 'goal' is to reproduce itself, which may as a consequence suppress the reproduction of other genes). In addition, males and females must spend resources to attract and compete for mates. Sexual selection
also can favor traits that reduce the fitness of an organism, such as brightly colored plumage in birds of paradise that increases the likelihood for an individual to be noticed by both predators and potential mates (see the handicap principle
for more on this). Thus, sexual reproduction can be highly inefficient.
One possible explanation for the fact that nearly all vertebrate
s are sexual is that sex increases the rate at which adaptation can occur. This is for two reasons. Firstly, if an advantageous mutation
occurs in an asexual
line, it is impossible for that mutation to spread without wiping out all other lines, which may have different advantageous mutations of their own. Secondly, it mixes up alleles. Some instances of genetic variation might be advantageous only when paired with other mutations, and sex increases the likelihood that such pairings will occur. Also, in asexually reproducing organisms, especially parthenogenetic organisms, mutations conferring an advantageous allele will have to occur twice, before the advantageous allele becomes fixed in the population, resulting in a longer phase where the heterozygote for the disadvantageous allele (relative to the new advantageous allele) is fixed in the population.
For sex to be advantageous for these reasons requires constant selection for changing conditions. One factor that might cause this is the constant arms race between parasites and their host
s. Parasites generally evolve quickly because of their short life cycles. As they evolve, they attack their hosts in a variety of ways. Two consecutive generations might be faced with very different selective pressures. If this change is rapid enough, it might explain the persistence of sex.
See also
, fashioned as a sequel to the novel, features Helena Bonham Carter
as the Red Queen. Bonham Carter's head was digitally increased three times its original size on screen.
Bonham Carter's character is a combination of the Red Queen, the Duchess
and the Queen of Hearts
. From the original Red Queen, this character gets only a relationship to the White Queen. Here the Red Queen is the older sister of the White Queen, and is jealous of her sister, whom her subjects genuinely love.
From the original John Tenniel
illustrations of the Duchess, she gets a massive head in proportion to her body and a retinue of frog footmen. The White Queen theorizes that the movie's Red Queen has a tumor
pressing against her brain, explaining both her large head and her deranged behaviour.
Most of her characteristics are taken from the Queen of Hearts, including:
The irritable, snobbish mother of Alice's potential husband, cast as a corresponding villain in the "real world" also resembles the Queen of Hearts when she fumes about her gardeners planting white instead of red roses so Alice paints them red to please the mighty red queen.
In the video game adaptation of the film, she plays a minor role, first appearing as a mere illustration. She is not seen in person until near the end of the game, first playing croquet and beheading the hedgehogs she uses as balls whenever they miss their target at her castle, and then again both before and after the battle with the Jabberwocky. Her clothes and persona is similar to the Tudor sisters Queen Mary I
(persona) and Queen Elizabeth I (clothes). Her name Iracebeth is also a play on the name Elizabeth.
Fictional character
A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...
in Lewis Carroll
Lewis Carroll
Charles Lutwidge Dodgson , better known by the pseudonym Lewis Carroll , was an English author, mathematician, logician, Anglican deacon and photographer. His most famous writings are Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, as well as the poems "The Hunting of the...
's fantasy novella
Novella
A novella is a written, fictional, prose narrative usually longer than a novelette but shorter than a novel. The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America Nebula Awards for science fiction define the novella as having a word count between 17,500 and 40,000...
, Through the Looking-Glass
Through the Looking-Glass
Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There is a work of literature by Lewis Carroll . It is the sequel to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland...
.
Overview
With a motif of Through the Looking-Glass being representations of the game of chessChess
Chess is a two-player board game played on a chessboard, a square-checkered board with 64 squares arranged in an eight-by-eight grid. It is one of the world's most popular games, played by millions of people worldwide at home, in clubs, online, by correspondence, and in tournaments.Each player...
, the Red Queen could be viewed as an antagonist
Antagonist
An antagonist is a character, group of characters, or institution, that represents the opposition against which the protagonist must contend...
in the story as she is the queen
Queen (chess)
The queen is the most powerful piece in the game of chess, able to move any number of squares vertically, horizontally, or diagonally. Each player starts the game with one queen, placed in the middle of the first rank next to the king. With the chessboard oriented correctly, the white queen starts...
for the side opposing Alice. Despite this, their initial encounter is a cordial one, with the Red Queen explaining the rules of Chess concerning promotion
Promotion (chess)
Promotion is a chess rule describing the transformation of a pawn that reaches its eighth rank into the player's choice of a queen, knight, rook, or bishop of the same color . The new piece replaces the pawn on the same square and is part of the move. Promotion is not limited to pieces that have...
— specifically that Alice is able to become a queen by starting out as a pawn
Pawn (chess)
The pawn is the most numerous and weakest piece in the game of chess, historically representing infantry, or more particularly armed peasants or pikemen. Each player begins the game with eight pawns, one on each square of the rank immediately in front of the other pieces...
and reaching the eighth square at the opposite end of the board. As a queen in the game of Chess, the Red Queen is able to move swiftly and effortlessly.
Later, in Chapter 9, she appears with the White Queen, posing a series of typical Wonderland/Looking-Glass questions ("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 upon 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
Kitten
A kitten is a juvenile domesticated cat.The young of big cats are called cubs rather than kittens. Either term may be used for the young of smaller wild felids such as ocelots, caracals, and lynx, but "kitten" is usually more common for these species....
. In doing this, Alice presents an end game, awakening from the dream world of the looking glass
Mirror
A mirror is an object that reflects light or sound in a way that preserves much of its original quality prior to its contact with the mirror. Some mirrors also filter out some wavelengths, while preserving other wavelengths in the reflection...
, by both realizing her hallucination and symbolically "taking" the Red Queen in order to checkmate
Checkmate
Checkmate is a situation in chess in which one player's king is threatened with capture and there is no way to meet that threat. Or, simply put, the king is under direct attack and cannot avoid being captured...
the Red King.
Confusion with the Queen of Hearts
The Red Queen is commonly mistaken for the Queen of HeartsQueen of Hearts (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland)
The Queen of Hearts is a character from the book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by the writer and mathematician Lewis Carroll. She is a foul-tempered monarch, that Carroll himself pictured as "a blind fury", and who is quick to decree death sentences at the slightest offense...
in the story's predecessor, Alice in Wonderland
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is an 1865 novel written by English author Charles Lutwidge Dodgson under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll. It tells of a girl named Alice who falls down a rabbit hole into a fantasy world populated by peculiar, anthropomorphic creatures...
, but in reality shares none of her characteristics other than being a queen. Indeed, Carroll, in his lifetime, made the distinction between the two Queens by saying:
The 1951 animated film Alice in Wonderland
Alice in Wonderland (1951 film)
Alice in Wonderland is a 1951 American animated feature produced by Walt Disney and based primarily on Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland with a few additional elements from Through the Looking-Glass. Thirteenth in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series, the film was released in New...
perpetuates the long-standing confusion between the Red Queen and the Queen of Hearts. In the film, the Queen of Hearts delivers several of the Red Queen's statements, the most notable being based on her "all the ways about here belong to me". Both characters say this to suggest importance and possible arrogance, but in the Red Queen's case it has a double meaning since her status as a Chess-queen means that she can move in any direction she desires.
In both American McGee's Alice
American McGee's Alice
American McGee's Alice is a third-person action game released for PC on October 6, 2000. The game, developed by Rogue Entertainment and published by Electronic Arts, is set in an alternative universe of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland...
and Tim Burton
Tim Burton
Timothy William "Tim" Burton is an American film director, film producer, writer and artist. He is famous for dark, quirky-themed movies such as Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Ed Wood, Sleepy Hollow, Corpse Bride and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet...
's film adaptation
Alice in Wonderland (2010 film)
Alice in Wonderland is a 2010 American computer-animated/live action fantasy adventure film directed by Tim Burton, written by Linda Woolverton, and released by Walt Disney Pictures...
of the books, the characters are also combined, leading to further popular misconception. Also, Jefferson Airplane
Jefferson Airplane
Jefferson Airplane was an American rock band formed in San Francisco in 1965. A pioneer of the psychedelic rock movement, Jefferson Airplane was the first band from the San Francisco scene to achieve mainstream commercial and critical success....
's song "White Rabbit" contains the lyric "and the Red Queen's off with her head", another instance of the two characters combined or mistaken for one another.
Red Queen's Hypothesis
The Red Queen's HypothesisRed Queen's Hypothesis
The Red Queen's Hypothesis, also referred to as Red Queen, Red Queen's race or Red Queen Effect, is an evolutionary hypothesis. The term is taken from the Red Queen's race in Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass...
, Red Queen, "Red Queen's race" or "Red Queen Effect" is an evolution
Evolution
Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...
ary hypothesis
Hypothesis
A hypothesis is a proposed explanation for a phenomenon. The term derives from the Greek, ὑποτιθέναι – hypotithenai meaning "to put under" or "to suppose". For a hypothesis to be put forward as a scientific hypothesis, the scientific method requires that one can test it...
. The term is taken from the Red Queen's race in Lewis Carroll
Lewis Carroll
Charles Lutwidge Dodgson , better known by the pseudonym Lewis Carroll , was an English author, mathematician, logician, Anglican deacon and photographer. His most famous writings are Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, as well as the poems "The Hunting of the...
's Through the Looking-Glass
Through the Looking-Glass
Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There is a work of literature by Lewis Carroll . It is the sequel to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland...
. The Red Queen said, "It takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place." The Red Queen Principle can be stated thus:
- "For an evolutionary system, continuing development is needed just in order to maintain its fitness relative to the systems it is co-evolving with."
The hypothesis is intended to explain two different phenomena: the advantage of sexual reproduction
Evolution of sex
The evolution of sexual reproduction is currently described by several competing scientific hypotheses. All sexually reproducing organisms derive from a common ancestor which was a single celled eukaryotic species. Many protists reproduce sexually, as do the multicellular plants, animals, and fungi...
at the level of individuals, and the constant evolutionary arms race
Evolutionary arms race
In evolutionary biology, an evolutionary arms race is an evolutionary struggle between competing sets of co-evolving genes that develop adaptations and counter-adaptations against each other, resembling an arms race, which are also examples of positive feedback...
between competing species. In the first (microevolution
Microevolution
Microevolution is the changes in allele frequencies that occur over time within a population. This change is due to four different processes: mutation, selection , gene flow, and genetic drift....
ary) version, by making every individual an experiment when mixing mother's and father's gene
Gene
A gene is a molecular unit of heredity of a living organism. It is a name given to some stretches of DNA and RNA that code for a type of protein or for an RNA chain that has a function in the organism. Living beings depend on genes, as they specify all proteins and functional RNA chains...
s, sexual reproduction
Sexual reproduction
Sexual reproduction is the creation of a new organism by combining the genetic material of two organisms. There are two main processes during sexual reproduction; they are: meiosis, involving the halving of the number of chromosomes; and fertilization, involving the fusion of two gametes and the...
may allow a species to evolve quickly just to hold onto the ecological niche
Ecological niche
In ecology, a niche is a term describing the relational position of a species or population in its ecosystem to each other; e.g. a dolphin could potentially be in another ecological niche from one that travels in a different pod if the members of these pods utilize significantly different food...
that it already occupies in the ecosystem
Ecosystem
An ecosystem is a biological environment consisting of all the organisms living in a particular area, as well as all the nonliving , physical components of the environment with which the organisms interact, such as air, soil, water and sunlight....
. In the second (macroevolution
Macroevolution
Macroevolution is evolution on a scale of separated gene pools. Macroevolutionary studies focus on change that occurs at or above the level of species, in contrast with microevolution, which refers to smaller evolutionary changes within a species or population.The process of speciation may fall...
ary) version, the probability of extinction for groups (usually families
Family (biology)
In biological classification, family is* a taxonomic rank. Other well-known ranks are life, domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, genus, and species, with family fitting between order and genus. As for the other well-known ranks, there is the option of an immediately lower rank, indicated by the...
) of organisms is hypothesized to be constant within the group and random among groups.
The paradox of sex — the "cost" of males
Science writer Matt Ridley
Matt Ridley
Matthew White Ridley, FRSL, FMedSci is an English journalist, writer, biologist, and businessman.-Career:...
popularized the term "the red queen" in connection with sexual selection
Sexual selection
Sexual selection, a concept introduced by Charles Darwin in his 1859 book On the Origin of Species, is a significant element of his theory of natural selection...
in his book The Red Queen. In the book, Ridley discussed the debate in theoretical biology over the adaptive benefit of sexual reproduction
Sexual reproduction
Sexual reproduction is the creation of a new organism by combining the genetic material of two organisms. There are two main processes during sexual reproduction; they are: meiosis, involving the halving of the number of chromosomes; and fertilization, involving the fusion of two gametes and the...
to those species in which it appears. The connection of the Red Queen to this debate arises from the fact that the traditionally accepted theory (Vicar of Bray
Vicar of Bray (scientific hypothesis)
The "Vicar of Bray" is the name given to a hypothesis attempting to explain why sexual reproduction might be favoured over asexual reproduction, in which sexual populations are able to outcompete asexual populations because they evolve more rapidly in response to environmental changes...
) only showed adaptive benefit at the level of the species or group, not at the level of the gene
Gene
A gene is a molecular unit of heredity of a living organism. It is a name given to some stretches of DNA and RNA that code for a type of protein or for an RNA chain that has a function in the organism. Living beings depend on genes, as they specify all proteins and functional RNA chains...
(although, it must be added here that the protean 'Vicar of Bray' adaptation is very useful to some species that belong to the lower levels of the food chain). By contrast, a Red-Queen-type theory that organisms are running cyclic arms races with their parasites can explain the utility of sexual reproduction at the level of the gene by positing that the role of sex is to preserve genes that are currently disadvantageous, but that will become advantageous against the background of a likely future population of parasites.
Sex is an evolutionary puzzle
Puzzle
A puzzle is a problem or enigma that tests the ingenuity of the solver. In a basic puzzle, one is intended to put together pieces in a logical way in order to come up with the desired solution...
. In most sexual species, males make up half the population
Sex ratio
Sex ratio is the ratio of males to females in a population. The primary sex ratio is the ratio at the time of conception, secondary sex ratio is the ratio at time of birth, and tertiary sex ratio is the ratio of mature organisms....
, yet they bear no offspring
Offspring
In biology, offspring is the product of reproduction, of a new organism produced by one or more parents.Collective offspring may be known as a brood or progeny in a more general way...
directly and generally contribute little to the survival of offspring. In fact, in some species, such as lions, males pose a positive threat to live young
Infanticide (zoology)
In animals, infanticide involves the killing of young offspring by a mature animal of its own species, and is studied in zoology, specifically in the field of ethology. Ovicide is the analogous destruction of eggs. Although human infanticide has been widely studied, the practice has been observed...
fathered by other males (although this could be viewed as a manifestation of Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
Clinton Richard Dawkins, FRS, FRSL , known as Richard Dawkins, is a British ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author...
' so-called selfish gene, whose 'goal' is to reproduce itself, which may as a consequence suppress the reproduction of other genes). In addition, males and females must spend resources to attract and compete for mates. Sexual selection
Sexual selection
Sexual selection, a concept introduced by Charles Darwin in his 1859 book On the Origin of Species, is a significant element of his theory of natural selection...
also can favor traits that reduce the fitness of an organism, such as brightly colored plumage in birds of paradise that increases the likelihood for an individual to be noticed by both predators and potential mates (see the handicap principle
Handicap principle
The handicap principle is a hypothesis originally proposed in 1975 by biologist Amotz Zahavi to explain how evolution may lead to "honest" or reliable signaling between animals who have an obvious motivation to bluff or deceive each other...
for more on this). Thus, sexual reproduction can be highly inefficient.
One possible explanation for the fact that nearly all vertebrate
Vertebrate
Vertebrates are animals that are members of the subphylum Vertebrata . Vertebrates are the largest group of chordates, with currently about 58,000 species described. Vertebrates include the jawless fishes, bony fishes, sharks and rays, amphibians, reptiles, mammals, and birds...
s are sexual is that sex increases the rate at which adaptation can occur. This is for two reasons. Firstly, if an advantageous mutation
Mutation
In molecular biology and genetics, mutations are changes in a genomic sequence: the DNA sequence of a cell's genome or the DNA or RNA sequence of a virus. They can be defined as sudden and spontaneous changes in the cell. Mutations are caused by radiation, viruses, transposons and mutagenic...
occurs in an asexual
Asexual reproduction
Asexual reproduction is a mode of reproduction by which offspring arise from a single parent, and inherit the genes of that parent only, it is reproduction which does not involve meiosis, ploidy reduction, or fertilization. A more stringent definition is agamogenesis which is reproduction without...
line, it is impossible for that mutation to spread without wiping out all other lines, which may have different advantageous mutations of their own. Secondly, it mixes up alleles. Some instances of genetic variation might be advantageous only when paired with other mutations, and sex increases the likelihood that such pairings will occur. Also, in asexually reproducing organisms, especially parthenogenetic organisms, mutations conferring an advantageous allele will have to occur twice, before the advantageous allele becomes fixed in the population, resulting in a longer phase where the heterozygote for the disadvantageous allele (relative to the new advantageous allele) is fixed in the population.
For sex to be advantageous for these reasons requires constant selection for changing conditions. One factor that might cause this is the constant arms race between parasites and their host
Host (biology)
In biology, a host is an organism that harbors a parasite, or a mutual or commensal symbiont, typically providing nourishment and shelter. In botany, a host plant is one that supplies food resources and substrate for certain insects or other fauna...
s. Parasites generally evolve quickly because of their short life cycles. As they evolve, they attack their hosts in a variety of ways. Two consecutive generations might be faced with very different selective pressures. If this change is rapid enough, it might explain the persistence of sex.
See also
- Evolutionary arms raceEvolutionary arms raceIn evolutionary biology, an evolutionary arms race is an evolutionary struggle between competing sets of co-evolving genes that develop adaptations and counter-adaptations against each other, resembling an arms race, which are also examples of positive feedback...
- Chaos theoryChaos theoryChaos theory is a field of study in mathematics, with applications in several disciplines including physics, economics, biology, and philosophy. Chaos theory studies the behavior of dynamical systems that are highly sensitive to initial conditions, an effect which is popularly referred to as the...
- Punctuated equilibriumPunctuated equilibriumPunctuated equilibrium is a theory in evolutionary biology which proposes that most species will exhibit little net evolutionary change for most of their geological history, remaining in an extended state called stasis...
- Self-organized criticalitySelf-organized criticalityIn physics, self-organized criticality is a property of dynamical systems which have a critical point as an attractor. Their macroscopic behaviour thus displays the spatial and/or temporal scale-invariance characteristic of the critical point of a phase transition, but without the need to tune...
In business
“Red Queen marketing” is defined as the business practice of launching new products in order to replace past failed launches while the overall sales of a brand may remain static or growth is less than fully incremental (Donald Kay Riker, 2009). The concept is important since traditional financial metrics, such as sales and revenue growth, do not adequately describe a company’s efficiency at product development and marketing. In a perfectly efficient development process the sales of a new launch would contribute entirely incremental growth; if that launch simply replaces prior launches, or cannibalizes related brand offerings, the company is practicing a form of Red Queen marketing. Companies that launch new products at an increasingly high rate over time to maintain the status quo are likely practicing Red Queen marketing.Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland (2010)
The 2010 live-action film Alice in WonderlandAlice in Wonderland (2010 film)
Alice in Wonderland is a 2010 American computer-animated/live action fantasy adventure film directed by Tim Burton, written by Linda Woolverton, and released by Walt Disney Pictures...
, fashioned as a sequel to the novel, features Helena Bonham Carter
Helena Bonham Carter
Helena Bonham Carter is an English actress of film, stage, and television. She made her acting debut in a television adaptation of K. M. Peyton's A Pattern of Roses before winning her first film role as the titular character in Lady Jane...
as the Red Queen. Bonham Carter's head was digitally increased three times its original size on screen.
Bonham Carter's character is a combination of the Red Queen, the Duchess
Duchess (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland)
The Duchess is a character in Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, published in 1865. Carroll does not describe her physically in much detail, although her hideous appearance is strongly established in the popular imagination thanks to John Tenniel's illustrations and from context it...
and the Queen of Hearts
Queen of Hearts (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland)
The Queen of Hearts is a character from the book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by the writer and mathematician Lewis Carroll. She is a foul-tempered monarch, that Carroll himself pictured as "a blind fury", and who is quick to decree death sentences at the slightest offense...
. From the original Red Queen, this character gets only a relationship to the White Queen. Here the Red Queen is the older sister of the White Queen, and is jealous of her sister, whom her subjects genuinely love.
From the original John Tenniel
John Tenniel
Sir John Tenniel was a British illustrator, graphic humorist and political cartoonist whose work was prominent during the second half of England’s 19th century. Tenniel is considered important to the study of that period’s social, literary, and art histories...
illustrations of the Duchess, she gets a massive head in proportion to her body and a retinue of frog footmen. The White Queen theorizes that the movie's Red Queen has a tumor
Tumor
A tumor or tumour is commonly used as a synonym for a neoplasm that appears enlarged in size. Tumor is not synonymous with cancer...
pressing against her brain, explaining both her large head and her deranged behaviour.
Most of her characteristics are taken from the Queen of Hearts, including:
- A quickness to anger, including the famous phrase "Off with his/her/their/your head!" Her first name, Iracebeth, is a play on the word "irascible". In the movie, the queen's moat is full of heads from her many decapitations. Carter has said that she based her performance on her toddler-aged daughter.
- The use of animals as inanimate objects. Beside the flamingo mallets & hedgehog croquet balls from the original, this queen also uses them as furniture. location= red queens castle in salasumgrum
- Having tarts stolen, although in this adaptation it was a starving frog footman who stole the tarts rather than the Knave of Hearts. Here, the queen is madly in love with the Knave of Hearts, who leads her army, and has executed her husband the King for fear that he would leave her.
- Employment of a fish footman and the White RabbitWhite RabbitThe White Rabbit works for the Red Queen, but is also a secret member of the Underland Underground Resistance, and was sent by the Hatter to search for Alice...
. - Heart motifs throughout her palace & a 16th century16th centuryAs a means of recording the passage of time, the 16th century lasted from 1501 to 1600. It is regarded by historians as the century in which the rise of the West occurred....
-style costume associated with the queen of hearts playing cardQueen (playing card)The Queen is a playing card with a picture of a queen on it. The usual rank of a queen is as if it were 12 ....
& the original John Tenniel illustrations for the Queen of Hearts.
The irritable, snobbish mother of Alice's potential husband, cast as a corresponding villain in the "real world" also resembles the Queen of Hearts when she fumes about her gardeners planting white instead of red roses so Alice paints them red to please the mighty red queen.
In the video game adaptation of the film, she plays a minor role, first appearing as a mere illustration. She is not seen in person until near the end of the game, first playing croquet and beheading the hedgehogs she uses as balls whenever they miss their target at her castle, and then again both before and after the battle with the Jabberwocky. Her clothes and persona is similar to the Tudor sisters Queen Mary I
Mary I of England
Mary I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from July 1553 until her death.She was the only surviving child born of the ill-fated marriage of Henry VIII and his first wife Catherine of Aragon. Her younger half-brother, Edward VI, succeeded Henry in 1547...
(persona) and Queen Elizabeth I (clothes). Her name Iracebeth is also a play on the name Elizabeth.
Further reading
- Bell, G. (1982). The Masterpiece Of Nature: The Evolution and Genetics of Sexuality. University of California PressUniversity of California PressUniversity of California Press, also known as UC Press, is a publishing house associated with the University of California that engages in academic publishing. It was founded in 1893 to publish books and papers for the faculty of the University of California, established 25 years earlier in 1868...
, Berkeley, 378 pp. - Lewis CarrollLewis CarrollCharles Lutwidge Dodgson , better known by the pseudonym Lewis Carroll , was an English author, mathematician, logician, Anglican deacon and photographer. His most famous writings are Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, as well as the poems "The Hunting of the...
. 1960 (reprinted). The Annotated Alice: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass, illustrated by J. Tenniel, with an Introduction and Notes by M. Gardner. The New American Library, New York, 345 pp. Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new2?id=CarGlas.sgm&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=2&division=div1 - Dawkins, R.Richard DawkinsClinton Richard Dawkins, FRS, FRSL , known as Richard Dawkins, is a British ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author...
& Krebs, J. R. (1979). Arms races between and within species. Proceedings of the Royal society of London, B 205, 489–511. - Francis HeylighenFrancis HeylighenFrancis Paul Heylighen is a Belgian cyberneticist, and research professor at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, the Dutch-speaking Free University of Brussels, where he directs the transdisciplinary research group on "Evolution, Complexity and Cognition".-Biography:Francis Heylighen was born on...
(2000): "The Red Queen Principle", in: F. Heylighen, C. Joslyn and V. Turchin (editors): Principia Cybernetica Web (Principia Cybernetica, Brussels), URL: http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/REDQUEEN.html. - Pearson, Paul N. (2001) Red Queen hypothesis Encyclopedia of Life SciencesEncyclopedia of Life SciencesThe Encyclopedia of Life Sciences is an encyclopedia that spans the entire spectrum of life sciences and is published by Wiley-Blackwell....
http://www.els.net - Ridley, M.Matt RidleyMatthew White Ridley, FRSL, FMedSci is an English journalist, writer, biologist, and businessman.-Career:...
(1995) The Red Queen: Sex and the Evolution of Human Nature, Penguin Books, ISBN 0-14-024548-0 - Leigh Van ValenLeigh Van ValenLeigh Maiorana Van Valen was an American evolutionary biologist. He was professor emeritus in the Department of Ecology and Evolution at the University of Chicago....
. (1973). "A new evolutionary law". Evolutionary Theory 1: 1—30. - Vermeij, G.J. (1987). Evolution and escalation: An ecological history of life. Princeton University PressPrinceton University Press-Further reading:* "". Artforum International, 2005.-External links:* * * * *...
, Princeton, NJ.