Through the Looking-Glass · Characters
Character guide
Key figures in Through the Looking-Glass by Lewis Carroll.
Skim names here — open a free preview to see character cards and Character Web beside the page as you read.
Alice
major
Also known as poor Alice, Queen Alice, Queen Alice IX
Alice arrives in Looking-Glass House as an outsider who can see and lift the chessmen no one else notices, then finds herself cast as a White Pawn in a game she barely understands. Her politeness and stubborn good sense clash with queens who live backward, flowers that shout, and twins who insist she is only a figment of a sleeping king's dream. Her willingness to keep asking questions and correcting crooked shawls is what carries the story forward.
White Queen
supporting
Also known as The Queen, White Queen, The White Queen
The White Queen first appears as a tiny chess piece scrambling up a fender to reach her screaming daughter Lily, then grows into Alice's traveling companion and eventual fellow queen. She is hopeless at dressing herself, all over pins, and cheerfully illogical about punishment that precedes the crime. Her backward memory and her talk of jam that can never be eaten today give Alice her first real lesson in the looking-glass world's upside-down rules.
Red Queen
supporting
Also known as the Red Queen
The Red Queen rules the chessboard Alice is crossing, issuing commands and corrections with the confidence of someone who has never been contradicted. She is impatient with Alice's ordinary logic, insisting that here it takes all the running you can do to stay in the same spot. Her brisk authority defines the game's stakes and pushes Alice toward the eighth square.
Humpty Dumpty
supporting
Also known as Humpty, VI Humpty Dumpty, Evidently Humpty Dumpty
Humpty Dumpty sits cross-legged on his wall, refuses to look at Alice, and treats every polite question as an impertinent riddle. He is vain about his name, his shape, and his mastery of language, boasting that when he uses a word it means just what he intends. His bristling, self-important conversation gives Alice her sharpest lesson in the looking-glass world's habit of making meaning arbitrary.
Tweedledum
supporting
Also known as IV Tweedledum
Tweedledum leads Alice to the sleeping Red King and, with his brother, calmly informs her that she would go out like a candle if the King woke. He is quarrelsome and quick to fury, stamping and tearing his hair when he finds his new rattle broken. His petty tantrum and his unsettling claim about reality together make the wood one of Alice's strangest encounters.
Tweedledee
supporting
Tweedledee finishes his brother's sentences and echoes his claims, triumphantly explaining that Alice exists only as part of the Red King's dream. He is cheerful, selfish, and quick to retreat, ducking under the umbrella the moment Tweedledum's temper erupts over the rattle. Together the twins embody the wood's disorienting logic, where identity and reality are up for debate.
White Knight
supporting
Also known as the White Knight, the poor Knight, the Knight
He arrives as Alice's last companion before the final stage of her journey, a grown-up who treats her as an equal and insists, with wounded dignity, that he has had 'plenty of practice' at riding even as he topples off repeatedly. His inventions — a head-first method for vaulting gates, a sugar-loaf helmet — are absurd and untried, yet he offers them with such earnest pride that Alice's exasperation keeps dissolving into laughter. His blend of incompetence and tenderness gives the book one of its warmest, strangest farewells.
Lion
minor
Also known as The Lion, the Lion
A majestic lion who fights the Unicorn for the White King's crown.
Unicorn
minor
Also known as Unicorn, the Unicorn, The Unicorn
A mythical creature who battles the Lion and befriends Alice.
White King
minor
Also known as The King, King
A forgetful king who relies on his messengers Haigha and Hatta.
Hatta
minor
The White King's other messenger, often seen eating hay.
Gnat
minor
Also known as the Gnat, The Gnat
A tiny insect who talks to Alice about looking-glass insects.
Rose
minor
Also known as the Rose
A talking flower in the garden who comments on Alice's appearance.
Kitty
minor
Alice's black kitten who is transformed into the Red Queen in the dream.
Dinah
minor
Alice's mother cat, mentioned as the mother of Kitty and Snowdrop.
Snowdrop
minor
Alice's white kitten who becomes the White Queen in the dream.
Lily
minor
Also known as the little Lily
The White Queen's daughter, a tiny flower-like girl.
Fawn
minor
Also known as the Fawn
A young deer who befriends Alice in the woods until they remember names.
Haigha
minor
The White King's messenger who hops like a kangaroo.
Sheep
minor
Also known as the Sheep
A shopkeeper who knits and rows a boat with Alice.
Frog
minor
Also known as the Frog, The Frog
A footman who delivers invitations in the looking-glass house.
Walrus
minor
Also known as The Walrus, the Walrus
A character in Tweedledee's poem who eats oysters with the Carpenter.
Carpenter
minor
A character in the poem who helps the Walrus eat the oysters.
Oysters
minor
Also known as O Oysters, the Oysters
The naive oysters who are lured and eaten by the Walrus and Carpenter.
Eldest Oyster
minor
Also known as The eldest Oyster
The wise oyster who warns the others but is ignored.
Feather
minor
A minor character mentioned briefly in the looking-glass world.
Monster
minor
Also known as The Monster, Monster
A vague threat mentioned in the poem 'Jabberwocky'.