We’ve all grown up reading Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll and watching the iconic film that’s still buried deep down within us, hidden in the Pandora’s pithos of what we used to call the innocence of our childhood. Of course, no Alice in Wonderland adaptation, be it a book or a movie or a television series is complete without the addition of a certain quirky eccentric tea enthusiast with the March Hare as his dearest friend, you guessed it correctly, he’s none other than our very own Mad Hatter himself!
Did you ever long for a day where you could just relax, unwind and let loose and be free by embracing your childhood innocence and being silly? Well, there’s no reason to fret any longer because the fateful day of October 6th is dedicated to commemorate the contribution of the Mad Hatter to the plot of Alice in Wonderland. It does sound strange when you ponder more about the topic regarding why exactly there’s an entire day dedicated to a fictional character of all people, to the Mad Hatter no less but sometimes, the world needs more creativity with a tinge of slight madness to give rise to some of the best creations of all. I believe that every artist possesses a certain eccentric quirk that draws a line of a dichotomic contrast between the normal and the extravagant, the quirk being madness.
People usually associate madness with something negative but what if the madness stemmed out of simple curiosity wrongfully termed as madness in the eye of society? The Hatter was a rather benign individual despite his oddities and ‘madness’ as termed by the Cheshire cat in the books and movies. Perhaps this is the first time people are hearing about such a day even existing, another question that pops up in mind is, ‘what exactly do people do on this day to celebrate the Mad Hatter?’ One of the sole reasons for this day to exist is to provide a day to escape from the usual routine and break the cycle of predictability by doing something that’s unexpected yet provides amusement and joy. One could also ask people silly riddles such as ‘Why is a raven like a writing desk’, a popular riddle framed by none other than the Hatter himself and embrace the concept of silliness by letting loose, being carefree for a while.
One could also host a tea party with their close friends and acquaintances and just take a moment to be in the moment, appreciating the changes around such as the leaves changing color and summer waving goodbye to welcome the season of harvest filled with fiery red leaves and spices and pumpkins. National Mad Hatter was first observed in the year of 1986 by Colorado technicians in boulder to celebrate his silliness and were inspired by his character from the book.
Movie buffs and ardent bookworms would be able to recollect a certain fact about the prized hat worn by the Mad Hatter, there was a tag attached to the hat that displayed 10/6, which not only represented the day for the holiday to be celebrated but also depicted that the hat cost around 10 shillings and 6 pence, as illustrated by John Tenniel. There are two aspects that depict the symbolism and the hidden meaning behind the existence of the Mad Hatter, the first type of interpretation could be that he just represents the chaos, confusion and all things entropic becoming the epitome of the uncertain events that take place in Wonderland with its many whimsical elements. The other interpretation is that he represents the plight of Victorian era workers who were being mistreated by their superiors, his clothing resembling the decline and the fall from grace of aristocracy that was slowly starting to lose its influence and power during the Victorian era.
The creation of the character of the Mad Hatter did have real life inspiration as astounding and mind boggling that might seem to be. The inspiration was taken from an eccentric furniture dealer from the streets of Oxford to be an outlandish caricature of a man by the name of Theophilius Carter. As for the age-old question of ‘Why is a raven like a writing desk’ that he puts forth as a question to young Alice when she joins him for his tea party, the answer was “Because it can produce a few notes, though they are very flat; and it is never put with the wrong end in front’’. Another possible answer could be that a raven eats worms, a writing desk is also usually worm eaten, hence trying to establish a relation between the two. To be honest, I don’t really get it either but I suppose that’s all a part of the Hatter’s charm at the end of the day. Good ole’ Hatter.