No Meaning Saves a World of Trouble Painting

Lewis Carroll’s exploration of language and its usage is the foundation of some of the greatest advances in the philosophy of language. And yet he is often thought of as the originator of the theatre of the absurd. The word play is perfect nonsense and perfectly meaningful. It takes us to where we question our thoughts and make us wonder where we are. Is what we are seeing, feeling, experiencing anything we in fact are seeing, feeling, experiencing. We are lost, and must come to realize that we are just purveyors of communicative placeholders so we can get anywhere. But where are we? During Alice’s trial, the questioning of the king makes this, and what we are truly experiencing in everyday life, perfectly clear. When talking to the jury Alice said, “If any of them can explain it, I’ll give him a sixpence. I don’t believe there’s an atom of meaning in it.” To which the king responds, “If there’s no meaning in it, that saves a world of trouble, you know, as we needn’t try to find any.”