Why is a raven like a writing desk?

The Mystery:

One of the biggest dick moves in literature is the moment when the Mad Hatter from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland poses Alice with the riddle "Why is a raven like a writing desk?" ... and then never gives the answer. So he's not just mad, he's downright evil.

After the novel was first published, Lewis Carroll received so many letters asking him for the answer to the riddle (along with hundreds of others that said, "Please stay away from my daughter") that eventually, in the 1896 re-edition, he decided to settle the matter once and for all. According to Carroll, the riddle "as originally invented" had "no answer at all," but he offered the following one anyway: "Because it can produce a few notes, tho they are very flat; and it is never put with the wrong end in front."

This answer was ... less than satisfying, and we're pretty sure the second part doesn't even make sense. Since no one liked Carroll's half-assed solution, other writers offered ones of their own: Aldous Huxley wrote, "Because there's a 'B' in 'both,' and because there's an 'N' in 'neither,'" while puzzle genius Sam Loyd offered, "Poe wrote on both."

This sounds pretty cool until you realize he means that Poe wrote on the poem "The Raven," not on an actual raven.

For the longest time, "no answer" seemed like the best answer. But then ...

How They Solved It:

In 1976, over a century after the book was first published, Denis Crutch from the Lewis Carroll Society of North America discovered that the real answer was in a long forgotten typo. Crutch found out that in 1896, Carroll originally wrote: "Because it can produce a few notes, tho they are very flat; and it is nevar put with the wrong end in front." Later editions corrected the word "nevar" -- not realizing that Carroll clearly meant to write "raven" backward. As in, "It is raven put with the wrong end in front."

Yeah, that's not exactly what we were expecting, either, but at least it does sound like something Lewis Carroll would have come up with.

I'm putting this here because I'm sure that first editor was a grammar nazi virgo, spoiling all the fun.

Lazy taurus must be an oxymoron

And this reflects Virgos how?

I still dislike Lewis Carroll I think he was a pervert. And I never understood Alice in Wonderland.

But for some reason this book is still pushed on young girls.

Though you did a very good analysis... And it took people over a hundred years to figure out that in the manuscript that raven was spelled backwards as nevar?

Shows how much people thought of the book.

I'm putting this here because I'm sure that first editor was a grammar nazi virgo, spoiling all the fun.

Lewis Carroll was an aquarius...he was WAY OUT THERE

Posted by Damnata

I'm putting this here because I'm sure that first editor was a grammar nazi virgo, spoiling all the fun.

Lewis Carroll was an aquarius...he was WAY OUT THERE

Now this makes a whole lotta sense. Context my Dear Context.

Signed

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson

What is it with you and intrigue?

You certainly are a curious Virgin.

Curiosity killed me. 🙂

Oh we virgo do this all the time. So a direct question is not unusual for us.

And to tell someone some odd fact is also in the realm of Virgo.

Its just the way we are.

I'm totally random from one subject to the other though.

My mind makes the connections but for the rest of the people it looks really weird