Lewis Carroll

Father William

Father William.
"Father William," a parody by Lewis Carroll (1833-), is even more clever than the original. Harmless fun brightens the world. It takes a real genius to create wit that carries no sting.

Parody structure

Carroll is responding to Robert Southey's 1799 poem "The Old Man's Comforts and How He Gained Them," which presented a sentimental old man dispensing wisdom. Carroll inverts this: his Father William is absurd, selfish, and refuses genuine engagement.

"You are old, Father William," the young man said,
"And your hair has become very white;
And yet you incessantly stand on your head—
Do you think, at your age, it is right?"
"In my youth," Father William replied to his son,
"I feared it might injure the brain;
But now that I'm perfectly sure I have none,

Logic inversion

The joke works through backwards reasoning: most people fear headstands damage the brain, so they stop. Father William does them more because he's convinced he has no brain left to damage. This is absurdist logic, not wisdom.

Why, I do it again and again."
"You are old," said the youth, "as I mentioned before,
And have grown most uncommonly fat;
Yet you turned a back-somersault in at the door—
Pray, what is the reason of that?"
"In my youth," said the sage, as he shook his gray locks,
"I kept all my limbs very supple
By the use of this ointment—one shilling the box—

Salesmanship intrusion

Father William suddenly tries to sell ointment to his questioner mid-conversation. This breaks the expected mentoring tone and reveals his real character: opportunistic and indifferent to the youth's genuine curiosity.

Allow me to sell you a couple."
"You are old," said the youth, "and your jaws are too weak
For anything tougher than suet;
Yet you finished the goose, with the bones and the beak:
Pray, how did you manage to do it?"
"In my youth," said his father, "I took to the law,
And argued each case with my wife;
And the muscular strength which it gave to my jaw
Has lasted the rest of my life."
"You are old," said the youth; "one would hardly suppose
That your eye was as steady as ever;
Yet you balanced an eel on the end of your nose—
What made you so awfully clever?"
"I have answered three questions, and that is enough,"
Said his father, "don't give yourself airs!
Do you think I can listen all day to such stuff?
Be off, or I'll kick you down-stairs!"

Dismissal and threat

Instead of patience or wisdom, Father William ends with irritation and violence. "Be off, or I'll kick you down-stairs!" reveals he's been tolerating the youth's questions only because he had to, not from any paternal concern.

Lewis Carroll
("Alice in Wonderland.")
Source

Reading Notes

How Carroll Dismantles Sentiment

Carroll's "Father William" works as parody by taking Southey's earnest poem—where an old man explains his contentment through virtue and moderation—and replacing every answer with selfish nonsense. Where Southey's Father William attributes his happiness to temperance and industry, Carroll's attributes his vigor to having no brain, selling dubious ointments, and arguing with his wife. The structure stays identical (youth asks questions, father answers), but the content becomes increasingly hostile and ridiculous.

The poem's real target isn't old age or wisdom literature—it's the Victorian assumption that virtue and sentiment naturally align. Southey presents an old man who is both physically capable and morally sound. Carroll separates these: his Father William is physically absurd *and* morally bankrupt (he tries to sell snake oil, he threatens violence). By keeping the verse form tight and the rhyme scheme predictable, Carroll makes the absurdity feel inevitable rather than forced. The competent meter carries ridiculous content, which is where the humor lives.

The Escalation Pattern

Each stanza follows the same rhythm: the youth presents a factual observation ("You are old"), notes a contradiction ("yet you do X impossible thing"), and asks why. Father William then provides an explanation that is logically broken but delivered with complete confidence. The explanations get progressively worse: from having no brain (absurd but harmless) to selling ointment (parasitic) to jaw strength from arguing with his wife (nonsensical) to balancing an eel on his nose (purely magical thinking).

The poem's final move is crucial: Father William doesn't continue the pattern. Instead of answering the eel question, he cuts off the conversation entirely and threatens violence. This breaks the established rhythm, which is exactly the point. The youth has been following the rules of polite questioning, but Father William was never actually engaging—he was tolerating an annoyance. Carroll reveals that the entire exchange has been a performance of patience that was never genuine. The threat of violence at the end recontextualizes everything before it: not as wisdom-sharing, but as an old man's irritable endurance of a pest.