How to Apologize for Standing Someone Up: A Lesson from Lewis Carroll’s Hilarious Letter
“I am obliged to use an umbrella to keep the tears from running down on to the paper.”
By Maria Popova
From Richard Feynman’s sketches to Marilyn Monroe’s poetry to Sylvia Plath’s drawings, we’ve learned that famous creators often harbor little-known talent in a different medium. Among this tendency’s prime examples is Charles Dodgson, better-known today as Lewis Carroll. Though primarily celebrated as the author of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, he was also a masterful mathematician and logician, as well as a dedicated practitioner of the then-new art form of photography. Known for his friendships with children, Dodgson had a particular soft spot for photographing them and famously took portraits of Alice Liddell, the real little girl who inspired Wonderland. But his greatest talent of all was perhaps his good-natured humor and irreverent wit.
From the endlessly delightful Funny Letters from Famous People (public library) — the same gem that gave us the best resignation letter ever written, courtesy of Sherwood Anderson — comes Carroll’s charmingly hyperbolic apologetic letter to Annie Rogers, a young friend and photography model whom he accidentally stood up in 1867.

My dear Annie:
This is indeed dreadful. You have no idea of the grief I am in while I write. I am obliged to use an umbrella to keep the tears from running down on to the paper. Did you come yesterday to be photographed? And were you very angry? Why wasn’t I there? Well the fact was this — I went out for a walk with Bibkins, my dear friend Bibkins — we went many miles from Oxford — fifty — a hundred, say. As we were crossing a field full of sheep, a thought crossed my mind, and I said solemnly, “Dobkins, what o’clock is it?” “Three,” said Fipkins, surprised at my manner. Tears ran down my cheeks. “It is the HOUR,” I said. “Tell me, tell me, Hopkins, what day is it?” “Why, Monday, of course,” said Lupkins. “Then it is the DAY!” I groaned. I wept. I screamed. The sheep crowded round me, and rubbed their affectionate noses against mine. “Mopkins!” I said, “you are my oldest friend. Do not deceive me, Nupkins! What year is this?” “Well, I think it’s 1867,” said Pipkins. “Then it’s the YEAR!” I screamed, so loud that Tapkins fainted. It was all over: I was brought home, in a cart, attended by the faithful Wopkins, in several pieces.
When I have recovered a little from the shock, and have been to the seaside for a few months, I will call and arrange another day for photographing. I am too weak to write this myself, so Zupkins is writing it for me.
Your miserable friend,
Lewis Carroll
Funny Letters from Famous People, edited by the great Charles Osgood, remains a treat in its entirety.
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Published August 5, 2013
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https://www.themarginalian.org/2013/08/05/lewis-carroll-apology-letter/
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