Good Morning Mad Hatters!

Today we celebrate Mat Hatter Day, so take out your best hat and let's get mad! hehe

About The Hatter:
The Hatter is a character in Alice's Adventures In Wonderland, a novel written in 1865 by Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll).

When Carroll was a child, Hat-making was the main occupation where he lived. As Mercury was used in manufacturing felt hats, many of the hatters died of Mercury poisoning. As a result many believed that Hatters really were mad, hence the phrase "Mad as a Hatter".

Mercury poisoning symptoms include; lack of self-confidence and anxiety, neither of which Carroll's Hatter possessed, but I guess, through a child's eyes, it was probably how he imagined a mad hatter would act.

About The Famous Riddle:
The Hatter is known to talk nonesense but many, my self included, had wondered if there ever was an answer to his famus riddle "Why is a raven like a writing desk?". Even Alice couldn't come up with an answer.
Many readers at the time, requested Carroll provide an answer to the riddle, and on his 1896 edition, he replied. He added a brief explanation in the preface as follows:

"Enquiries have been so often addressed to me, as to whether any answer to the Hatter's riddle can be imagined, that I may as well put on record here what seems to me to be a fairly appropriate answer, "because it can produce a few notes, though they are very flat; and it is nevar put with the wrong end in front!" This, however, is merely an afterthought; the riddle as originally invented had no answer at all."

I am glad he didn't mean for it to have an answer. I think finding logic in the riddle makes The Hatter less mad, don't you think.

Who Is Your Favourite Mad Hatter?
For me it's always been the Disney Animated version even if the live action ones were good because I prefer funny mad over creepy mad to be honest hehe. Plus Ed Wynn voicing the Mad Hatter was a given bonus!

I read that Edward Everett Horton played the Mad Hatter in the 1933 TV film, but I have yet to watch it because I couldn't find a version with good quality. I've only seen Gary Cooper's scene, but it was useless because he was the knight, so we couldn't see his handsome face and he had no lines haha.

Which Is Your Favourite Mad Hatter Illustration?
While I like the original version by Sir John Tenniel, I think 19th century illustrations are grim, so I can't love it.

 

The Disney version by John Lounsbery was the best because it was funny and looked like Ed Wynn hehe. His expressions were the maddest too.

 

You can see the test footage of Wynn playing the Mad Hatter and the process in which the character was created, below:

Another great version of the Mad Hatter was Mary Blair's concept illustrations for Disney's 1951 animation.

Blair is one of my favourite illustrators and she had been the concept designer for most of Disney's 1950s animations. Her art for Alice In Wonderland combined both the creepy and the funny side of the Mad Hatter.

I think for an animation the Lounsbery version was the most perfect but in general, I prefer Blair's style more.