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The Hunting of the Snark
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The Hunting of the Snark: An Agony in Eight Fits
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The Hunting of the Snark

poem by Carroll
Also known as: “The Hunting of the Snark: An Agony in Eight Fits”(Show More)
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History

The Hunting of the Snark, nonsense poem by Lewis Carroll, first published in 1876. The fanciful eight-canto poem describes the sea voyage of a bellman, boots (bootblack), bonnet maker, barrister, broker, billiard marker, banker, beaver, baker, and butcher and their search for the elusive undefined snark. A dedicatory poem that Carroll attached to the work contained an acrostic on the name of his then-favourite child friend, Gertrude Chataway, whose name is also found in the first words of each stanza of the poem: Girt, Rude, Chat, Away. While scholars have attributed to the work hidden meanings from political subversion to existential agony, Carroll maintained that it was intended simply as nonsense.

This article was most recently revised and updated by Kathleen Kuiper.