Tweedledee

Also known as the one marked 'DEE', Next Boy

Major
First seen · Book 2 · Ch. 3

Tweedledee has the stout, buttoned-up look of a man who takes his own importance very seriously, even when his clothes suggest otherwise. His boldly labeled collar and saucepan-shaped helmet make him hard to mistake—and harder to take entirely solemnly.

Gender: male
First appears: Book 2 · Ch. 3
Books: 1

Tweedledee appears beside his twin, Tweedledum, under a tree, the two standing with an arm around one another as they greet Alice. He takes part in their boastful, peculiar exchange and later dresses for battle in a haphazard jumble of household coverings, complete with a helmet like a saucepan. His repeated poetry and theatrical manner leave Alice with an encounter as memorable for its absurdity as for its confidence.

Description

Tweedledee is a fat little man with a rounded, compact build and a collar embroidered with the clear identifying letters “DEE.” His ordinary appearance is simple and toy-like, while his makeshift battle costume piles bolsters, blankets, hearth-rugs, table-cloths, dish-covers, and coal-scuttles around him. A helmet resembling a saucepan sits on his head, lending his stout figure a wonderfully improvised air. He carries himself with comic confidence, especially when standing close beside his twin. Tweedledee is a fat little man, short and rounded in the storybook manner, with a soft, plump silhouette. His face and coloring are not specified, so his most reliable visual marker is the embroidered “DEE” on his collar. He wears simple clothing suited to a nursery-rhyme figure, with no other distinctive accessories established. His presence is genial and peculiar, as though he belongs to a world where labels and logic are equally playful.

Connections

Family & partnersFriends & mentorsRivals

Tweedledumconflicting source relationships
The brothers are physically affectionate and closely coordinated, hugging and holding hands, but they quarrel over Tweedledum’s new rattle and agree to fight over it.
Aliceconflicting source relationships
Tweedledee dances with Alice and recites the poem “The Walrus and the Carpenter” to her, though he repeatedly ignores her questions and disputes her interpretation.
Red Kingsubjects or attendants to the sleeping king
Tweedledee identifies the loud snoring as the Red King and presents him to Alice.