Lewis Carroll is the pen name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832–1898), a mathematician who achieved worldwide fame with his literary works Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass. In 1865, he published the story of a girl named Alice who falls down a rabbit hole and finds herself in a strange and magical world.

On a snowy November night, Alice is sitting in an armchair before the fireplace, playing with a white kitten and a black kitten. She talks about the game of chess and then speculates what the world is like beyond the mirror. Having climbed onto the mantelpiece, she touches the mirror above the fireplace and discovers, to her surprise, that she can step through it.