Humpty Dumpty, Lewis Carroll and Donald Trump

In earlier posts, I've talked about how fiction can be used to predict the future, or perhaps foreshadow what is to come, citing George Orwell's "Nineteen Eighty Four" as particularly noteworthy when it comes to trends in the United States and perhaps elsewhere.

Today, in the same context, I want to turn to another British author, who went by the pen name of Lewis Carroll.  When "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" proved to be overwhelmingly popular, Carroll wrote a sequel called "Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There."





In chapter six of the latter, Alice meets a curious egg named Humpty Dumpty -- of nursery rhyme fame.

With the arrival of the Trump administration, we are now in the world of "false news" and "alternative facts," which brings to mind the following lines from "Trough the Looking Glass:"

"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less."

`"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things."

"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master – – that’s all."

In the nursery rhyme, Humpty "had a great fall" from the heights to which he had ascended and that was the end of him. "All the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty together again."

One wonders about the possible fate of our own Humpty Dumpty. 

The truth is what I choose it to be; nothing more and northing less. That seems to be the current refrain from the nation's capital.