Snark (Lewis Carroll) Snark (Lewis Carroll) The snark is a fictional animal species created by Lewis Carroll in his nonsense poem "The Hunting of the Snark". His descriptions of the creatures were, in his own words, unimaginable, and he wanted that to remain so. According to Carroll, the initial inspiration to write the poem – which he called an "agony in eight fits" – was the final line, "For the snark was a boojum, you see". Carroll was asked repeatedly to explain the snark. In all cases, his answer was he did not know and could not explain. Later commentators have offered many
The Hunting of the Snark refused his illustration of the Boojum, preferring that the creature go without a depiction, and made him change his initial portrayal of the Broker, as it could be perceived as anti-semitic. When finally published, the poem comprised 141 stanzas of four lines each, with internal rhymes in the first and third lines of irregular stanzas appearing in the poem from the second fit onwards. In his poem, Lewis Carroll might have alluded to a limerick by Edward Lear. Instead of faces turning red or white, both authors let waistcoats display the bodily reactions of their owners to stress. To illustrate