The Hunting of the Snark Gardner sees the poem as dealing with existential angst, and states that the Baker may be Carroll's satire of himself, pointing to the fact that the Baker was named after a beloved uncle, as was Carroll, and that the two were around the same age at the time of the writing of the poem. Alternatively, Larry Shaw of the fan magazine "Inside and Science Fiction Advertiser" suggests that the Boots, being the Snark, actually murdered the Baker. Also references to religious issues had been suggested, like the Baker's 42 boxes being a reference to Thomas Cranmer's "Forty-Two Articles" with a
Carroll diagram Carroll diagram A Carroll diagram, Lewis Carroll's square, biliteral diagram or a "two-way table" is a diagram used for grouping things in a yes/no fashion. Numbers or objects are either categorised as 'x' (having an attribute x) or 'not x' (not having an attribute 'x'). They are named after Lewis Carroll, the pseudonym of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson. Although Carroll diagrams can be as simple as the first one above, the most well known types are those similar to the second one, where two attributes are shown. The <nowiki>'</nowiki>universe<nowiki>'</nowiki> of a Carroll diagram is contained within the boxes in the diagram,