Was the song named after the book or the book named after the song?

Cafe Society
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1

Go Ask Alice. Or am I tripping?

2

The Song title was an allusion to Alice in Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass.

The book came later and probably was alluding to the song.

But tripping to Jefferson Airplane is quite appropriate.

3

That was quick and thank you!

4

The Jefferson Airplane song is actually called “White Rabbit”.

5

Plus, the song was called White Rabbit. I’m pretty sure it preceeded the book.

6

Thanks, Andy. :grinning:

7

The book (1971) after a line in the song “White Rabbit” (1967), which referenced “Alice in Wonderland” (1865).

ETA: Ninja’ed, and by so many! It’s clear what we all do on a Sunday morning!

8

“White Rabbit” came out in 1967. The book Go Ask Alice was published in 1971. So, this can be the only answer, barring time travel. :wink:

9

Good point, but much like Baba O’Reilly was often called Teenage Wasteland, I also remember White Rabbit being called Go Ask Alice. So easy mistake.

And according to Wiki at least,

The title was taken from a line in the 1967 Grace Slick-penned Jefferson Airplane song “White Rabbit”[7][13] (“go ask Alice/ when she’s ten feet tall”); the lyrics in turn reference scenes in Lewis Carroll’s 1865 novel Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland, in which the title character Alice eats and drinks various substances, including a mushroom, that make her grow larger or smaller. Slick’s song is understood as using Carroll’s story as a metaphor for a drug experience.[14][15]

I suppose with enough acid or shrooms we can’t completely rule out time travel. It would probably require a Surrealistic Pillow also.

10

So the real answer, after all these answers, is: I be trippin’!

11

Teenage Wasteland was a song/demo intended for the Lifehouse project that morphed into Baba O’Riley when the project was abandoned in favor of Who’s Next.