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Alice and the Caterpillar (Alice in Wonderland)

"Alice et la Chenille (Alice au Pays des Merveilles)"
French C1 writing exercise

Alice meets the mysterious Caterpillar in this adapted excerpt from "Alice in Wonderland"

 

In this literary text, use Le Passé Simple when appropriate (i.e. not in dialogues)

Pay attention to the hints!

Some vocabulary you may want to look up before or during this exercise: "a hookah", "to address [someone]", "languid", "just at present", "mean by that?", "to explain [oneself]", "to change sizes", "so many times".

Written by Qualified French Expert Aurélie Drouard HKH, Licence d'anglais LLCE
Last updated: 2023-03-12

I’ll give you some sentences to translate into French

  • I’ll show you where you make mistakes
  • I’ll keep track of what you need to practise
  • Change my choices if you want
Start the exercise
How the test works
You’ll practise: Le Présent (Indicatif), Le Passé Simple (Indicatif), Pronom d'objet direct

Here's a preview of the text for the writing challenge, when you're ready click the start button above:

The Caterpillar and Alice looked at each other for some time in silence: then the Caterpillar took the hookah out of its mouth, and addressed her in a languid, sleepy voice. "Who are YOU?" said the Caterpillar. This was not an encouraging opening for a conversation. Alice replied, rather shyly, "I–I hardly know, sir, just at present - at least I know who I WAS when I got up this morning, but I must have changed several times since then." "What do you mean by that?" said the Caterpillar sternly. "Explain yourself!" "I'm afraid I can't explain MYSELF, sir" said Alice, "because I'm not myself, you see." "No, I don't see," said the Caterpillar. "I'm sorry, but I can't explain it more clearly," Alice replied very politely, "for I can't understand it myself to begin with; and it's very confusing to change sizes so many times in a day." "No, it isn't," said the Caterpillar.

Clever stuff happening!