Twilight Lexicon Discussion Forums

Hello all! I haven't posted here in quite some time, but something odd occurred to me today. How did Alice know her own name? I have read through all of the tidbits and Personal Correspondences on the Lex about Alice, but I can't understand how she knew her name was Alice (okay, technically it was Mary Alice) when she awoke as a Vampire. She didn't learn her full name until she got tipped off by James (via Bella) in Twilight about who she was and where she came from. Any guesses? My only hypothesis is that she was wearing something with her name on it when she woke up as a vamp (asylum clothes? UNDERWEAR? It's killing me!)

omg i am like half in love with alice! i cried sooooooooooooooo hard when i was watching the new moon movie while bella was trying 2 talk 2 alice it was so sad!

AHHH Alice is one of my favourite characters!!! All the descriptions of her in the book... I wish I had a friend like her!! I'm not sure why I LOVE her but she is just soo... AMAZING!

Oh-Marvelous-Things wrote:Hello all! I haven't posted here in quite some time, but something odd occurred to me today. How did Alice know her own name? I have read through all of the tidbits and Personal Correspondences on the Lex about Alice, but I can't understand how she knew her name was Alice (okay, technically it was Mary Alice) when she awoke as a Vampire. She didn't learn her full name until she got tipped off by James (via Bella) in Twilight about who she was and where she came from. Any guesses? My only hypothesis is that she was wearing something with her name on it when she woke up as a vamp (asylum clothes? UNDERWEAR? It's killing me!)

Actually, I did a lot of research on amnesia for my fic on Alice called Singularity. For it, I read about 100 different articles on amnesia. It is possible for a person to forget memories but still remember the names of things, including themselves. So they may not know how or why they know that a dog is called a dog, but they do know it. I made Alice have this type of amnesia. I forget the name, but it is associated with trauma and does allow her to have no active memories of the past, and yet be able to speak and communicate.
Hope that helps.

Actually, I did a lot of research on amnesia for my fic on Alice called Singularity. For it, I read about 100 different articles on amnesia. It is possible for a person to forget memories but still remember the names of things, including themselves. So they may not know how or why they know that a dog is called a dog, but they do know it. I made Alice have this type of amnesia. I forget the name, but it is associated with trauma and does allow her to have no active memories of the past, and yet be able to speak and communicate.
Hope that helps.

Awesome! That was one of the theories I have been thinking about as well. It makes the most sense; she still knew the names of basic objects, facts of life, etc. so it does make perfect sense for her name to also be one of those definitive facts that she would remember. Do you have a link to your fic? I'd love to read it.

Hi everyone, another Alice-lover checking in.

Seriously, don't we all love her. She's one of those force-of-nature characters who you can't help but adore, even when they're being irritating.

I thought I'd take a pass at answering a couple of previously posed Alice questions:

1) How could Alice predict the stock market?

As it happens, I can claim just a tiny bit of professional authority on this subject.

<pauses, rummages around desk to find "economics professor hat" and puts it on, clears throat in a professorial way>

First, how Alice's precognition works, precisely, is something we don't fully know. SM chose, wisely I think, to avoid giving too much detail. We know that Alice can see the consequences of human or vampire decisions once they are made; we also know that she can see the future of "impersonal forces" like the weather to some degree.

It might be that seeing the future of the stock market is kind of like seeing the weather for her. Maybe she sees the news reports in advance. There are a couple of daily financial market summaries in the Wall Street Journal; if Alice could get a look at them, even a few days in advance, it would be very lucrative.

Alternately, she might just see the consequences, in terms of the stock market, of important decisions. She might be able to see, for example, that a pair of writers for Fortune are planning to investigate the finances of a certain corporation, and see the ultimate consequences. She could then dance down the hall and say "Uh, Carlisle, you know our Enron stock? I think it's time to unload all of it" and tap her forehead meaningfully.

Footnote: What I'm alluding to is the March 2001 piece in Fortune, by Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind, titled "Is Enron Overpriced?" This was the small rock that started the avalanche that eventually led to Enron's bankruptcy.

Even if all she's aware of is the existence of important business decisions, that would be valuable. There's always a time lag between when a decision is made, and when it becomes public. So Alice could be acquiring "inside information." If you could get even one piece of inside information a day, you might not be able to make each one of them pay off, but over time you'd be able to make a killing.

Okay, end of lecture

The other question is one that I know has been posed somewhere on this forum, although I can't find it anywhere in this thread:

2) What musical instrument do you think Alice would play?

I came up with a couple of ideas here. One, I can easily see Alice playing some kind of jazz instrument--maybe the saxophone. Jazz has so much room for improvisation and individual expression, and since Alice is such a free spirit I think she'd be really into something like that.

I can also see Alice as a kind of folkie. Namely, the sort who carries a guitar almost everywhere and can start picking out a tune and singing at a moment's notice. For those who have seen Say Anything, think Lili Taylor's character.

Jestak~ I completely agree that I have always thought of Alice as kind of a hippie/folk character. She just seems to be such a free spirit and happy go lucky. I can totally picture her sitting in a tree, playing a guitar. She seems to be a very well-rounded character even though most/all of her human life is a mystery to her.

Aww everyone forgot about my beautiful Alice, and yes she is mine.

Alice is so amazing in all the books, and of course Ashley Greene plays her so well. I love her in Twilight from the moment I saw her, before I read the books btw.

I always wondered how Alice would be with Renesmee as she gets older, what with her messing with her visions.

MrOverseer wrote:Aww everyone forgot about my beautiful Alice, and yes she is mine.

hahaha, MrOverseer ! i thinks you have competition on that one! xD

But anyway, Alice is my all time favourite. And Ashley Greene did an amazing job bringing her to life! I think it is so cool she found out she had a living relative still. Her niece was it? I have been thinking about writing a fic about her human life before she was imprisoned into the asylum by her cruel family. Who cares if she was having premonitions, she is your flesh and blood. But then again, the asylum did save her from the grasp of James.

For some reason I am imagining Alice seeing things like the beginning of Final Destination, where like the first 10 minutes is just a horrible horrible accident, as her visions. lol I dunno why.