Cheshire Cat

Cheshire Cat
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland character
The Cheshire cat as illustrator John Tenniel envisioned it in the 1865 publication
Created by	Lewis Carroll
Voiced by	Sterling Holloway Tony Pope (Disneyland attractions) Jim Cummings (current) Keith David (Once Upon A Time in Wonderland) Stephen Fry
Information
Species	Tabby British Shorthair Cat
Gender	Male (the Queen of Hearts cries "off with his head" when the cat upsets the king)
Quote	"Most everyone's mad here" "You may have noticed that I'm not all there myself"

The Cheshire Cat (/ˈtʃɛʃər/ or /ˈtʃɛʃɪər/) is a fictional cat popularised by Lewis Carroll in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and known for its distinctive mischievous grin. While most often celebrated in Alice-related contexts, the Cheshire Cat predates the 1865 novel and has transcended the context of literature and become enmeshed in popular culture, appearing in various forms of media, from political cartoons to television, as well as cross-disciplinary studies, from business to science. One of its distinguishing features is that from time to time its body disappears, the last thing visible being its iconic grin.

There are numerous theories about the origins of the phrase "Grinning like a Cheshire Cat" in English history.

This phrase owes its origin to the unhappy attempts of a sign painter of that country to represent a lion rampant, which was the crest of an influential family, on the sign-boards of many of the inns. The resemblance of these lions to cats caused them to be generally called by the more ignoble name. A similar case is to be found in the village of Charlton, between Pewsey and Devizes, Wiltshire. A public-house by the roadside is commonly known by the name of The Cat at Charlton. The sign of the house was originally a lion or tiger, or some such animal, the crest of the family of Sir Edward Poore.

The Cheshire Cat is now largely identified with the character of the same name in Lewis Carroll's novel Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Alice first encounters the Cheshire Cat at the Duchess' house in her kitchen, and later on the branches of a tree, where it appears and disappears at will, and engages Alice in amusing but sometimes perplexing conversation. The cat sometimes raises philosophical points that annoy or baffle Alice; but appears to cheer her when it appears suddenly at the Queen of Hearts' croquet field; and when sentenced to death, baffles everyone by having made its head appear without its body, sparking a debate between the executioner and the King and Queen of Hearts about whether a disembodied head can indeed be beheaded. At one point, the cat disappears gradually until nothing is left but its grin, prompting Alice to remark that 'she has often seen a cat without a grin but never a grin without a cat'.