Alice

Saint Alice of Schaerbeek (died 1250) was a Cistercian nun in Brabant venerated as a patron of the blind and paralyzed. The name remained common in English noble and gentry families throughout the medieval and early modern periods.

The name’s modern celebrity rests on Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass (1871), inspired by Alice Liddell, the daughter of the dean of Christ Church, Oxford.

The books have been translated into more than 175 languages and have generated continuous adaptations, including the 1951 Disney animated film and Tim Burton’s 2010 live-action version.

Other literary Alices include the title character of Henry James’s The Wings of the Dove (1902) and Alice Walker, author of The Color Purple (1982).

In the United States, Alice ranked within the top 10 from 1880 through 1919, peaking at rank 6 in 1900. It declined steadily through the mid-20th century, falling out of the top 100 in 1958, then bottomed out around rank 350.

A revival began in the early 2000s, and by 2014 Alice had reentered the top 100. By 2023 it had climbed to approximately rank 60. The name has held top 10 status in Italy and France in recent decades.

Contemporary bearers include American novelist Alice Munro, recipient of the 2013 Nobel Prize in Literature; British author Alice Walker; and singer Alice Cooper (a male stage name).

Alice’s combination of medieval royal pedigree, literary saturation, and short crisp phonetics has made it one of the most stable Western feminine names of the past 150 years.