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Land of Oz
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Oz is a fairy country (fantasy region) containing four lands under the rule of one monarch.
It was first introduced in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1900) by L. Frank Baum, one of many fairy countries that he created for his books. It achieved a popularity that none of his other works attained, and after four years, he returned to it. The land was described and expanded upon in the Oz Books. An attempt to cut off the production of the series with The Emerald City of Oz, by ending the story with Oz being isolated from the rest of the world, did not succeed owing to readers' reactions and Baum's financial need to write successful books.
The land of Oz is depicted as real in the books, unlike the 1939 movie adaptation, which transformed it into an ambiguous dream of Dorothy's.
In all, Baum wrote fourteen children's books about Oz and its odd inhabitants, as well as six shorter books intended for younger readers.
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Encyclopedia
Oz is a fairy country (fantasy region) containing four lands under the rule of one monarch.
It was first introduced in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1900) by L. Frank Baum, one of many fairy countries that he created for his books. It achieved a popularity that none of his other works attained, and after four years, he returned to it. The land was described and expanded upon in the Oz Books. An attempt to cut off the production of the series with The Emerald City of Oz, by ending the story with Oz being isolated from the rest of the world, did not succeed owing to readers' reactions and Baum's financial need to write successful books.
The land of Oz is depicted as real in the books, unlike the 1939 movie adaptation, which transformed it into an ambiguous dream of Dorothy's.
In all, Baum wrote fourteen children's books about Oz and its odd inhabitants, as well as six shorter books intended for younger readers. After his death, Ruth Plumly Thompson and other writers continued the series.
"Oz as History"
In Baum's time, it was common for authors to present works of fiction as true accounts (compare Sherlock Holmes and Tarzan for other examples). While Baum presented Oz as fiction in some of his forewords such as that of the first book, in other books he presented it as a true account related to him by those involved. Most notably, in The Emerald City of Oz he attempted to end the series on the basis of a letter he had claimed to have received from Dorothy Gale, the main character. In the following book, The Patchwork Girl of Oz, he explained that after some difficulty he had re-established communication with the characters by wireless telegraph.
Baum also began signing himself as "Royal Historian of Oz," a title which several other authors of the series have taken on after his death.
Because Baum himself wrote from an in-universe standpoint, many fans of the series treat the books as if they were true, known among the fans as the "Oz as History" standpoint. Any confusion or contradiction between the different versions of their histories is said to be the fault of the historian making an honest mistake, of the editors for removing parts which they did not consider suitable for the child audience, of the characters involved who reported the incidents in question back to the historian, or explained by the concept that many alternate versions of Oz co-exist simultaneously.
There are many discussions founded on clues in the series in Oz fan group Regalia (and previously Nonestica and the Ozzy Digest) on how large Oz is, its population, and many other details not addressed explicitly in the books themselves. Articles of the sort frequently appear in The Baum Bugle as well.
While some fans enjoy trying to explain the various inconsistencies in the books, others prefer to ignore them, since apparently the inconsistencies weren't important to Baum himself. These fans prefer to view Oz from the contrasting, but more traditional, Oz as Literature standpoint. Many fans enjoy both standpoints, and it is not uncommon for new ideas about Oz to be examined from both standpoints by the same people.
Characteristics
Oz is, in the first book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, distinguished from Dorothy's native Kansas by not being civilized; this explains why Kansas does not have witches and wizards, while Oz does. In the third book, Ozma of Oz, Oz is described as a "fairy country", new terminology that remained to explain its wonders.
Geography
The Land of Oz
Oz is roughly rectangular in shape, and divided along the diagonals into four countries: Munchkin Country (but commonly referred to as 'Munchkinland' in adaptations) in the East, Winkie Country (called 'The Vinkus' in Gregory Maguire's Wicked and its sequel Son of a Witch) in the West, (sometimes West and East are reversed on maps of Oz, see West and East below) Gillikin Country in the North, and Quadling Country in the South. In the center of Oz, where the diagonals cross, is the fabled Emerald City, capital of the land of Oz and seat to the monarch of Oz, Princess Ozma.
The regions have a color schema: blue for Munchkins, yellow for Winkies, red for Quadlings, green for the Emerald city, and (in works after the first) purple for the Gillikins, which region was also not named in the first book. (This contrasts with Kansas; Baum, describing it, used "gray" nine times in four paragraphs.) In The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, this is merely the favorite color, used for clothing and other man-made objects, and having some influence on their choice of crops, but the basic colors of the world are natural colors. The effect is less consistent in later works. In The Marvelous Land of Oz, the book states that everything in the land of the Gillikins is purple, including the plants and mud, and a character can see that he is leaving when the grass turns from purple to green, but it also describes pumpkins as orange and corn as green in that land. Baum, indeed, never used the color schema consistently; in many books, he alluded to the colors to orient the characters and readers to their location, and then did not refer to it again. His most common technique was to depict the man-made articles and flowers as the color of the country, leaving leaves, grass, and fruit their natural colors.
Most of these regions are settled with prosperous and contented people. However, this naturally is lacking in scope for plot. Numerous pockets throughout the land of Oz are cut off from the main culture, for geographic or cultural reasons. Many have never heard of Ozma, making it impossible for them to acknowledge her as their rightful queen. These regions are concentrated around the edges of the country, and constitute the main settings for books that are set entirely within Oz. The Lost Princess of Oz, for instance is set entirely in rough country in Winkie Country, between two settled areas. In Glinda of Oz, Ozma speaks of her duty to discover all these stray corners of Oz.
In The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, a yellow brick road leads from the lands of the Munchkins to the Emerald City. Other such roads featured in other works: one from Gillikin Country in The Marvelous Land of Oz, and a second one from Munchkin Land in The Patchwork Girl of Oz.
Oz is completely surrounded on all four sides by a desert, which insulates the citizens of Oz from discovery and invasion. In the first two books, this is merely a desert, with only its extent to make it dangerous to the traveler. Indeed, in The Marvelous Land of Oz, Mombi tries to escape through it and Glinda chases her over the sands. Still, it is the dividing land between the magic of Oz and the outside world, and the Winged Monkeys can not obey Dorothy's command to carry her home because it would take them outside the lands of Oz. In Ozma of Oz, it has become a magical desert, the Deadly Desert with life-destroying sands (no destruction is depicted in the Oz books, unlike in the film, Return to Oz), a feature that remained constant through the rest of the series. The desert has nonetheless been breached numerous times, both by children from our world (mostly harmless), by the Wizard of Oz himself, and by more sinister characters, such as the Nome King, who attempted to conquer Oz. After such an attempt in The Emerald City of Oz, the book ends with Glinda creating a barrier of invisibility around the Land of Oz, for further protection. This was, indeed, an earnest effort on Baum's part to escape the series, but the insistence of the readers meant the continuation of the series, and therefore the discovery of many ways for people to pass through this barrier as well as over the sands. Despite this continual evasion, the barrier itself remained; nowhere in any Oz book did Baum hint that the inhabitants were even considering removing the magical barrier.
West and East
The first known map of Oz was a glass slide used in Baum's Fairylogue and Radio-Play traveling show, showing the blue land of the Munchkins in the east and the yellow land of the Winkies in the west. These directions are confirmed by the text of all of Baum's Oz books, especially the first, in which The Wicked Witch of the East rules over the Munchkins, and The Wicked Witch of the West rules over the Winkies.
Like traditional western maps, the Fairylogue and Radio-Play map showed the west on the left, and the east on the right. However, the first map of Oz to appear in an Oz book had those directions reversed, and the compass rose adjusted accordingly. It is believed that this is a result of Baum copying the map from the wrong side of the glass slide, effectively getting a mirror image of his intended map. When he realized he was copying the slide backward, he reversed the compass rose to make the directions correct. However, an editor at Reilly and Lee reversed the compass rose, thinking he was fixing an error and resulting in further confusion. Most notably, this confused Ruth Plumly Thompson, who frequently reversed directions in her own Oz books as a result.
Another speculation stems from the original conception of Oz, which at first appeared to be situated in an American desert. If Baum thought of the country of the Munchkins as the nearest region to him, it would have been in the east while he lived in Chicago, but when he moved to California, it would have be in the west.
Modern maps of Oz are almost universally drawn with the Winkies in the west and the Munchkins in the east, although west and east often appear reversed. Many Oz fans believe this is the correct orientation, perhaps as a result of Glinda's spell, which has the effect of confusing most standard compasses; perhaps resembling its similarity to the world Alice found through the looking glass in which everything was a mirror image; or perhaps just reflecting the alien nature of Oz. In Robert A. Heinlein's book The Number of the Beast he explains that Oz is on a retrograde planet, meaning that it spins in the opposite direction of Earth so that the sun seems to rise on one's left as one faces north. March Laumer's The Magic Mirror of Oz attribues the changes to a character named Till Orangespiegel attempting to turn the Land of Oz orange.
Location
Oz, like all of Baum's fantasy countries, was presented as existing as part of the real world, albeit protected from civilization by natural barriers. Indeed, in the first books, nothing indicated that it was not hidden in the deserts of the United States. It gradually acquired neighboring magical countries, often from works of Baum's that had been independent, as Ix from Queen Zixi of Ix, and Mo from The Magical Monarch of Mo. The first of these is Ev, introduced in Ozma of Oz.
In Tik-Tok of Oz, Baum included maps in the endpapers which definitively situated Oz in a continent with its neighboring countries. Oz is the largest country on the continent unofficially known as Nonestica (this name was proposed by Robert R. Pattrick in The Unexplored Territory in Oz for the whole of the countries surrounding Oz. Pattrick proposed "Ozeria" for the whole continent, but that name is generally unused in fan discussions), which also includes the countries of Ev, Ix, and Mo, which has also been known as Phunniland, among others. Nonestica is, according to the map, in the Nonestic Ocean. A fair amount of evidence in the books point to this continent as being envisioned as somewhere in the southern Pacific Ocean. At the opening of Ozma of Oz, Dorothy Gale is sailing to Australia with her Uncle Henry when she is washed overboard (in a chicken coop, with Billina the yellow hen), and lands on the shore of Ev—a rare instance in which an outsider reaches the Oz landmass through non-magical (or apparently non-magical) means. Palm trees grow outside the Royal Palace in the Emerald City, and horses are not native to Oz, both points of consistency with a South-Pacific location; illustrations and descriptions of round-shaped and domed Ozian houses suggest a non-Western architecture. Conversely, Oz has technological, architectural, and urban elements typical of Europe and North America around the turn of the twentieth century; but this may involve cultural input from unusual external sources (see History below). Ruth Plumly Thompson asserts in her first Oz book, The Royal Book of Oz, that the language of Oz is English, which also suggests European or American influence.
An argument against the South Pacific is that the seasons in Oz are shown as the same seasons in the United States at the same time. In addition, in The Wishing Horse of Oz, Pigasus follows the North Star when he flies to Thunder Mountain, which could only be done in the Northern Hemisphere.
Inspiration
Baum's creation of the Emerald City may have been inspired by the White City of the World Columbian Exposition, which he visited frequently. Its quick building, in less than a year, may have been an element in the quick construction of the Emerald City in the first book.
Schematically, Oz is much like the United States, with the Emerald City taking the place of Chicago: to the East, mixed forest and farmland; to the West, treeless plains and fields of wheat; to the South, warmth and lush growth, and red earth.
It has also been speculated since The Wizard of Oz was first written that Oz may have been based on China. Either way, the oriental influence on Oz has been noted by more than one scholar.
Ruth Plumly Thompson took a different direction with her Oz books, introducing European elements such as the title character of The Yellow Knight of Oz, a knight straight out of Arthurian Legend.
Inhabitants
Immortals
The world of the Oz books is ruled (and presumably created) by the immortals. These include fairies, nomes, mermaids, nymphs, and several races created by Baum himself, including ryls, knooks, gigans, and rampsies.
All of the immortals are ruled over three immortal "masters", described in Baum's The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus:
- But in the center of the circle sat three others who possessed powers so great that all the Kings and Queens showed them reverence.
- These were Ak, the Master Woodsman of the World, who rules the forests and the orchards and the groves; and Kern, the Master Husbandman of the World, who rules the grain fields and the meadows and the gardens; and Bo, the Master Mariner of the World, who rules the seas and all the craft that float thereon. And all other immortals are more or less subject to these three.
Fairies
The word "fairy" is used in several ways throughout the Oz books. "Fairy people" is often used to describe the people of Oz, who seem to be nothing more than human inhabitants of a fairy country. A number of supernatural creatures are also called fairies, from female spirits of nature who live in mist and on the rainbow, to the nomes, who are seemingly all male, yet also described as earth fairies.
The most powerful kind of fairy is never known by any other name in the books, although Baum sometimes differentiated them by spelling Fairy with a capital F. The Fairies seem to be the most powerful race, with seemingly limitless power. They travel in bands ruled over by Fairy Queens, and spend their time primarily in helping mortals and dancing.
Lurline is a Fairy Queen, and she and her band were the ones who made Oz a fairyland. According to Baum's later books, Ozma is a member of Lurline's band. There are no other Fairies of the highest sort in the Oz books, although The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus and Queen Zixi of Ix, which take place in lands neighboring Oz, both mention other Fairy Queens and their bands.
Nomes/Gnomes
Baum introduced the Nomes in Ozma of Oz, and they served as antagonists throughout the rest of the series. Baum always spelled their name without the traditional silent G, perhaps to Americanize the name, or to make it easier for his child audience to pronounce. Thompson later "corrected" Baum's spelling in her first book, and retained it throughout all the Oz books she wrote.
The Nomes are subterranean people who spend their time mining precious stones from the earth. They consider all of the mineral wealth of the world to be their own rightful property, which often leads to conflicts with other races; as, for instance, when the Shaggy Man's brother disappears in a mine, it is because the Nomes have captured him. They have a massive army, but not much innate magical ability. Although they play a major role in the Oz series, throughout a major part of the series, there are no Nomes actually living in Oz.
Others
The other immortal races of the world of the Oz books play less significant roles, largely appearing in the "borderlands" books by Baum that occur outside of Oz.
The mermaids care for all life in the ocean, and the nymphs serve a similar function under the Fairies in the forests. The nymphs are helped by the ryls, who color the flowers and care for all plants; and the knooks, who are crooked creatures who govern the beasts.
The massive gigans also served the Fairies until Fairy Queen Lulea, becoming annoyed with their large forms, transformed them into the tiny rampsies, smallest of all immortals. Whatever function they served is unknown, for they're only mentioned in Baum's short story Nelebel's Fairyland, in which the gigans reshape the land in their boredom.
Mortals
Although Baum did not often use the word "mortal," Thompson seemed far more fond of it as a way of describing the people who had come to Oz from the great outside world. Since Oz was a land much like any other prior to Lurline's enchantment, it seems that the only mortals in Oz are those who were not in Oz at the time it was enchanted, and were not born in Oz thereafter.
The Wizard was the first mortal in Oz described in Baum's books, followed by Dorothy and all the characters she met in her travels. Apart from the Wizard, the only mortals who originally found their way to Oz without Dorothy in Baum's books were Trot, Cap'n Bill, and Betsy Bobbin.
Witches and wizards
At the time of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the lands in the North, South, East and West of Oz are each ruled by a witch; the Witches of the North and South are Good, while the Witches of the East and West are Wicked. Glinda, the Good Witch of the South, is later revealed to be the most powerful of the four. After Dorothy's house crushes the Wicked Witch of the East, thereby liberating the Munckins from bondage, the Good Witch of the North tells Dorothy that she (the Witch of the North) is not as powerful as the Wicked Witch of the East had been, or she would have freed the Munchkins herself.
During the first scene in Oz in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the Good Witch of the North (Locasta or Tattypoo) explains to Dorothy that Oz still has witches and wizards, not being civilized, and goes on to explain that witches and wizards can be both good and evil, unlike the evil witches that Dorothy had been told of. That book contained only the four witches (besides the humbug wizard), but despite Ozma's prohibition on magic, many more magicians feature in later works.
Baum tended to capitalise the word "Witch" when referring to the Witches of the North, South, East or West, but did not do so when referring to witches in general (eg. In the afore-mentioned first scene of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Locasta (or Tattypoo) thanks Dorothy for killing the "Wicked Witch of the East", and introduces herelf as "the Witch of the North", with the word "Witch" capitalised in both cases. However, when she goes on to tell Dorothy that "I (the Witch of the North) am a good witch, and the people love me", the word "witch" is not capitalised).
White is the traditional color of witches in Oz. The Good Witch of the North wears a pointed white hat and a white gown decorated with stars, while Glinda, the Good Witch of the South (called a "sorceress" in later books), wears a pure white dress. Dorothy is taken for a witch not only because she had killed the Wicked Witch of the East, but because her dress is blue and white checked.
Ozma, once on the throne, prohibits the use of magic by anyone other than Glinda the Good, the Wizard, and herself—as, earlier, the Good Witch of the North had prohibited magic by any other witch in her domains. The illicit use of magic is a frequent feature of villains in later works in the series, appearing in The Scarecrow of Oz, Rinkitink in Oz, The Lost Princess of Oz, The Tin Woodman of Oz, and The Magic of Oz.
Other races
There is a multitude of other races living in the land of Oz, many of which only appear once. Among these are:
- The Flatheads - Humans who carry their brains in cans
- The Cuttenclips - Living paper dolls
- The Hammerheads - An armless race with extensible necks
- The bun people of Bunbury
- The bunnies of Bunnybury
- The living kitchen utensils of Utensia
- The Fuddles - Anthropomorphic jigsaw puzzles
Outside of them are many other strange races who are often found living in the wilderness of Oz. Despite the overlordship of Ozma, many of the communities live autonomously; Oz has great tolerance for eccentricity and oddness.
Many characters in Oz are animated objects. Such figures as the Glass Cat and the Scarecrow are common. Entire regions are the homes of such animated beings. The Dainty China Country is entirely filled with creatures of china, who would freeze into figurines if removed; the China princess lives in fear of breaking, because she would never be as pretty even if repaired.
Many other characters are highly individual, even unique members of a species. Many such people from the outer worlds find refuge in Oz, which is highly tolerant of eccentricity.
History
Prehistory
The history of Oz prior to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (often called the prehistory of Oz as it takes place before Baum's "histories") is often the subject of dispute, as Baum himself gave conflicting accounts. In The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the title character recounts that he was a ventriloquist and a circus balloonist from Omaha, and during one flight the rope for his parachute vent became tangled, preventing him from descending until the next morning, when he awoke floating over a strange land. When he landed, the people thought he was a great wizard because of his ability to fly. He didn't disabuse them of this notion, and with his new power over them, he had them build a city with a palace in the center of Oz. He also ordered them to wear green glasses so it would appear to be made entirely of emeralds. However, in the later Oz books the city is depicted as actually being made of emerald or other green materials. The Wizard was a young man when he first arrived in Oz, and grew old while he was there. Afraid of the Wicked Witches of the West and the East, who, unlike him, could do real magic, the Wizard hid away in a room of his palace and refused to see visitors. He lived in this way until the arrival of Dorothy in the first book.
In The Marvelous Land of Oz the prehistory was changed slightly. Glinda, the Good Witch of the South, reveals that the Wizard usurped the previous king of Oz, Pastoria, and hid away his daughter Ozma. This was Baum's reaction to the popular 1903 Broadway extravaganza Baum adapted from his book, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, in which the Wizard took the role of the main antagonist and the Wicked Witch of the West was left out.
The wizard, however, had been more popular with his readers than he thought. In Ozma of Oz, he omitted any mention of the Wizard's having usurped the throne of Ozma's father, but the largest changes occurred in the next book.
In the preface to Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz Baum remarks that the Wizard had turned out to be a popular character with the children who had read the first book, and so he brought the Wizard back. During it, the Wizard relates yet another account of his history in Oz, telling Ozma that his birth name was Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkle Emmanuel Ambroise Diggs, which, being a very long and cumbersome name, and as his other initials spelled out "PINHEAD," he preferred to leave just as O.Z. The balloon part of his story was unchanged, except for the detail added by Ozma, that the people probably saw his initials on his balloon and took them as a message that he was to be their king. She relates that the country was already named Oz (a word which in their language means "great and good"), and that it was typical for the rulers to have names that are variations of Oz (King Pastoria being a notable exception to this rule).
Ozma elaborates further, saying that there were once four Wicked Witches in Oz, who leagued together to depose the King, but the Witches of the North and South were conquered by Good Witches before the Wizard arrived in Oz. According to this version, the King at the time was Ozma's grandfather. This version of prehistory restores the Wizard's reputation, but adds the awkwardness of both Ozma and her father having been born in captivity.
In The Tin Woodman of Oz Baum writes how Oz came to be a fairyland:
- Oz was not always a fairyland, I am told. Once it was much like other lands, except it was shut in by a dreadful desert of sandy wastes that lay all around it, thus preventing its people from all contact with the rest of the world. Seeing this isolation, the fairy band of Queen Lurline, passing over Oz while on a journey, enchanted the country and so made it a Fairyland. And Queen Lurline left one of her fairies to rule this enchanted Land of Oz, and then passed on and forgot all about it.
Thenceforward, no one in Oz would ever age, get sick, or die. After becoming a fairyland, Oz harbored many Witches, Magicians and Sorcerers until the time when Ozma made magic illegal without a permit. In yet another inconsistency, it is implied that Ozma was the fairy left behind by Queen Lurline to rule the country, contradicting the story where she was Pastoria's daughter. This is later confirmed in Glinda of Oz:
- "If you are really Princess Ozma of Oz," the Flathead said, "you are one of that band of fairies who, under Queen Lurline, made all Oz a Fairyland. I have heard that Lurline left one of her own fairies to rule Oz, and gave the fairy the name of Ozma."
While this explains why no one dies or ages, and nevertheless there are people of differing ages in Oz, it is completely inconsistent with the earlier versions of the prehistory.
Maguire, author of Wicked addresses this inconsistency by saying that the people of Oz believe that Ozma is reincarnated—that her spirit was left behind by Lurline, but her body is reborn to different mortal queens.
In Jack Snow's The Magical Mimics in Oz, the prehistory story is retold. This version relates that Ozma was given to the king of Oz as an adoptive daughter, for he was old and had no children.
History through the first six books
Eventually, Dorothy Gale and her whole house are blown into Oz from Kansas by a tornado. When the house lands, it crushes the Wicked Witch of the East (in Gregory Maguire's book, Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, she is given a name, Nessarose), ruler of the Munchkins. In an attempt to get back to her home, she journeys to the Emerald City. Along the way, she meets the Tin Woodman, the Cowardly Lion, and the Scarecrow, all of whom accompany her. Once there, they become the first people to gain an audience with the Wizard since he went into seclusion, although he disguises himself because Dorothy now has the Wicked Witch of the East's magic silver slippers, and he is afraid of her. The Wizard sends Dorothy and her party to destroy the Wicked Witch of the West and in exchange promises to grant her request to be sent home as a way of disposing of a political rival. Surprisingly, Dorothy destroys the Witch by throwing a pail of water on her. Defeated, the Wizard reveals to the group that he is in fact not a real wizard and has no magical powers, but he promises to grant Dorothy's wish and take her home himself in his balloon. He leaves the Scarecrow in his place to rule Oz.
Finally, it is discovered that the wizard had given the daughter of the last king of Oz, Princess Ozma, to the old witch Mombi to have her hidden away. Mombi had turned Ozma into a boy named Tip, whom she raised. When all of this is revealed Tip is turned back into Ozma and takes her rightful place as the benevolent ruler of all of Oz. Ozma successfully wards off several attempts by various armies to overthrow her. To prevent any upheaval of her rule over Oz, she outlaws the practice of all magic in Oz except by herself, the returned and reformed wizard, and by Glinda, and she has Glinda make all of Oz invisible to outsiders. Ozma remains the ruler of Oz for the entirety of the series.
Economy and politics
Some political analysts have claimed that Oz is a thinly disguised socialist utopia, though some Baum scholars disagree. Advocates of this theory support it using this quotation from The Emerald City of Oz:
- "There were no poor people in the land of Oz, because there was no such thing as money, and all property of every sort belonged to the Ruler. Each person was given freely by his neighbors whatever he required for his use, which is as much as anyone may reasonably desire. Every one worked half the time and played half the time, and the people enjoyed the work as much as they did the play, because it is good to be occupied and to have something to do. There were no cruel overseers set to watch them, and no one to rebuke them or to find fault with them. So each one was proud to do all he could for his friends and neighbors, and was glad when they would accept the things he produced."
This is a revision of the original society: in the first two books, the people of Oz lived in a money-based economy. For instance, the people of the Emerald City use "green pennies" as coinage. Money was not abolished in the course of the series, but excised from the conception of Oz. Indeed, in The Magic of Oz, a character from Oz gets into trouble when he goes to Ev because he was unaware of the concept of money. This decision to remove money from Oz may reflect Baum's own financial difficulties in the times when he was writing these books.
Since Oz is ruled by a monarch, benevolent though she may be, Oz is closer in nature to a benevolent dictatorship than a welfare state or a Marxist one. When she was first introduced, Ozma was the monarch specifically of the Emerald City, but in the description of Ozma of Oz, Oz is presented as a federal state, rather like the United States, in monarchies rather than republics: having an overall ruler in Ozma, and individual kings and queens of smaller portions.
The society grew steadily more Utopian, in that its peace and prosperity were organized, but from the first book, it was a stupendously wealthy country, in contrast to Kansas's crop failures, droughts, and mortgages -- just as it also is colorful to contrast with Kansas's gray. On the other hand, despite the presence of the Emerald City, Oz is an agrarian country, similar to Kansas; the story has been interpreted as a Populist parable, and certainly contains many Populist themes.
In The Wonder City of Oz Princess Ozma (called "Queen Ozma" in this book) is seen running for election ("ozlection") to her office as ruler against Jenny Jump, a half-fairy newcomer from New Jersey. However, this book was not written by Baum, but by John R. Neill, Baum's second successor. Further, the concept of the "ozlection" was not in Neill's manuscript for the book, but was added by an editor at Reilly and Lee, the publisher.
At times the rulers of Oz's territories have grander titles than would normally be customary, but this is done mostly for the satisfaction of the incumbents. The ruler of the Winkie Country is the Emperor, the Tin Woodman. The ruler of the Quadling Country is Glinda the Good.
The Royal Flag of Oz is based on the map of the Land of Oz, the four colors represent the four countries, and the green star represents the Emerald City.
Defense
Oz is mostly a peaceful land and the idea of subversion is largely unknown to its people. Most military positions are only formal. This has caused many problems, such as in the The Marvelous Land of Oz when the Emerald City, which was only guarded by an elderly doorman and one soldier who was the entire Army of Oz at the time, was easily conquered by the Army of Revolt led by General Jinjur. This army was in turn overwhelmed by another army of girls, led by Glinda.
Security of Oz is mostly maintained by magic, such as Glinda's spell making Oz completely invisible. Oz also has a natural barrier in the form of a desert that surrounds the land: anyone who touches the desert turns to sand. The Nome King has tried to conquer Oz on several occasions. A nominal army once existed, but it had an extremely large officers/privates ratio, other than its commander the Tin Woodman and one private, the portion of it seen in Ozma of Oz was composed entirely of cowardly officers. In the end of the book it was said that there are three privates all in all, and it is unknown how many - if any - officers were left at home during Ozma's travel to Ev. The private seen in the book, named Omby Amby, is later promoted to Captain General.
In the movie Return to Oz, the mechanical man Tik-Tok is the entire royal army of Oz.
Attempts by outsiders to conquer the Land of Oz are frequent, particularly in the Oz books by Ruth Plumly Thompson. But these attempts are always successfully thwarted in the end, usually by Ozma or by forces sympathetic to her.
Characters
Recurring characters in the series include:
- Dorothy Gale, a girl from Kansas
- The Tin Woodman (Nick Chopper), an enchanted man, made entirely out of tin, and the current Emperor of the Winkies
- The Scarecrow, a living man made of straw and briefly King of the Emerald City.
- The Wizard, the former ruler of Oz, originally Oscar Diggs from Omaha, Nebraska and now a skilled wizard
- The Cowardly Lion, the timid King of Beasts
- Princess Ozma, the rightful ruler of Oz.
- Jack Pumpkinhead, a man made out of branches with a carved pumpkin for a head
- Tik-Tok, a super-intelligent, clockwork robot (one of the first robots in literature)
- The Patchwork Girl, (a.k.a. "Scraps") a living patchwork doll
- The Shaggy Man, another human from "the real world"
- Glinda, the good witch of the South, or Quadling Country, and its benevolent ruler (although in the 1939 MGM movie, she was the Good Witch of the North)
See also: List of characters in the Oz books
Alternate Lands/Versions of Oz
The 1939 MGM film's Oz
The Land of Oz as portrayed in the 1939 MGM film is quite different from that portrayed in the books. The most notable difference is that in the film the entire land of Oz appears to be dreamed up by Dorothy (thus making it a dream world), although, Dorothy earnestly corrects the adults at the end that she was indeed there. The apparent message is that one should appreciate one's home, no matter how dull it may be. This contrasts sharply with the books, in which Dorothy and her family are eventually invited to move to Oz due to a bank foreclosure on the farm, showing both that Oz is a real place, and that it is a Utopia compared to Kansas.
There are many other small differences between the books and the movie. For example, the first witch Dorothy meets in Oz in the book is the Good Witch of the North, a minor character that only had one other appearance in Baum's books. In the movie this character is conflated with Glinda, who is the Good Witch of the South in the book.
It is also worthy of note that the Dorothy of the books is brave and resourceful, only crying when faced with despair, whereas the older Dorothy of the movie (portrayed as a twelve-year-old by sixteen-year-old Judy Garland) spends several portions of the film crying and being told by others what to do. This is more consistent with Thompson's portrayal of Dorothy—Baum is known for his strong female characters.
The Wicked Witch of the West also changes significantly between books and movie. In the books no mention is ever made of her skin color, whereas in the movie she is green without explanation, although the Winkies she has enslaved are also green. In the book she is portrayed as having only one eye, which could see distant objects like a telescope, but in the movie she uses a crystal ball to watch Dorothy from afar. The 1939 MGM film makes the first reference to The Witches of the East and West being sisters, which was not the case in the book.
The Wizard of Oz doesn't resort to anywhere near as much trickery in the movie as the book. In the book he entertains each member of Dorothy's party on a different day, and takes a different form for each. In the movie he takes only one false form—that of a giant head.
The nature of the Emerald City is changed in the film. In the book, the city is not actually green, but everyone is forced to wear green spectacles (ostensibly to protect their eyes from the dazzling splendor of the city), thus making everything appear green. In the film, the city is actually green. The architecture of the Emerald City in the movie uses a much more contemporary Art Deco style than Baum could have imagined.
The movie replaces the silver shoes of the book with ruby slippers. This was because full color motion pictures were still a relatively new technology in 1939, and MGM wanted to show off the process. Shiny red shoes were more impressive in a color motion picture than silver ones.Due to the popularity of the movie, the green witch and the ruby slippers are more well known to the general public than their book counterparts, and are even considered iconic.
Gregory Maguire's revisionist Oz
In his revisionist Oz novels Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West and Son of a Witch, Gregory Maguire portrays a very different version of the Land of Oz. Maguire's Oz is not Baum's utopia, but a land troubled by political unrest and economic hardship. One political issue in Maguire's novels is the oppression of the Animals (Maguire distinguishes speaking Animals from non-speaking animals by the use of initial capital letters). There are many religious traditions in Maguire's Oz, including Lurlinism (which regards the Fairy Lurline as Oz's creator), Unionism, which worships the Unnamed God, and the pleasure faiths which had swept Oz during the time that the witches were at Shiz. An example of the pleasure faiths were tic-toc (where creatures were enchanted to tell secrets or the future and run by clockwork), and sorcery.
Maguire's presentation of Oz's geography is also politically tinged. A large political prison, Southstairs, exists in caverns below the Emerald City. Gillikin, home of Shiz University, has more industrial development than other parts of Oz. Munchkinland is Oz's breadbasket and at one point declares its independence from the rule of the Emerald City. Quadling Country is largely marshland, inhabited by the artistic and sexually free Quadlings. And the Vinkus (Maguire's name for Winkie Country) is largely open grassland, populated by semi-nomadic tribes.
The musical Wicked, based on Maguire's first Oz novel, portrays an Oz slightly closer to the version seen in Baum's novels and the 1939 film. The oppression of the Animals is still a theme, but the geographical and religious divisions portrayed in Maguire's novel are barely present.
In both the book and musical, several characters from the traditional Oz stories are present, but named differently, Glinda is originally called Galinda, before changing her name to Glinda, The Wicked Witch of the West is called Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the East is called Nessarose. In the musical, Boq becomes the Tin Man, and Fiyero becomes the Scarecrow, but this only happens in the musical not the book.
Alexander Melentyevich Volkov's Magic Land
Alexander Melentyevich Volkov was a Russian author best known for his translation of The Wizard of Oz into Russian, and for writing his own original sequels, which were based only loosely on Baum's. Volkov's books have been translated into many other languages, and are better known than Baum's in some countries. The books, while still aimed at children, feature many mature political and ethical elements. They have been retranslated into English, partially by March Laumer, who used elements of them in his own books.
March Laumer's Oz
March Laumer was one of the first authors to continue the Oz series after the Famous Forty. His books were written with the permission of Contemporary Books, who owned Reilly & Lee, the original publisher. His canon includes everything he knew of that was set in the land of Oz, including Volkov's Russian Oz, the MGM movie, the Disney sequel, and many of Baum's own books that most fans do not consider canonical.
Laumer also made several controversial changes to Oz. He married off several of the major characters, often to unlikely prospects. For example, the intelligent and mature sorceress Glinda was married to Button Bright, who had been a small and dim-witted child throughout Baum's books. He also aged Dorothy to a teenager to make her a romantic prospect for several characters, made Ozma a lesbian based on her upbringing as a boy, and made the Shaggy Man an ephebophile based on his frequent travels with young girls.
Laumer's books do not portray one consistent version of Oz. Because most of his books were collaborations, he often included elements of other author's visions of Oz which may have been inconsistent with his own. For example, while he explicitly made Dorothy sixteen in A Fairy Queen in Oz, he had her physically eight in Aunt Em and Uncle Henry in Oz; and while he portrayed Volkov's Oz as a parallel universe in Farewell to Oz he also showed Volkov's characters living in Baum's Oz in many of his other books, such as Aunt Em and Uncle Henry in Oz. Despite these discrepancies, many of his books are consistent with each other, and characters introduced in some often appear in others.
Philip José Farmer's Oz
Philip José Farmer portrays a very different Oz in his book A Barnstormer in Oz. The premise is that nothing after the first book occurred--Dorothy never returned to Oz, and instead grew up, got married, and had a son. Her son, Hank Stover, is the main character, a World War I veteran flier and the titular barnstormer. While flying in his Curtiss JN-4 biplane he enters a green haze and emerges in the civil war-stricken land of Oz.
Farmer portrays the land of Oz as a science fiction author, attempting to explain scientifically many of the "magical" elements of Baum's story.
Robert A. Heinlein's Oz
Robert A. Heinlein's book, The Number of the Beast passes through many famous fictional worlds including those of Alice in Wonderland, Gulliver's Travels, and Ringworld, as well as some of Heinlein's own works, and of course the land of Oz.
The Oz portrayed in the book is very close to Baum's Oz, although Heinlein does make an attempt to explain some things from the standpoint of a science fiction author. He explains that Oz is on a retrograde planet, where the direction of rotation relative of the poles is reversed, resulting in the sun seeming to rise in what would normally be the west.
Heinlein also explains that the population remains steady in Oz despite the lack of death because it is impossible for children to be born in Oz. When the population does increase through immigration, Glinda just extends the borders an inch or two in each direction, which makes more than enough space for all additional people.
L. Sprague de Camp's Oz
In his originally collaborative Harold Shea series, L. Sprague de Camp, like Heinlein before him, brings his own characters to Oz from their own universe in his book Sir Harold and the Gnome King. Unlike Heinlein, he does not rewrite Oz as science fiction, but he does deviate from the original books. He follows Thompson's Oz books, thus using her spelling of "Gnome" and her final fate of the character, but he makes several changes to the world, including aging Ozma and Dorothy and marrying them both.
In the Otherland series, by Tad Williams, a virtual reality version of Oz exists, wherein real-world antagonists play sadistic versions of the roles of the Tin Man, The Scarecrow, and the Cowardly Lion, in a twisted, martial, and post-apocalyptic version of Oz, populated both by characters from the novels, and a large quantity of male and female humans who go by the names "Henry" and "Em" respectively. The humans, computer-generated characters based on the lost minds of children drawn into the Otherland program, look forward to a messianic prophecy fortelling the coming of "The Dorothy," where a child would be born among them.
The Outer Zone (Tin Man)
The 2007 Sci Fi television miniseries Tin Man reinvents Oz as the Outer Zone (O.Z.), a parallel universe that was first visited by Dorothy Gale during the latter Victorian Era and is ruled over by her descendants. It is implied, by reference to centuries having elapsed since Dorothy came to the O.Z., that time has progressed at different rates in the O.Z. and "the other side". The re-imagined Oz is described as a place where "the paint has peeled, and what was once the goodness of Oz has become the horrible bleakness of the O.Z." The scenic design of the O.Z. features elements of steampunk, particularly the "1930's fascist realist" decor of the evil sorceress's palace and the computer-generated Central City, analogue of the Emerald City.
Emerald City Confidential
2009 point-and-click adventure video game Emerald City Confidential reinvents Oz in a film noir style, with Dorothy Gale as a femme fatale, the Lion as a corrupt lawyer and some other changes.
Magic
Being a fantasy series Oz is rich in magic. In particular, there are many magic items which play an important role in the series.
Silver Shoes
The Silver Shoes originally belonged to the Wicked Witch of the East and transported Dorothy back to Kansas in the first book.
Powder of Life
Powder of Life is a magic substance from the book series The substance first appears in The Marvelous Land of Oz .
It is a magical powder that brings inanimate objects to life. The witch Mombi first obtained it from a "crooked magician." Later in the series it is revealed that the substance is made by a Dr. Pipt. In order to make the substance, Dr. Pipt had to stir four large cauldrons for six years. Only a few grains of the powder could be made at a time. It is always described as being carried in a pepper box.
Mombi's shaker also contained three "wishing pills" fabricated by Dr. Nikidik.
Magic Belt
The Magic Belt is first introduced in Ozma of Oz. The belt is a magical tool with seemingly limitless powers. It is generally used as a universal problem solver, and functions as a deus ex machina solution in several of the books. Originally the belt belonged to the Nome King but was stolen away from him by Dorothy Gale and given to Ozma. Ozma uses the belt several times to magically transport people, and most notably to make all of Oz invisible to outsiders. It gives the wearer protection from harm.
In the Oz books, this object is always identified as the Magic Belt—in capitals—to distinguish it from any generic magical belts that may exist in the fantasy universe.
In The Lost Princess of Oz, Dorothy states that the Magic Belt only grants one wish a day: she used yesterday's wish on a box of caramels, but saved today's for an emergency. Baum's decision to ration the Magic Belt to one wish a day may be a retcon attempt to limit the Belt's otherwise infinite ability to get his characters out of predicaments; at any rate, this one-per-day wish limit is never mentioned again in any other Oz book.
Magic Picture
In Ozma's boudoir hangs a picture in a radium frame. This picture usually appears to be of a pleasant countryside, but when anyone wishes for the picture to show a particular person or place, the scene will display what is wished for. Sometimes the onlooker is able to hear sounds from the scene within the Magic Picture and sometimes an additional device is necessary to transmit sound.
Great Book of Records
Glinda's Great Book of Records is introduced in the thirteenth chapter of The Scarecrow of Oz: "In this book is inscribed everything that takes place in all the world, just the instant it happens; so that by referring to its pages Glinda knows what is taking place far and near, in every country that exists." The Book proves useful in The Scarecrow of Oz and Glinda of Oz; and it recurs in many of the stories of Baum's successors and imitators. It is one of the prime magic devices of Oz; villains steal it when they can (as in The Lost Princess of Oz or in Handy Mandy in Oz). Since it covers the planet and not merely Oz, the Book's entries are compressed and sometimes cryptic, and difficult to decipher (as in Paradox in Oz or Queen Ann in Oz).
Miscellaneous
Death in Oz
In the later Oz books, no one can die. One of the books assures us that while you are in the Land of Oz, you can't die. Unfortunately, this information comes after characters in the books have been chopped into pieces, beheaded, melted, and so forth and it's mentioned that you could be transformed into an inanimate object, turned into sand, and buried. Even so, you'd still be alive and presumably conscious.
Baum puts it this way in the third chapter of The Emerald City of Oz:
- "No disease of any sort was ever known among the Ozites, and so no one ever died unless he met with an accident that prevented him from living."
Note also the spell which caused this also prevented aging, and took effect on everyone in Oz at the same time; this means that any babies in Oz are eternally babies, and that anyone who was at the moment of death is permanently caught there, and so on.
Theories
Death is treated inconsistently; in some books it is said that it is impossible to die, in others, people die. Problematically, the plot often depends on something either dying, or not being killable.
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz shows an early example of the problem: although the Tin Woodman does not die when his limbs and head are severed, the two wicked witches are killed. One theory brought forth as to why the Tin Woodsman doesn't die is discussed in Edward Einhorn's book "Paradox in Oz", where King Oz says that the Tin Woodsman (then Nick Chopper) would have died were it not for his time magic. When the Tin Woodman rescues the Queen of the Field Mice by chopping off the head of a pursuing wildcat, it seems unlikely the cat's unjoined head and body continue to live independently of each other, although this goes unmentioned. Again, although the Tin Woodman survived losing all his body, prior to that, he had grown up and lost his parents in a manner inconsistent with later descriptions of Oz. Again, in Ozma of Oz, Jack Pumpkinhead was described as "a little overripe", and in Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz, he does not appear at all, although all the other characters do reappear; the implication is that he spoiled, as he feared from his creation.
Both Ozma of Oz and Tik-Tok of Oz describe trees with meat growing on them, so it is possible that no animal was killed for most of the meat eaten in Oz. However, in Tin Woodman of Oz a hungry Jaguar tries to eat a live monkey, suggesting that occasionally (among animals, at least) animal flesh is preferred to that of plants.
Death is a matter of some debate among Oz fans, and there seem to be as many explanations as there are fans, none of which has ever been widely accepted by a majority of the fans because none of them explain all the deaths. For example, in The Road to Oz Baum attempted to explain this inconsistency by saying that only bad people could die. However, he'd already mentioned the death of good King Pastoria in a previous book, and went on to mention the death of good King Kynd in a later book.
Another of Baum's attempts to explain death in Oz is the following passage from The Emerald City of Oz.
- No disease of any sort was ever known among the Ozites, and no one ever died unless he met with an accident that prevented him from living.
This passage has been translated by some fans to mean that one ceases to live if one's body is damaged to the extent that it cannot be repaired. However, in Tik-Tok of Oz Baum suggested that Oz people could go on living after being eaten and digested, and also that Nomes would continue to live after being cut into tiny pieces, which disproves the destruction theory.
Any working theory must make Baum wrong about something, but fans may never reach a consensus on exactly what he was wrong about.
The issue of death leads into another issue of much dispute among fans. Baum says in The Emerald City of Oz that no one ever ages in Oz either. Many Oz fans feel that this is unfair as it leaves extremely old people eternally bedridden, and it leaves some families changing diapers and comforting crying infants for eternity. Presumably this includes pre-birth aging, which makes everyone in Oz sterile and fixes the population. However, although pregnancy is never mentioned in Oz, it's also possible that some women are left eternally pregnant, although if Dot and Tot in Merryland is considered canon, babies are delivered by storks.
It has also been questioned whether children continue to be mentally childlike, or remain children only in body.
Talking Animals
In Oz, animals such as the Cowardly Lion and the Hungry Tiger can talk, and all native animals appear to be able to.
It is important to note that Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West emphasized the difference between Animals and animals. Animals (capitalized) are sentient beings that can talk. Several theories exist as to how animals gained the gift of speech.
The treatment of non-native animals was inconsistent. In the first book, the dog Toto never speaks, although brought to Oz. In The Patchwork Girl of Oz Dorothy even outright says that Toto can't talk because he's not a fairy dog. However, in Ozma of Oz, the chicken Billina acquires the ability to speak merely by being swept to the lands near Oz, and in Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz, the kitten Eureka and the cab horse Jim also gained the ability when reaching the land of Mangaboos, a similarly magical land. In Tik-Tok of Oz, Baum restored the continuity: Toto can speak, and always could, but never bothered to, because it was unnecessary.
An additional inconsistency is introduced with Tik-Tok of Oz: Hank the Mule can not speak until he reaches the Land of Oz, although he lands on the shore of Ev first, where Billina the chicken gained the ability to speak. This might be because Tik-Tok of Oz was originally a stageplay version of Ozma of Oz. Dorothy was replaced by Betsy because he'd sold the stage rights for Dorothy, and Billina was replaced by Hank because a mule could more convincingly be played by two people in a costume. Hank probably couldn't talk because Baum already had his speaking comedy characters: the Shaggy Man, and Tik-Tok. Thus Hank would fill a better niche as a visual comedy character, in the tradition of British pantomime. The part of Hank was also an analog to the part of Dorothy's cow Imogene, Toto's replacement on stage in the immensely successful 1903 Broadway version of The Wizard of Oz, a success that Baum tried to duplicate for the rest of his life.
Origin of the name Oz
A legend of uncertain validity is that when relating bedtime stories (the earliest form of the Oz books) Baum was asked by one of his listeners the name of the magical land. He glanced at a nearby filing cabinet which was marked O-Z. Thus he named the land Oz. This story was first told in 1903, but there is little evidence for it. In Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz, the name is translated as "great and good", which is roughly equivalent to the meaning of "Öz" in Turkish, although that would be pronounced more like "ohs," which Jack Snow suggested was a possible pronunciation of the name.
Another theory is that Oz is a corruption of Uz, the homeland of Job in the Old Testament. It is also speculated that Oz was named after the abbreviation for ounce, in the theory that Oz is an allegory for the populist struggle against the illusion (the wizard) of the gold standard. "Os" (with an s) is also Old English for God.
Several of Baum's fairy stories that take place in the United States were situated on the Ozark Plateau, and the similarity of name may not be a coincidence.
In Wicked, Elphaba researches the etymology of Oz and concludes that it comes from either oasis, because it is surrounded by desert on all sides, or ooze, due to the creation legend of a great flood.
Oz is a common vernacular contraction of Australia (Australia - Aussie - Aus - Oz). Australia is a large continent predominated by desert regions, with pockets of intense green tropical, sub-tropical and sub-alpine greenlands and rainforests. It is quite possible that Baum took the popular nickname of Australia as the national name for his fictional world. Also note that many fans
place Oz in the South Pacific, see Location above. However, according to the Oxford English dictionary, the first references to Australia by this name were made in 1902—after the first book had been published.
Others have said that Oz stands for New York, since the letters before O and Z respectively are NY.
In the Sci-fi mini-series "Tin Man" Oz was portrayed as an acronym for The Outer Zone.
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