The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

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Plot summary
Dorothy is an orphan raised by her Uncle Henry and Aunt Em in the bleak landscape of a Kansas farm. She has a
little black dog Toto, who is her sole source of happiness on the dry, gray prairies. One day the farmhouse, with
Dorothy and Toto inside, is caught up in a tornado and deposited in a field in Munchkin Country, the eastern
quadrant of the Land of Oz. The falling house kills the evil ruler of the Munchkins, the Wicked Witch of the East.
The Good Witch of the North comes with the Munchkins to greet Dorothy and gives Dorothy the silver shoes
(believed to have magical properties) that the Wicked Witch had been wearing when she was killed. In order to
return to Kansas, the Good Witch of the North tells Dorothy that she will have to go to the "Emerald City" or "City
of Emeralds" and ask the Wizard of Oz to help her.
On her way down the yellow brick road, Dorothy frees the Scarecrow from the pole he is hanging on, restores the
movements of the rusted Tin Woodman with an oil can, and encourages them and the Cowardly Lion to journey with
her and Toto to the Emerald City. The Scarecrow wants to get a brain, the Tin Woodman a heart, and the Cowardly
Lion, courage. All are convinced by Dorothy that the Wizard can help them too. Together, they overcome obstacles
on the way including narrow pieces of the yellow brick road, Kalidahs, a river, and the Deadly Poppies.
When the travelers arrive at the Emerald City, they are asked to use green spectacles by the Guardian of the Gates.
When each traveler meets with the Wizard, he appears each time as someone or something different. To Dorothy, the
Wizard is a giant head; the Scarecrow sees a beautiful woman; the Tin Woodman sees a ravenous beast; the
Cowardly Lion sees a ball of fire. The Wizard agrees to help each of them, but only if one of them kills the Wicked
Witch of the West who rules over the Winkie Country.
As the friends travel across the Winkie Country, the Wicked Witch sends wolves, crows, bees, and then her Winkie
soldiers to attack them, but they manage to get past them all. Then, using the power of the Golden Cap, the Witch
summons the Winged Monkeys to capture Dorothy, the Cowardly Lion and Toto, and to destroy the Scarecrow and
the Tin Woodman.
When the Wicked Witch gains one of Dorothy's silver
shoes by trickery, Dorothy in anger grabs a bucket of
water and throws it on the Wicked Witch. To her
shock, this causes the Witch to melt away. The Winkies
rejoice at being freed of the witch's tyranny, and they
help to reassemble the Scarecrow and the Tin
Woodman. The Winkies love the Tin Woodman, and
they ask him to become their ruler, which he agrees to
do after helping Dorothy return to Kansas.
Dorothy uses the Golden Cap to summon the Winged
Monkeys to carry her and her companions back to the
Emerald City, and the King of the Winged Monkeys
tells how he and the other monkeys were bound by an
enchantment to the cap by the sorceress Gayelette.

The Wicked Witch melts, from the W. W. Denslow illustration of the

first edition (1900).

When Dorothy and her friends meet the Wizard of Oz again, he tries to put them off. Toto accidentally tips over a
screen in a corner of the throne room, revealing the Wizard to be an ordinary old man who had journeyed to Oz from
Omaha long ago in a hot air balloon. The Wizard has been longing to return to his home and be in a circus again ever
since.
The Wizard provides the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman, and the Cowardly Lion with a head full of bran, pins, and
needles ("a lot of bran-new brains"), a silk heart stuffed with sawdust, and a potion of "courage", respectively.
Because of their faith in the Wizard's power, these otherwise useless items provide a focus for their desires. In order
to help Dorothy and Toto get home, the Wizard realizes that he will have to take them home with him in a new

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

balloon, which he and Dorothy fashion from green silk. Revealing himself to the people of the Emerald City one last
time, the Wizard appoints the Scarecrow, by virtue of his brains, to rule in his stead. Dorothy chases Toto after he
runs after a kitten in the crowd, and before she can make it back to the balloon, the ropes break, leaving the Wizard
to rise and float away alone.
Dorothy turns to the Winged Monkeys to carry her and Toto home, but they cannot cross the desert surrounding Oz,
subsequently wasting her second wish. The Soldier with the Green Whiskers advises that Glinda, the Good Witch of
the South, may be able to send Dorothy and Toto home. They, the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman, and the Cowardly
Lion journey to Glinda's palace in the Quadling Country. Together they escape the Fighting Trees, dodge the
Hammer-Heads, and tread carefully through the China Country. The Cowardly Lion kills a giant spider, who is
terrorizing the animals in a forest, and he agrees to return there to rule them after Dorothy returns to Kansasthe
Hungry Tiger, the biggest of the tigers ruling in his stead as before. Dorothy uses her third wish to fly over the
Hammer-Heads' mountain, almost losing Toto in the process.
At Glinda's palace, the travelers are greeted warmly, and it is revealed by Glinda that Dorothy had the power to go
home all along. The Silver Shoes she wears can take her anywhere she wishes to go. She tearfully embraces her
friends, all of whom will be returned, through Glinda's use of the Golden Cap, to their respective kingdoms: the
Scarecrow to the Emerald City, the Tin Woodman to the Winkie Country, and the Cowardly Lion to the forest. Then
she will give the Golden Cap to the king of the Winged Monkeys, so they will never be under its spell again. Having
bid her friends farewell one final time, Dorothy taps her heels three times, and wishes to return home. When she
opens her eyes, Dorothy and Toto have returned to Kansas to a joyful family reunion. The Silver Shoes are dropped
in the desert during Dorothy's flight and never seen again (at least, in the official books).

Illustration and design

The book was illustrated by Baum's friend and collaborator W. W. Denslow, who also co-held the copyright. The
design was lavish for the time, with illustrations on every page, backgrounds in different colors, and several color
plate illustrations. In September 1900, The Grand Rapids Herald wrote that Denslow's illustrations are "quite as
much of the story as in the writing". The editorial opined that had it not been for Denslow's pictures, the readers
would be unable to picture precisely the figures of Dorothy, Toto, and the other characters.[14]
A new edition of the book appeared in 1944, with illustrations by Evelyn Copelman. Although it was claimed that
the new illustrations were based on Denslow's originals, they more closely resemble the characters as seen in the
famous 1939 film version of Baum's book, starring Judy Garland, Ray Bolger, Jack Haley, and Bert Lahr.[15]
The distinctive look led to imitators at the time, most notably Eva Katherine Gibson's Zauberlinda, the Wise Witch,
which mimicked both the typography and the illustration design of Oz.[16] The typeface was the newly designed
Monotype Old Style. Denslow's illustrations were so well-known that merchants of many products obtained
permission to use them to promote their wares. The forms of the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman, the Cowardly Lion,
the Wizard, and Dorothy were made into rubber and metal sculptures. Costume jewelry, mechanical toys, and soap
were also designed using their figures.[17]

Themes
Baum explores the theme of self-contradiction in The Wizard of Oz. He created characters wholike humanshave
complex, contradictory natures.[18] The Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman, and the Cowardly Lion all lack
self-confidence. The Scarecrow believes that he has no brains, though he comes up with clever solutions to several
problems that they encounter on their journey. The Tin Woodman believes that he lacks a heart, but is moved to tears
when misfortune befalls the various creatures they meet. The Cowardly Lion believes that he has no courage even
though he is consistently brave through their journey. Carl L. Bankston, III of Salem Press noted that "These three
characters embody the classical human virtues of intelligence, caring, and courage, but their self-doubts keep them

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The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

149

from being reduced to mere symbols of these qualities."[18]

By the end of novel, the characters attain self-fulfillment when they have met their objectives. To convince the
characters they have the qualities they desire, the Wizard places an amalgamation of bran, pins, and needles in the
Scarecrow's head to inspire intellect; gives a silk heart to the Tin Woodman to inspire love; and a drink to the
Cowardly Lion to inspire bravery.[18]

Sources of images and ideas

Baum acknowledged the influence of the Brothers
Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen, which he was
deliberately revising in his "American fairy tales" to
include the wonder without the horrors.[19]
Local legend has it that Oz, also known as The Emerald
City, was inspired by a prominent castle-like building
in the community of Castle Park near Holland,
Michigan where Baum summered. The yellow brick
road was derived from a road at that time paved by
yellow bricks. These bricks were found in Peekskill,
New York where Baum attended the Peekskill Military
Academy. Baum scholars often reference the 1893
Chicago World's Fair (the "White Town") as an
inspiration for the Emerald City. Other legends allude
that the inspiration came from the Hotel Del Coronado
near San Diego, California. Baum was a frequent guest
at the hotel, and had written several of the Oz books
there.[20] In a 1903 interview with Publishers
Weekly,[5] Baum said that the name "OZ" came from
his file cabinet labeled "O-Z".[21]
Dorothy meets the Cowardly Lion, from the first edition.

Alice in Wonderland
Another influence lay in Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland. A September 1900 review in the Grand Rapids
Herald called The Wonderful Wizard of Oz a "veritable Alice in Wonderland brought up to the present day of
standard of juvenile literature".[14] Although Baum found their plots incoherent, he identified their source of
popularity as Alice herself, a child with whom the child readers could identify; this influenced his choice of a
protagonist.[19] Baum was also influenced by Carroll's belief that children's books should have many pictures and be
pleasurable reads. Carroll rejected the Victorian-era ideology that children's books should be saturated with morals,
instead believing that children should be allowed to be children. Building on Carroll's style of numerous images
accompanying the text, Baum amalgamated the conventional features of a fairy tale (witches and wizards) with the
well-known things in his readers' lives (scarecrows and cornfields).[22]