The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

173 pages

Published 1900 

Summary: 

It is the first novel in the Oz series of books. A Kansas farm girl named Dorothy ends up in the magical Land of Oz after she and her pet dog Toto are swept away from their home by a cyclone. Upon her arrival in the magical world of Oz, she learns she cannot return home until she has destroyed the Wicked Witch of the West.

My Thoughts: 

I picked The Wizard of Oz as my book club's 2025 classic book because of all of the hype about Wicked, which is, of course, based on the book of the same name by Gregory Macguire and serves as something of a prequel to The Wizard of Oz. I used to read an abridged edition of the book to my daughter when she was growing up (it was one of her favorite books), but it's been a very long time since I read the full story (probably around the time I was 9, after having watched the movie on television one evening. Between the abridged version, the decades since I'd read the original, and the movie adaptation, I'd forgotten a lot about this book. 

Number one, they were silver slippers, not ruby. They never saw the Wicked Witch of the West until they were taken to her castle. Glinda didn't appear until the end of the book. And there was almost no buildup before the tornado - no farm hands, no Professor Marvel, and no Almira Gulch and her threats against Toto. But there were a lot more adventures on the way to the Emerald City, including a journey through a land entirely made of china, great ravines and rivers to cross, and new enemies and friends along the way. 

But I was delighted to find that much of the dialogue in the movie came straight from the book, particularly when the friends were with the Wizard. I found myself wishing that I'd found a copy of the full book to read to my daughter instead of the abridged edition. 

Something I hadn't realized when I'd read the book so very long ago was that, while it was written to appeal to children, it was heavily political. The silver slippers, for example, were a metaphor for the silver standard which was being replaced by the gold standard (the fiduciary backing metal); the yellow brick road symbolizes the dangerous path the gold standard placed the United States upon. The green of the Emerald City represented the color of paper money. The Emerald City itself represents Washington D.c. Each of the characters, from Dorothy to the Wicked Witches represents a class of people (or, in the case of the Cowardly Lion, one specific three-time presidential candidate from Nebraska, William Jennings Bryan). 

I learned all of this after having finished the book then wished I had time to reread it before my book club meeting, knowing what I know now. If you ever find yourself contemplating a reread of this classic, I highly recommend learning more before you go into it - it will give the book so much more depth. I did enjoy it without that knowledge, but I would have enjoyed it more had I learned more first.