Oz

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum. This book launched the Oz series.

The Oz series is a popular children's book series which has attracted a significant fan base. It began with L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, with illustrations by W.W. Denslow, published in 1900. Baum did not intend to start a series; however, readers enjoyed it so much that they called for a sequel, and he needed the money after moving to Hollywood. While Baum tried to end the series at least twice, he ended up writing fourteen books. After his death, other authors continued the series up to 1963.

While Baum himself stated that he wrote Wizard of Oz "solely to please children of today", the Oz books have addressed or left significantly unaddressed several philosophical questions. The political themes arguably present in the original The Wizard of Oz in 1900 and the Broadway play based on it were not continued in the rest of the series. The famous 1939 movie version is based on the 1900 original.

Impact on readers

The 40 Oz books had a significant impact on their young middle class readers who read them in English, Spanish, Russian, French, German, Romanian, Latin, Hebrew, or Arabic editions. Novelist Gore Vidal (born 1925) recalls:

Like most Americans my age (with access to books) I spent a good deal of my youth in Baum's Land of Oz. I have a precise, tactile memory of the first Oz book that came into my hands. It was the original 1910 edition of The Emerald City of Oz. I still remember the look and the feel of those dark blue covers, the evocative smell of dust and old ink. I also remember that I could not stop reading and rereading the book. But 'reading' is not the right word. In some mysterious way, I was translating myself to Oz, a place which I was to inhabit for many years .... With The Emerald City, I became addicted to reading."

Philosophical perspectives

Nonviolence

Baum stated in the preface to Wizard of Oz that he wanted to eliminate "old time fairy tale... with all the horrible and blood-curdling incidents devised by their authors to point a fearsome moral to each tale." Indeed, in the first book, Dorothy only kills the two wicked witches by accident, even "clasping her hands together in dismay" when she sees that her house has fallen on the Wicked Witch of the East and saying, "I'm very sorry, indeed," when she accidentally melts the Wicked Witch of the West with a bucket of water.

Hardly a single villain is killed throughout the Oz books. In the sixth book, Baum even has Ozma (the ruler of Oz) say when faced with an invasion, "No one has the right to destroy any living creatures, however evil they may be, or to hurt them or make them unhappy. I will not fight, even to save my kingdom." Fortunately for Baum's protagonists, the enemies are defeated by the magic "Waters of Oblivion," which make them forget their plans of conquest. Such magical solutions often reappear; the villain in Lost Princess of Oz is transformed into a dove and the villains in Magic of Oz are rendered harmless by being made to forget their magical knowledge.

While such magic provides an easy solution within the Oz books, Baum opposed violence even when no other solution was possible. In the non-Oz book Enchanted Isle of Yew, Baum's protagonist refuses to execute a group of defeated bandits even after everyone has admitted that it would be just, instead presuming that their quick repentance is genuine. Within the context of the story, this strategy works: the bandits actually do repent and come to the protagonist's aid later in the book.

List of official Oz books

Forty official Oz books were published by the original publishers. Fans have written and published many unofficial books; however, these mostly do not have the permission of the original authors and are mostly considered unofficial.

By L. Frank Baum

Title	Year	Available online?	Summary
1. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz	1900	Yes
2. The Marvelous Land of Oz	July 1904	Yes
3. Ozma of Oz	1907	Yes
4. Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz	1908	Yes
5. The Road to Oz	1909	Yes
6. The Emerald City of Oz	1910	Yes
7. The Patchwork Girl of Oz	??	Yes
8. Tik-Tok of Oz	1914	Yes
9. The Scarecrow of Oz	1915	Yes
10. Rinkitink in Oz	1916	Yes	This was originally a non-Oz book entitled King Rinkitink, which Baum adapted into an Oz book by having the main character be rescued by Dorothy at the end.
11. The Lost Princess of Oz	1917	Yes
12. The Tin Woodman of Oz	1918	Yes
13. The Magic of Oz	1919	Yes
14. Glinda of Oz	1915	Yes

By Ruth Plumly Thompson

After Baum's death, his publisher (with Baum's wife's consent) hired Ruth Plumly Thompson, a popular children's book author, to continue the series.

Thompson's earlier books moved into the public domain before the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act; her later books are also public-domain because she neglected to renew the copyright.

Title	Year	Available online?	Summary
15. The Royal Book of Oz	1921	Yes	This book was falsely claimed to be based on an original draft by Baum.
16. Kabumpo in Oz	1922	Yes
17. The Cowardly Lion of Oz	1923	No; still under copyright.
18. Grampa in Oz	1924	No; still under copyright.
19. The List King of Oz	1925	No; still under copyright.
20. The Hungry Tiger of Oz	1926	No; still under copyright.
21. The Gnome King of Oz	1927	No; still under copyright.
22. The Giant Horse of Oz	1928	No; still under copyright.
23. Jack Pumpkinhead of Oz	1929	No; still under copyright.
24. The Yellow Knight of Oz	1930	No; still under copyright.
25. Pirates in Oz	1931	No; still under copyright.
26. The Purple Prince of Oz	1932	No; still under copyright.
27. Ojo in Oz	1933	No; still under copyright.
28. Speedy in Oz	1934	No; still under copyright.
29. The Wishing Horse of Oz	1935	Yes
30. Captain Salt in Oz	1936	Yes
31. Handy Mandy in Oz	1937	Yes
32. The Silver Princess in Oz	1938	Yes
33. Ozoplaning with the Wizard of Oz	1939	Yes

By Neill, Snow, Cosgrave, and McGraw

Title	Author	Year	Summary
34. The Wonder City of Oz	John R. Neill	1940
35. The Scalawagons of Oz	John R. Neill	1941
36. Lucky Bucky in Oz	John R. Neill	1942
37. The Magical Mimics in Oz	Jack Snow	1946
38. The Shaggy Man of Oz	Jack Snow	1949
39. The Hidden Valley of Oz	Rachel R. Cosgrave	1951
40. Merry Go Round in Oz	Eloise Jarvis McGraw & Lauren McGraw Wagner	1963

External links

Other

• Archives of "The Ozzy Digest," a discussion group for fans of the Oz series. Parts of it have been sorted into discussions about each individual book.
• Official website of the International Wizard of Oz Club