L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

Katharine Rogers (CUNY Graduate Center)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.3: American (US) Writing and Culture: The Early Twentieth-century , 1900-1945.
Vol. editors: J. Michael Duvall (College of Charleston), Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Dale Enggass (University of Utah), Matthew Hofer (University of New Mexico), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Tony Papanikolas (San Jose State University), Justin Parks (UiT - The Arctic University of Norway), Nick Selby (University of East Anglia)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1900

Places

United States (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Children's Literature
Novel

Resources

Save to Bookshelf

L. Frank Baum chose a daringly original setting for his fairy story

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

: a naturalistically portrayed poor farm on the dry, treeless prairie of Kansas, in the midwestern United States. He used the word

gray

nine times in his first few paragraphs: for the landscape, the house, and finally the people. The only exceptions to the gray hopelessness are a little girl, Dorothy, and her little black dog, Toto.

A cyclone, a common occurrence in Kansas, takes up their house, with them inside, and carries them to a beautiful new land. Dorothy is shocked to learn that the nice old lady she meets there is a witch, until the lady reassures her that she is a good witch. She suggests that Dorothy ask the Wonderful Wizard in the Emerald City to send her home. So Dorothy and Toto set

Please log in to consult the article in its entirety. If you are a member (student of staff) of a subscribing institution (see List), you should be able to access the LE on campus directly (without the need to log in), and off-campus either via the institutional log in we offer, or via your institution's remote access facilities, or by creating a personal user account with your institutional email address. If you are not a member of a subscribing institution, you will need to purchase a personal subscription. For more information on how to subscribe as an individual user, please see under Individual Subcriptions.

3655 words

Citation: Rogers, Katharine. "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 02 October 2007; last revised 30 August 2018. [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=8209, accessed 26 November 2024.]

L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

Dates

Places

Genres and Modes

Resources

Save this article

Leave Feedback