The Wizard of Oz is so closely associated with the Great Depression (thanks to the movie) that it’s hard to remember it was actually published almost 30 years before the great stock market crash of 1929. The book has since been adapted and retold numerous times. The sequel to it, published four years later, has also been adapted a number of times (or worked into the adaptations of The Wizard of Oz). Thus, both books could work for the two bingo slots I’m filling today. […]
Down the Yellow-Brick Road
“Folklore, legends, myths and fairy tales have followed childhood through the ages, for every healthy youngster has a wholesome and instinctive love for stores fantastic, marvelous and manifestly unreal. The winged fairies of Grimm and Andersen have brought more happiness to childish hearts than all other human creations.” – L. Frank Baum
“A brain!” “A heart!” “A home!” “Da vote!”
It’s all too common for modern readers to look into the works of the past and see things that may or may not have been intended in the fullness of time. What we may see as a delicate, subtly woven metaphor to rail against some then-incumbent wrongdoing the author may have added as nothing more than a narrative flourish. How much exactly did L. Frank Baum intend to comment on women’s suffrage, transgender issues, and the monstrosity of the pun? I can’t safely say, given […]
A farm girl walks into a bar. In her defense, it was invisible.
Unlike with Peter Pan, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was one of my first stark realizations of the differences that adaptations of works could bring. When I was wee, though I can’t recall if this was during elementary or middle school, there was a program by which one could earn a little extra credit. Quite literally, it was a program on one of the Apple terminals the school had that contained countless quizzes on books that our school library had in stock, ranging across various difficulties and lengths. […]