Category: Books
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Ozblogging: The Marvelous Land of Oz, Part 3
Episode Three: There and Back Again The Scarecrow and company seek refuge with the Tin Woodman in Winkie Country, then attempt to reconquer the Emerald City. Most people in a situation like this would raise an army, call up the CIA, maybe see if other powerful regional rulers in Oz might want to help restore…
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Ozblogging: The Marvelous Land of Oz, Part 2
Episode Two: The Scarecrow and Jinjur Tip and Jack Pumpkinhead leave Mombi and travel south, aiming for the Emerald City for no very good reason. It turns out to be pretty close: they spend a day hiking through the countryside and then come to the main road only nine miles away from the city. This…
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Ozblogging: The Marvelous Land of Oz, Part 1
Episode One: Tip L. Frank Baum published The Marvelous Land of Oz in 1904. His publisher wanted a new Oz book for Christmas and he obliged. Because Baum was so pleased with the success of the stage play based on The Wizard of Oz, he wrote the new book with an eye to adapting it…
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Ozblogging: The Wizard of Oz, Part 6
Episode VI: The Long Slog Home In the movie, once the Wizard is off the scene, Glinda the Good drops down out of the fly gallery to send Dorothy home and wrap everything up in the last five minutes. In the book we still have six chapters to go. Dorothy and her three companions set…
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Ozblogging: The Wizard of Oz, Part 5
Episode V: The Wild Wild Wizard After the Witch dies, L. Frank Baum kind of loses track of his story. I suspect he realized he was getting close to the ending, but was nowhere near the word count. So he did what all of us do in a situation like that: he started padding. How…
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Ozblogging: The Wizard of Oz, Part 4
Episode IV: Ozpocalypse Now Having been given the mission to kill the Wicked Witch of the West, Colonel Willard — oops, I mean Dorothy — heads off into the wilds of Cambodia, or Winkie Country. There's no road, as the Wicked Witch has cut off her realm from the rest of Oz. Sadly, Dorothy doesn't…
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Ozblogging: The Wizard of Oz, Part 3
Episode III: The Crawling Chaos of Oz Once past the poppies, our heroes finally reach the Emerald City. Despite the fact that Oz is a peaceful fairyland, the capital is a heavily-fortified walled city. It's not clear what the wall is supposed to keep out, as the Army of Oz consists of one soldier and…
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Ozblogging: The Wizard of Oz, Part 2
Episode II: Incidents of Travel in Oz Dorothy's journey to the Emerald City is about what you remember from the movie. Yellow brick road, finds Scarecrow, finds Tin Woodman, meets Cowardly Lion. Sure, the Wizard can help you, off we go. The Cowardly Lion is a really big lion, presumably born in the usual way…
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OzBlogging: The Wizard of Oz, part 1
Ozblogging: this is the first in an irregular series of posts about L. Frank Baum's Oz books. I think Baum is unjustly neglected as a fantasy writer — though I also recognize his considerable shortcomings. These little essays are not heavy literary criticism. I'm not going digging for complicated and unlikely interpretations of the books…
The Cambias Digression 