Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz
Encyclopedia
Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz: A Faithful Record of Their Amazing Adventures in an Underground World; and How with the Aid of Their Friends Zeb Hugson, Eureka the Kitten, and Jim the Cab-Horse, They Finally Reached the Wonderful Land of Oz is the fourth book set in the Land of Oz
written by L. Frank Baum
and illustrated by John R. Neill
. It was published on June 18, 1908 and reunites Dorothy with the humbug Wizard from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
. This is one of only two of the original forty Oz books (the other being The Emerald City of Oz
) to be illustrated with watercolor painting
s.
Baum, having resigned himself to writing a series of Oz books, set up elements of this book in the prior Ozma of Oz
. He was not entirely pleased with this, as the introduction to Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz opens with the protest that he knows many tales of many lands, and hoped that children would permit him to tell them those tales.
Written shortly after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake
and around the time Baum moved to California, the book starts with an earthquake in California. Dorothy and others are swallowed up by cracks in the earth, and fall into an underground cavern, where begin their adventures.
Very little of the story—six of the twenty chapters—actually takes place in Oz. As in Ozma of Oz before it, and in some of the books after, Oz is not the land where the adventures take place, but the land the characters are seeking as a refuge from adventure.
The book was dedicated to Harriet Alvena Baum Neal, the author's eldest sister.
is joining Uncle Henry in California at Hugson's Ranch, on their way home from Australia, Dorothy having visited friends in San Francisco. She strikes up an acquaintance with Hugson's nephew and her second cousin, Zeb. Dorothy, Eureka, who is Dorothy's cat, and Zeb are riding a buggy being pulled by a cab-horse
named Jim when an earthquake
starts and opens a crevice beneath them that sends them hurtling into the bowels of the earth.
Dorothy, Eureka, Jim, Zeb, and the buggy alight in the land of the Mangaboos, a vegetable people who accuse them of causing the Rain of Stones (what the Mangaboos call the earthquake because they are beneath the surface of the earth, and earth instead falls on them). Zeb is surprised by this strange new land, but Dorothy surmises that they are in a fairy country because they are meeting vegetable people and the animals—Jim and Eureka—are now speaking. Just as they are about to be sentenced to death by the Mangaboos, a hot air balloon
falls out of the sky, and in the basket is the Wizard of Oz
, whom Dorothy last met as he floated away from the Emerald City
.
The Wizard brags about his showmanship and with the others' aid attempts to awe the Mangaboos into sparing their lives. After defeating their wizard Gwig by slicing him in half—and showing him, as a vegetable, completely solid inside—he is appointed by the Mangaboo prince as their temporary wizard. The Wizard, Dorothy, and Zeb temporarily escape the fate of all intruders—to be cut up and planted—when they release a Princess from the garden who assumes authority. The Prince will now lose his authority and be planted himself. The cold Princess, however, vows to have Jim and Eureka killed nonetheless, so they all plan to escape higher into the earth where the Mangaboos cannot follow them due to the stronger pull of gravity the further they rise.
Dorothy, Eureka, Zeb, Jim, and the Wizard enter a beautiful green valley and the Wizard's nine tiny piglets devour an enticing fruit which they find makes them invisible. They enter a seemingly empty cottage and are welcomed by invisible people, for they have entered the Valley of Voe, whose inhabitants use their invisibility to hide from marauding bears. The inhabitants of Voe help them escape the bears and explain what lays ahead, particularly the terrible Gargoyle
s. (A story the Voe people tell seems to indicate that by now Baum had decided that people in a fairy land do not die; even cut into pieces, an individual is still active and aware. See The Tin Woodman of Oz
for another example of this.)
The companions reach the base of Pyramid Mountain and meet the Braided Man halfway up. He used to make holes, Flutters (guaranteed to make any flag flutter on a windless day), and Rustles for silk skirts. One day he stacked up many postholes he had made and fell into Pyramid Mountain and since then kept shop there, continuing to make his wares. His facial hair has gotten so long, however, that he has had to braid it to keep from tripping. Dorothy had given him a blue bow, for he had tied each braid with a different color hair bow. The only color he didn't have was blue so Dorothy gave him one. They head into the land of the Gargoyles and at first repel them successfully because the winged wooden creatures are startled by loud noises. However, they do not tire and soon imprison Dorothy and her friends. They manage to escape the Gargoyles' grasp, using their detached wings and Jim's guidance.
After a close encounter with the Dragonettes, baby dragons whose mother has tied their tails to a post until she returns from hunting, they find themselves trapped in a cave which they can not exit. Dorothy suggests that she signal Ozma
to bring them to Oz by using the magic belt which she'd captured from the Nome King
in Ozma of Oz. She does so at a prearranged time of day, and Dorothy, the Wizard, Zeb, Eureka, and Jim arrive within the Emerald City.
Soon after renewing his acquaintance with the Emerald City staff and making the acquaintance of Ozma, the Wizard elects to remain in Oz permanently. The others' visit is highlighted by the wooden Saw-Horse beating Jim in a race and the trial of Eureka for eating Ozma's pet piglet given to her by the Wizard; in fact, the kitten is innocent and the piglet alive and well, but the obstinate Eureka will not say so. After the piglet is restored to Ozma and Zeb and Jim decide they've had enough of fairyland, Ozma then uses the magic belt to send Dorothy and Eureka back to Kansas, and Zeb and Jim back to California.
, that the Oz books were more popular and sold better than any of Baum's other works. After 1907's Ozma of Oz, Baum devoted more of his energies to Oz. A 1906 contract between Baum and his publisher called for new Oz books at two-year intervals between 1907 and 1911.
In fact, Baum accelerated this schedule, producing Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz only a year after the previous book. The effect of this effort on the quality of the resulting work can only be a matter of speculation; but commentators have noted that this fourth Oz book is darker and more troubling than usual. In it, Baum violates his own standard of leaving out most elements that can disturb or frighten children. "In the first two-thirds of the book, Dorothy and her friends...barely escape from an unrelenting succession of threatening magical countries...." In the company of the Wizard, "Dorothy is a helpless little girl, given no opportunity to show her resourcefulness." When Oz is finally reached, it is a bland "goody-goody place" with few positive events to offer.
Land of Oz
Oz is a fantasy region containing four lands under the rule of one monarch.It was first introduced in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum, one of many fantasy countries that he created for his books. It achieved a popularity that none of his other works attained, and after four years, he...
written by L. Frank Baum
L. Frank Baum
Lyman Frank Baum was an American author of children's books, best known for writing The Wonderful Wizard of Oz...
and illustrated by John R. Neill
John R. Neill
John Rea Neill was a magazine and children's book illustrator primarily known for illustrating more than forty stories set in the Land of Oz, including L. Frank Baum's, Ruth Plumly Thompson's, and three of his own. His pen-and-ink drawings have become identified almost exclusively with the Oz series...
. It was published on June 18, 1908 and reunites Dorothy with the humbug Wizard from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is a children's novel written by L. Frank Baum and illustrated by W. W. Denslow. Originally published by the George M. Hill Company in Chicago on May 17, 1900, it has since been reprinted numerous times, most often under the name The Wizard of Oz, which is the name of...
. This is one of only two of the original forty Oz books (the other being The Emerald City of Oz
The Emerald City of Oz
The Emerald City of Oz is the sixth of L. Frank Baum's fourteen Land of Oz books. It was also adapted into a Canadian animated film in 1987. Originally published on July 20, 1910, it is the story of Dorothy Gale and her Uncle Henry and Aunt Em coming to live in Oz permanently...
) to be illustrated with watercolor painting
Watercolor painting
Watercolor or watercolour , also aquarelle from French, is a painting method. A watercolor is the medium or the resulting artwork in which the paints are made of pigments suspended in a water-soluble vehicle...
s.
Baum, having resigned himself to writing a series of Oz books, set up elements of this book in the prior Ozma of Oz
Ozma of Oz
Ozma of Oz: A Record of Her Adventures with Dorothy Gale of Kansas, the Yellow Hen, the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman, Tiktok, the Cowardly Lion and the Hungry Tiger; Besides Other Good People too Numerous to Mention Faithfully Recorded Herein published on July 30, 1907, was the third book of L....
. He was not entirely pleased with this, as the introduction to Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz opens with the protest that he knows many tales of many lands, and hoped that children would permit him to tell them those tales.
Written shortly after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake
1906 San Francisco earthquake
The San Francisco earthquake of 1906 was a major earthquake that struck San Francisco, California, and the coast of Northern California at 5:12 a.m. on Wednesday, April 18, 1906. The most widely accepted estimate for the magnitude of the earthquake is a moment magnitude of 7.9; however, other...
and around the time Baum moved to California, the book starts with an earthquake in California. Dorothy and others are swallowed up by cracks in the earth, and fall into an underground cavern, where begin their adventures.
Very little of the story—six of the twenty chapters—actually takes place in Oz. As in Ozma of Oz before it, and in some of the books after, Oz is not the land where the adventures take place, but the land the characters are seeking as a refuge from adventure.
The book was dedicated to Harriet Alvena Baum Neal, the author's eldest sister.
Plot
In the story, set after the last book, DorothyDorothy Gale
Dorothy Gale is the protagonist of many of the Oz novels by American author L. Frank Baum, and the best friend of Oz's ruler Princess Ozma. Dorothy first appears in Baum's classic children's novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and reappears in most of its sequels...
is joining Uncle Henry in California at Hugson's Ranch, on their way home from Australia, Dorothy having visited friends in San Francisco. She strikes up an acquaintance with Hugson's nephew and her second cousin, Zeb. Dorothy, Eureka, who is Dorothy's cat, and Zeb are riding a buggy being pulled by a cab-horse
Horse
The horse is one of two extant subspecies of Equus ferus, or the wild horse. It is a single-hooved mammal belonging to the taxonomic family Equidae. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million years from a small multi-toed creature into the large, single-toed animal of today...
named Jim when an earthquake
Earthquake
An earthquake is the result of a sudden release of energy in the Earth's crust that creates seismic waves. The seismicity, seismism or seismic activity of an area refers to the frequency, type and size of earthquakes experienced over a period of time...
starts and opens a crevice beneath them that sends them hurtling into the bowels of the earth.
Dorothy, Eureka, Jim, Zeb, and the buggy alight in the land of the Mangaboos, a vegetable people who accuse them of causing the Rain of Stones (what the Mangaboos call the earthquake because they are beneath the surface of the earth, and earth instead falls on them). Zeb is surprised by this strange new land, but Dorothy surmises that they are in a fairy country because they are meeting vegetable people and the animals—Jim and Eureka—are now speaking. Just as they are about to be sentenced to death by the Mangaboos, a hot air balloon
Hot air balloon
The hot air balloon is the oldest successful human-carrying flight technology. It is in a class of aircraft known as balloon aircraft. On November 21, 1783, in Paris, France, the first untethered manned flight was made by Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier and François Laurent d'Arlandes in a hot air...
falls out of the sky, and in the basket is the Wizard of Oz
Wizard (Oz)
The Wizard of Oz, known during his reign as The Great and Powerful Oz, is the epithet of Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkel Emmannuel Ambroise Diggs, a fictional character in the Land of Oz, created by American author L...
, whom Dorothy last met as he floated away from the Emerald City
Emerald City
The Emerald City is the fictional capital city of the Land of Oz in L. Frank Baum's Oz books, first described in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz...
.
The Wizard brags about his showmanship and with the others' aid attempts to awe the Mangaboos into sparing their lives. After defeating their wizard Gwig by slicing him in half—and showing him, as a vegetable, completely solid inside—he is appointed by the Mangaboo prince as their temporary wizard. The Wizard, Dorothy, and Zeb temporarily escape the fate of all intruders—to be cut up and planted—when they release a Princess from the garden who assumes authority. The Prince will now lose his authority and be planted himself. The cold Princess, however, vows to have Jim and Eureka killed nonetheless, so they all plan to escape higher into the earth where the Mangaboos cannot follow them due to the stronger pull of gravity the further they rise.
Gargoyle
In architecture, a gargoyle is a carved stone grotesque, usually made of granite, with a spout designed to convey water from a roof and away from the side of a building thereby preventing rainwater from running down masonry walls and eroding the mortar between...
s. (A story the Voe people tell seems to indicate that by now Baum had decided that people in a fairy land do not die; even cut into pieces, an individual is still active and aware. See The Tin Woodman of Oz
The Tin Woodman of Oz
The Tin Woodman of Oz: A Faithful Story of the Astonishing Adventure Undertaken by the Tin Woodman, Assisted by Woot the Wanderer, the Scarecrow of Oz, and Polychrome, the Rainbow's Daughter is the twelfth Land of Oz book written by L. Frank Baum and was originally published on May 13, 1918...
for another example of this.)
The companions reach the base of Pyramid Mountain and meet the Braided Man halfway up. He used to make holes, Flutters (guaranteed to make any flag flutter on a windless day), and Rustles for silk skirts. One day he stacked up many postholes he had made and fell into Pyramid Mountain and since then kept shop there, continuing to make his wares. His facial hair has gotten so long, however, that he has had to braid it to keep from tripping. Dorothy had given him a blue bow, for he had tied each braid with a different color hair bow. The only color he didn't have was blue so Dorothy gave him one. They head into the land of the Gargoyles and at first repel them successfully because the winged wooden creatures are startled by loud noises. However, they do not tire and soon imprison Dorothy and her friends. They manage to escape the Gargoyles' grasp, using their detached wings and Jim's guidance.
After a close encounter with the Dragonettes, baby dragons whose mother has tied their tails to a post until she returns from hunting, they find themselves trapped in a cave which they can not exit. Dorothy suggests that she signal Ozma
Princess Ozma
Princess Ozma is a fictional character in the Land of Oz, created by L. Frank Baum. She appears in every book of the series except the first, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz .She is the rightful ruler of Oz, and L...
to bring them to Oz by using the magic belt which she'd captured from the Nome King
Nome King
The Nome King is a fictional character in L. Frank Baum's Oz books. Although the Wicked Witch of the West is the most famous of Oz's villains , the Nome King is the closest the book series has to a main antagonist.-In the novels:The character called the Nome King is originally named Roquat the Red...
in Ozma of Oz. She does so at a prearranged time of day, and Dorothy, the Wizard, Zeb, Eureka, and Jim arrive within the Emerald City.
Soon after renewing his acquaintance with the Emerald City staff and making the acquaintance of Ozma, the Wizard elects to remain in Oz permanently. The others' visit is highlighted by the wooden Saw-Horse beating Jim in a race and the trial of Eureka for eating Ozma's pet piglet given to her by the Wizard; in fact, the kitten is innocent and the piglet alive and well, but the obstinate Eureka will not say so. After the piglet is restored to Ozma and Zeb and Jim decide they've had enough of fairyland, Ozma then uses the magic belt to send Dorothy and Eureka back to Kansas, and Zeb and Jim back to California.
Publication history
Four years passed between the first and second Oz books (1900-4), and three between the second and third (1904-7). By 1907, however, it was clear to Baum and to his publisher, Reilly & BrittonReilly & Britton
The Reilly and Britton Company, or Reilly & Britton was an American publishing company of the early and middle 20th century, famous as the publisher of the works of L. Frank Baum.-Founding:...
, that the Oz books were more popular and sold better than any of Baum's other works. After 1907's Ozma of Oz, Baum devoted more of his energies to Oz. A 1906 contract between Baum and his publisher called for new Oz books at two-year intervals between 1907 and 1911.
In fact, Baum accelerated this schedule, producing Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz only a year after the previous book. The effect of this effort on the quality of the resulting work can only be a matter of speculation; but commentators have noted that this fourth Oz book is darker and more troubling than usual. In it, Baum violates his own standard of leaving out most elements that can disturb or frighten children. "In the first two-thirds of the book, Dorothy and her friends...barely escape from an unrelenting succession of threatening magical countries...." In the company of the Wizard, "Dorothy is a helpless little girl, given no opportunity to show her resourcefulness." When Oz is finally reached, it is a bland "goody-goody place" with few positive events to offer.
Continuity
Baum made it clear that continuity was not high on his list when it came to importance, these books being written solely to delight children. This led to several facts throughout the series that do not match up across the entire canon.- At the end of Ozma of Oz, before Ozma sends Dorothy to Australia by using the magic power of the Nome King's Belt, Ozma agrees to check on Dorothy each Saturday morning to see if she wishes to return to Oz. However, when trapped in the cave, Dorothy states that the agreement is "every day at four o'clock Ozma has promised to look at me in that picture," even though the events happen only months after the events at the end of the previous book occur, and Dorothy does not visit Oz during this time.
- As events unfold in The Marvelous Land of OzThe Marvelous Land of OzThe Marvelous Land of Oz: Being an Account of the Further Adventures of the Scarecrow and the Tin Woodman, commonly shortened to The Land of Oz, published on July 5, 1904, is the second of L. Frank Baum's books set in the Land of Oz, and the sequel to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. This and the next...
we find that when the Wizard of Oz first came to Oz, he had Mombi the Witch hide Ozma, the true heir to the Land of Oz, so that he could rule. In Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz however, not only does the Wizard not know who Ozma is, but he has to be told the entire story as if he wasn't involved and is never questioned about his actions.
External links
- the full text of the book
- Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz (audiobook) at LibrivoxLibriVoxLibriVox is an online digital library of free public domain audiobooks, read by volunteers and is probably, since 2007, the world's most prolific audiobook publisher...