Reading The Original Source

[plumtreeblossom]

It occurred to me recently that for all I'm a fan of The Wizard of Oz movie and the Wicked novels and musical, I unbelievably had never read the canon. Really. Never cracked even the first book of the series. Kind of inconsistent for someone who's LJ is even decorated on a loose wicked witch theme. So now I have done.

I'm amazed at how different it is from the derivative works it later inspired. In fact, the vast majority of the original book was left out of the 1939 movie (out of necessity, obviously) and it didn't occur to me how much more there was in the book.

I enjoyed the book's art nouveau-inspired illustrations, but some of them are scary. Among many other things that struck me is how, with each incarnation of this story, the Wicked Witch of The West has gotten less ugly.

In the original book, the Wicked Witch of The West is almost indescribably hideous and frightening in a way that would keep a child awake and screaming all night. She looks like a half-bald old man with stick-out braids and one pop-eye, kind of a scary clown/pirate/psych ward freak thing. Margaret Hamilton's green movie Witch looked shrewish and beak-faced, but fell rather short of certifiable hideousness. The Wicked novel's green teen Elphaba is plain by her own choosing, unaware and uninterested in her non-traditional comeliness. And the musical's Elphaba radiates a defiant beauty once she decides who she is. If they ever make a movie musical, I can only guess how much sexier a wicked witch could possibly get.

In the case of Wicked, it goes without saying that the author had to de-uglify her to the extent that readers could sympathize with her. I guess I've left out Eviline from the 1970s The Wiz, who I only remember as being rotund and bossy, but otherwise not so much scary as imperious.

Anyway, I'm glad I now know what I missed in the canon. I don't think I'll have the time to read the rest of the series any time soon, but I'm sure I'll get around to it eventually.

Comments

[weegoddess.livejournal.com]

One thing that confuses me is in the play posters, like your icon, Glinda has a hand. But thought that in the book (what the play is based on) she'd been born without arms or hands. Or am I just remembering the book wrong? Admittedly, it's been awhile since I read it.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

No, the one without arms is Nessarose, Elphaba's younger sister who goes on to be the Witch of The East (and who is killed by Dorothy's falling house).

For the stage version, since it would be pretty impossible to do armlessness, they put her in a wheelchair. But in both the book and the musical, Glinda is fully able-bodied. :-)

[greenlily.livejournal.com]

I've never seen the stage version. Do they use the part about how the ruby slippers are magically enchanted to compensate for Nessarose's disabilities, and that's why they're so important to Elphaba?

(I liked that bit in the book, about how the shoes were enchanted so that, when wearing them, someone without arms could still balance.)

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

In the stage version, in which the shoes are closer to the original silver shoes, they are enchanted and they allow her to stand up and walk from her wheelchair (she is not armless). In the book, they allow to armlessly balance and walk normally.

That's one nit-pick I have with Wicked. People born without arms generally adjust very well and can walk and run perfectly normally, as well as do almost anything else with their feet. They're hardly handicapped at all, unlike Nessarose. Check out this amazing athlete and mother with no arms:

[weegoddess.livejournal.com]

Ah, that's right. I'd forgotten. Maybe it's time to read that book again, as well as the others.

::puts them on the ever-growing pile::

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

I really like the Oz books, and the whole world he created, which included several other magical countries around Oz, as well. And Santa Claus, for that matter -- it explains where Santa came from, who he actually is, how he does what he does, and so forth.

Come to think of it, I'm surprised there's not more Oz fanfic. There are stories, like shanex's Cheshire Crossing, which include Dorothy and so forth, but Oz is the kind of open-ended world that usually invites fanfic.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I'm surprised there's not more Oz fanfic.

You would think. I guess technically Wicked is fanfic, albeit really, really god fanfic. Plus it's public domain, so anyone writing Oz fanfic can just go ahead and publish it, if I'm not mistaken.

[ayelle.livejournal.com]

The series was actually continued long after Baum stopped writing the books by at least one other author (Ruth Plumly Thompson? I'd have to check, too much of a hurry to Google it)... and even now, I think, new Oz books/stories sometimes appear. So you're right; there is something equivalent to fanfic, it's just that it's published often as not.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Wow, I just found tons of them on Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Oz_books

People are still writing and publishing them today!

[vanguardcdk.livejournal.com]

Now you're all set for your next literary papaer Orion Slave Girls and Wicked Witches: The History and Changes of Chromatic Beauty in Popular Culture.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Only if I get really bored. :-)

[daisytells.livejournal.com]

One cold winter in Derry NH when funds were low and heat was very costly, we three (husband, 5 year old son, and me - plus two cats) would go to one bedroom with three beds in it right after dinner. We were letting the wood stove die down for the night and relying on electic heat zoned room by room for overnight comfort. So we heated that one room allnight. Anyway, one of the ways we passed the time -- the three of us took turns reading aloud from L. Frank Baum's "The Wizard of Oz". Husband would read a page, then pass the book to our son K., who would read the next page, and then the book came to me to read the next page. We would read on to the end of a chapter each night. This group reading became a tradition with us, even into K's adulthood when we would spend the four weeks before Xmas reading the first four staves of Dickens' Christmas Carol, followed by Stave 5 (the conclusion) on Xmas Eve.
At any rate, the Wizard of Oz was a pleasant way to spend a snowbound winter week or so while trying to stay warm "up North".

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's awesome that your son's reading level was that high when he was only 5! I don't think I could have gotten through that level at that age. Congratulations on getting him reading so early!