Copyright © 2023 Rick and Ruth Coy

The Oz Books

Everyone has heard of the Wizard of Oz because of the highly popular, poorly adapted movie by MGM. They didn’t have the effects when it came out to do some of it, but some of the changes were whims like making the silver slipper into ruby slipper. Making Glinda into an old woman.
Now to make thing worse is that Disney did an OZ movie called Return to Oz loosely based on “Land Of Oz” and “Ozma of Oz”  It was hated…which is very sad, as the version of Oz in this movie - were right on. The biggest thing was how Dorothy was treated in Kansas, how could they do that.  In the books no one believed Dorothy when she tried to tell the story of here adventures in Oz. It isn’t until the 6th book, “The Emerald City of Oz” when Dorothy takes Aunt Em and Uncle Henry to OZ that they believe her. And they are not that nice about it when she tired to tell about them about OZ.

An interesting note - since animals could talk, eating them, So, everything you wanted to eat grew on trees- sandwich trees, fried chicken trees, what ever.

The two main writers of the OZ books were it’s creator L. Frank Baum who wrote 14 novels about OZ starting with “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” and ending with “Glinda of OZ” He did do many other things realted to OZ - 5 plays, some of which were basis for several silent movies and radio play.

The other writer is Ruth Plumly Thompson, she wrote 19 of the books. The Lake Worth Public library had all the Baum and Thompson books - my mother started reading them to me, and as soon as I could read well enough I started reading them myself.  My mother said I liked the Ruth Plumly Thompson books best, but some how I think it was her, who liked them the best.

If your only exposure to OZ has been the MGM Musical version (witch is a very good movie, just a very poor adaption of the book) pick up a copy of “The Wonderful Wizard of OZ” - it is written for children, but it is still a wonderful Fantasy book. Most of the Baum books can be found in new edition and they have reprinted the Thompson books also- so most can be found. They are public Domain and can be found for free at the Project Gutenberg.