The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is an American children's novel written by author L. Frank Baum and illustrated by W.W. Denslow, originally published by the George M. Hill Company in May 1900. It has since seen several reprints, most often under the title The Wizard of Oz, which is the title of the popular 1902 Broadway musical adaptation as well as the iconic 1939 live-action film.
The story chronicles the adventures of a young farm girl named Dorothy Gale in the magical Land of Oz after she and her pet dog Toto are swept away from their home in Kansas by a cyclone. The book is one of the best-known stories in American literature and has been widely translated. The Library of Congress has declared it "America's greatest and best-loved homegrown fairytale." Its groundbreaking success, and that of the Broadway musical adapted from the novel led Baum to write thirteen …
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is an American children's novel written by author L. Frank Baum and illustrated by W.W. Denslow, originally published by the George M. Hill Company in May 1900. It has since seen several reprints, most often under the title The Wizard of Oz, which is the title of the popular 1902 Broadway musical adaptation as well as the iconic 1939 live-action film.
The story chronicles the adventures of a young farm girl named Dorothy Gale in the magical Land of Oz after she and her pet dog Toto are swept away from their home in Kansas by a cyclone. The book is one of the best-known stories in American literature and has been widely translated. The Library of Congress has declared it "America's greatest and best-loved homegrown fairytale." Its groundbreaking success, and that of the Broadway musical adapted from the novel led Baum to write thirteen additional Oz books that serve as official sequels to the first story.
In January 1901, George M. Hill Company completed printing the first edition, a total of 10,000 copies, which quickly sold out. It had sold three million copies by the time it entered the public domain in 1956.
Reminds me of my reaction to "Raiders of the Lost Arc", a movie I didn't like at all. The larger reasons I didn't like that aren't relevant, but one of the most annoying things about it was that every line in the movie had been parodied to death such that the delivery of the lines in the parodies was better than they were in the inceptive movie. With "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz", this is also true... but the lines were way better in the film adaptation, which is incredible. There are certain creative flourishes here and there in the book that couldn't have made it into the film, but the overall package can't help but pale in comparison to its essentially perfect adaptation. So it's a bit underwhelming, but still quite nice.
Review of 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Oz, #1)' on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
I loved this book. This is my fist time reading it, but I watched the movie based on this book before. I have to say the book is better then a movie. I say this even though I loved watching this move as a child with my parents. It’s innocent story about the girl who ended up in World of Oz with little help of tornado. As she is trying to get home she meets interesting creatures and wants to find solution for their problems as well by visiting Wizard of Oz. Short little story. It’s for kids, don’t expect too much.
I read reviews where they are explaining how this book is used as economics parable. I can see where they are coming from. Interesting thought.
Review of 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Oz, #1)' on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
I loved reading this to my 4 year old grandson. He found it fascinating. He's a big fan of the Munchkins. And, opa (that's me) got lots of hugs & cuddles in the process.
Review of 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Oz, #1)' on 'Goodreads'
4 stars
I read the Wizard of Oz and all the sequels at least a couple of times as a child, but it's been a long time since then, so when I found Audible had the book narrated by Anne Hathaway, I picked it up.
There are several details where the movie differs from the book, which I had forgotten; for example, there are no ruby slippers, they're silver; the movie doesn't end when the wicked witch is killed and they return to Oz, but in fact they have to go and fight their way through several more adventures to find Glinda in her own kingdom; and the flying monkeys don't belong to the wicked witch either, but are in fact like a genie's lamp and can be used only three times by the owner of an enchanted gold cap. The wicked witch starts out with it, but later Dorothy commands the …
I read the Wizard of Oz and all the sequels at least a couple of times as a child, but it's been a long time since then, so when I found Audible had the book narrated by Anne Hathaway, I picked it up.
There are several details where the movie differs from the book, which I had forgotten; for example, there are no ruby slippers, they're silver; the movie doesn't end when the wicked witch is killed and they return to Oz, but in fact they have to go and fight their way through several more adventures to find Glinda in her own kingdom; and the flying monkeys don't belong to the wicked witch either, but are in fact like a genie's lamp and can be used only three times by the owner of an enchanted gold cap. The wicked witch starts out with it, but later Dorothy commands the monkeys also, and at the end they serve Glinda.
The book is still a fun, gentle children's story although I recall enjoying some of the sequels even more. May have to pick those up for a re-read too at some point!
Review of 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Oz, #1)' on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
Both of my daughters love this story, my eldest was obsessed with the movie when she was younger. I really enjoy reading it to them, it is such a good adventure with some brilliant characters.
I have just started reading it for a third time to my youngest, once we have finished it we will start the second book in the series, so really looking forward to that.
Review of 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Oz, #1)' on 'Goodreads'
4 stars
This was a fast read. I read it in less than a day. If it's on your to-read list, you don't have much of an excuse. :)
Overall, I really enjoyed it. It's a very light read, aimed at children (thus my pace, I guess). It was interesting to see how much the movie differed from the book. How the Tin Man came to be tin was kinda gruesome, especially for a child's book, but there weren't many details (beyond, say, the ax slipping and chopping off his head. :)
It's odd that this is the first time I've read an Oz book. I think I started one or two, long ago, and never finished them. But many people rave about Oz, and I love old books from that era (especially children's books), so recently I picked it up and read it through.
It didn't take long. In fact, I was quite surprised at how quickly I got through it. It's quite a short book. It's also very simply written. I don't think most young American children (say, ages 7 and up) would have any difficulty reading it at all. The grammar is slightly more formal than modern American English, but the vocabulary is startlingly ordinary; far less challenging than I'd expected.
Perhaps that's because most of the books I've read from that general era (The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was first published in 1900) are English, and …
It's odd that this is the first time I've read an Oz book. I think I started one or two, long ago, and never finished them. But many people rave about Oz, and I love old books from that era (especially children's books), so recently I picked it up and read it through.
It didn't take long. In fact, I was quite surprised at how quickly I got through it. It's quite a short book. It's also very simply written. I don't think most young American children (say, ages 7 and up) would have any difficulty reading it at all. The grammar is slightly more formal than modern American English, but the vocabulary is startlingly ordinary; far less challenging than I'd expected.
Perhaps that's because most of the books I've read from that general era (The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was first published in 1900) are English, and use a considerably deeper vocabulary. The majority of Americans would struggle with an unabridged Peter Pan or Winnie-the-Pooh, and be utterly defeated by Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.
That said, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was a nice, light, and very quick read with some pleasantly funny moments. I'd heard that it was an extended political parable - the scarecrow representing Midwestern farmers, the Tin Woodsman representing the factory workers of the new Industrial Revolution, and the Lion representing...actually, I don't remember - but if that's the case (and it may well be) the result certainly doesn't seem to very complex. I probably won't read The Wonderful Wizard of Oz for myself again very soon, but I'll probably soon read it to my son - or see if he's interested in reading it for himself.
I can't help but wonder if I'd have loved the book if I had first read it when I was seven. But I just don't know.
Oh, I almost forgot: Of course I've seen the movie many times, and am quite fond of it. I expected the book to be very different from the movie, and it was - but it turned out that the movie was more faithful to the text than I'd realized. That said, I have to say that the movie actually seemed to make a strong theme (there's no place like home, of course) which the book lacked. But then, Dorothy seemed much younger in the book.
It was also interesting that in the book, the voyage to Oz was clearly NOT a dream (Uncle Henry had had to build a new house to replace the one that had been taken away by the tornado), whereas the movie made it fairly clear that Oz HAD all been Dorothy's fever-dream (since, among other things, the house was unchanged and still there).
You can download a very nicely formatted edition of the book for free in all the major ebook formats from Standard eBooks, or read it there on their site.
