#Ozathon24: Losing steam

It’s painful to admit, but I am getting tired of the Oz books. Having completed books 11 and 12 — The Lost Princess of Oz and The Tin Woodman of Oz — I can feel Baum’s weariness and distraction, understandable since his health was failing and World War I was raging. Both books do have good bits, but also some frustrating qualities.

Lost Princess is stronger overall, with a fine premise — what if all the magic objects in Oz were stolen, along with Ozma herself? Of course, a quest through the strange and unexplored lands of Oz has to ensue, with a search party including Dorothy, Button Bright, the Patchwork Girl, and the Wizard. There are some good elements along the way: Button Bright’s annoying propensity for getting lost has some purpose in the plot, and the villain, when they find him, is bracingly cynical.

A side plot has Cayke the Cookie Cook and her friend the giant Frogman seeking Cayke’s giant gold and diamond dishpan (a quirky addition to the magic items of the kingdom). Here is some potential for satire, for the Frogman is a fraud whose vaunted wisdom is just hot air, dispelled when he unwittingly bathes in the Truth Pond.

Actually, as I write about it, I realize how many good parts there were in the book. But on this reading, I found that they just didn’t quite gel. The Frogman’s plunge into humility goes by largely unremarked by the other characters. The villain makes an unlikely 180 degree swerve to peace and love at the end. (Wishful thinking in response to the horrible war, no doubt.) And of course, Dorothy conveniently has her Magic Belt along to save the day, once she figures out how to use it — unaccountably, she has forgotten that she could use it quite well in Ozma of Oz.

An actively disturbing incident occurs when the search party comes to a city where the inhabitants drink a magic potion that gives them super strength, enabling them to use giants as their slaves. This is presented as an amusing reversal of the usual order of things; nobody objects to the cruel treatment of the giants. The group goes blithely on its way with a gift of the magic potion.

Although Oz is supposedly a beneficent autocracy, where Ozma and Glinda use their powers to protect the people, they frequently display blind spots and areas of indifference, of which this is perhaps the most egregious example. Of course, if they did see and correct every single transgression, there would be no freedom at all. Do freedom and indifference have to go hand in hand? That would be an interesting question to explore, but Baum doesn’t go there.

Anyway, something didn’t quite sit well with me this time, although I know many find this book a highlight of the latter part of the series.

Tin Woodman also starts well: When a passing traveler visits him and the Scarecrow in his tin palace, the Tin Woodman tells the tale of how he left the girl he loved when he became tin. The traveler remarks that when the Woodman gained his heart from the Wizard of Oz, he should have returned to the girl who was surely pining for him.

It’s a good inciting incident, and the climactic meeting with the girl (who has NOT been pining) is funny with a tinge of horror, but the rest of the book is a mess, plot-wise. For no good reason, the party wants to avoid their friends in the Emerald City who could help them to their goal. So they wander around, have disconnected adventures, get into trouble by ignoring signs of danger, and eventually have to be rescued by Dorothy and Ozma anyway. Polychrome has made one of her random descents from the sky, and also provides fairy magic as needed, once she remembers she has it.

Baum’s weakest point as a fantasist is providing limits and rules for magic so that it can’t just effortlessly solve problems. It’s great that his fertile imagination gives rise to all kinds of funny and weird and surprising inventions, but these have to exist within a coherent structure that isn’t just “anything goes.” His laxity in that regard is becoming frustrating by this point in the series.

Again, there’s potential for satire. The Tin Woodman may be kind-hearted, but he’s vain and proud and does not want to sully his shining image. The Scarecrow is not as smart as he thinks he is; once, as he’s pontificating about thinking, Polychrome merely smiles, as the narrator makes a sly remark that she knows more about thinking than he does. But by this point in the series Baum has gotten into conflict with his own talent for ironic self-critique. His Oz creations had become popular, and so they had to be beautiful and amazing and wonderful, which tends to make them bland and boring. When an urge to puncture that surface comes in, it’s quickly passed over.

In spite of these weaknesses, I will certainly continue, with only two books left — how will they strike me? How have these struck you, if you’ve made it this far?