The original 1900 novel is one of the best-known stories in American literature,
and the Library of Congress has declared the work to be "America's greatest and best-loved homegrown fairytale." The Classic 1939 MGM film with Judy Garland is one of few films on UNESCO's Memory of the World Register. There are several popular musicals, such as The Wiz, won 7 tony awards, film soundtrack, 1978, did well, a 1995 film staging with Jewel, Jackson Browne, Roger Daltrey, Natalie Cole and Ry Cooder, and Wicked, 2003, won 3 tony awards and a Grammy. A recent comic book adaptation by Eric Shanower and Skottie Young made NY Times bestseller list, with numerous other cultural adaptations, with books and films being the subject of many academic studies.
Baum bio that does not shy away from feminist, theosophical and spiritual elements
Finding Oz: How L. Frank Baum Discovered the Great American Story
Evan I. Schwartz Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009
PBS American Experience 2021 Frank L. Baum documentary
‘American Oz’: L. Frank Baum doc traces ‘Wizard of Oz,’ ‘Wicked’ roots to author’s formative Chicago years
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rt19cuPSvc0
Amazing
story that shows how deeply the story is ingrained in the American social
fabric, no effort spared to make the Red Slippers into a religious icon,
with an elaborate ritualistic pilgrimage and mythography worthy of the
most sacred holy relic. Dorothy’s stolen ruby slippers: a bizarre tale of obsession, small-town gossip and a police hunt that took 13 years When
the famous ruby slippers from The Wizard of Oz were stolen from a
museum in a small Minnesota town, it set off more than a decade of
investigations, rumours, false leads, wild goose chases ... and
eventually a big break.
Sun., May 19, 2019
Washington D.C. Museum Opens First Permanent
Exhibition For Pop Culture — Where To See Dorothy’s Red Slippers,
Muhammad Ali’s Robe, And More
Greg Robertson Jan.23.2023
https://www.travelawaits.com/2851753/national-museum-of-american-history-entertainment-nation-pop-culture-exhibit/How Wizard of Oz ruby slippers became ultimate Hollywood symbol
Maureen Lee Lenker Aug 25,2019
Opinion: Lumet’s ‘The Wiz’ is still a trailblazing film in Black culture
February 25, 2021
The film
is foremost a story of racial liberation paired with Afrofuturism
elements and perfectly blends with the combination of science fiction,
fantasy, magical realism and ancient African tradition that dares to
criticize historical events or envisions a Black future. Its impact is
evident in current cinema and has prompted recent groundbreaking films
as Get Out and Black Panther
Good critical review of Oz movie that discusses feminist and theosophical aspects:
On
the 100th Anniversary of the Woman’s Suffrage March on Washington,
Disney’s “Oz, the Great and Powerful” Sets the Women’s Movement back
beyond a century.
March 11, 2013
It comes as no surprise, then that Gage was also a Theosophist. The
primary belief of brotherhood and equality in Theosophical tenets would
surely have drawn her to this philosophy. These beliefs would also
inform her work opposing the political power of the Christian church,
whose oppression she had fought against in both her work as an
abolitionist and suffragist. Theosophy was brought to the United States
by Helen P. Blavatsky who introduced eastern philosophical ideas of
Buddhism and Hinduism to the West.
https://extremehistoryproject.org/tag/theosophy/
This Feminist Icon May Have Partially Inspired 'The Wizard Of Oz'
Picking up the book today, it doesn't exactly read like a cutting
edge feminist manifesto. We can thank L. Frank Baum, though, at least in
part, for several generations of fierce, female protagonists in
fiction. We can thank him for planting the seed of a witch who was powerful and magical without being evil in the public consciousness. And we can hope that Matilda Joslyn Gage, who never lived to see the Oz books published, would have been (begrudgingly) proud.
For all things Oz, consult The Daily Ozmopolitan
If you really wish to go all the way down the yellow brick road, check out The Oz VLog
instagram.com/theozvlog/
Lately, people have been less shy in noticing that theosophist and major feminism pioneer Matilda Jocelyn Gage, Baum's mother-in-law, helped inspire Baum's writing of the story, and that Baum himself was a theosophist and theosophical aspects have inspired the story. How this fact is to be understood in terms of what theosophy means to American culture is an idea that is beginning to become more of a topic of historical reflection.
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