BEFORE THE ACTION 
The Nome King plots to conquer Oz

Henry & Em learn that the farm is to be foreclosed in 30 days - they wait several days before telling Dorothy

Time passes

Day 1 - Dorothy leaves Kansas permanently for Oz - "About the time Dorothy went
  to Ozma" the Nome King makes Guph general
Day 2 - Dorothy assumes rank as Princess of Oz - Henry & Em brought to Oz - they
  meet the Cowardly Lion
Days 3-8 - Time passes - perhaps a week, more or less
  During this period the Nome King extends his tunnel and Guph visits the Whimsies
  and the Growleywogs
Day 9 - Dorothy's party begins a tour of Oz - they visit the Athletic College &
  Cuttenclips - Guph visits First & Foremost Phanfasm
Day 10 - Party visits Fuddlecumjig - night under trees - Guph returns to Nome King to
  report
Day 11 - Dorothy visits Utensia, Bunbury, Bunnybury - Ozma sees Nome King's tunnel in
  Magic Picture
Day 12 - Rigmaroles & Flutterbudgets - they arrive at the Tin Woodman's Castle
Day 13 - Tin Woodman tells Dorothy & party of Nome menace - they visit the
  Scarecrow & Jack Pumpkinhead - they arrive at the Emerald City at dusk - the
  Scarecrow's plan - The Nome King's allies begin their march to the EC 
Day 14 - The Nomes & their allies arrive at daybreak - invaders repelled - Ozma
  "closes" tunnel
Day 15 - Glinda seals Oz off by enchantment 

Some time later, Baum receives a note from Dorothy

Date: Sun, 24 Aug 1997 22:57:14 -0400
From: "Melody G. Keller" <harmonyarts at compuserve.com>
Subject: Ozzy Digest, 08-24-97
 
Now that we're starting the discussion of "Emerald City of Oz" today--when
I  first read it, Dorothy's move to Oz seemed a violation of the concept
"There's no place like home. (Kansas)" 
 
"Emerald City" also proved that even Baum could not get away with certain
types of Big Changes to Oz stories.. 
Baum: Oz is going to be cut off from the Outside World forever. No more Oz books!
Oz Fans: NOOOOOO! YOU CAN'T DO THIS TO US!  WAAAAAAAAH!
 
        And the Fountain of Oblivion at the end could have been saved from
deux ex machina status if Baum had introduced it near the beginning of
"Emerald City of Oz"--he could have had Aunt Em & Uncle Henry come across
it on their walk through the Palace gardens & ask questions about it.
 
        General Guph is a fine villain--he persuades the evil forces to
work for him with pure--guff!  "...he was a wise old Nome, and he knew that
the best way to get along with Roquat the Red was to show that he was not
afraid of him."
 
        We also learn that the Nome King has a Blackbird as one of his
spies. This Blackbird is the one that sees the Belt in Ozma's palace after
Dorothy leaves and reports the fact to Roquat.
 
        It's been said before in the article about the Emerald City palace,
but it bears mentioning again--when the newly Ozified Em and Henry ask for
poorer quarters that are more in their class, Dorothy tells them ALL the
Palace rooms are as luxurious as theirs--and some even better. 
 
        Jellia: Which means *I* have luxurious quarters too! (Let's
see--looks like the emeralds in my gold bedstead need polishing again....)
:-) 
 
        "Emerald City" contains the first hint of what's to come with
Ozma--Guph mentions that she has a fairy wand. Earlier she is still called
"...the most beautiful girl the world has ever known...",    Baum says that
Oz is a fairyland, so the people were fairy people, but he apparently had
not quite made up his mind to make Ozma a Fairy with a capital F yet.
 
Melody Grandy

Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 13:46:10 -0600 (CST)
From: Ruth Berman <berma005 at maroon.tc.umn.edu>
Subject: ozzy digest
 
Emerald City: David Hulan as commented in the past on how poorly it's
constructed, with many irrelevant episodes.  I noticed also on this read
through that some of the characters even are irrelevant -- Omby Amby
and Shaggy go along on the tour, but have very little to say and almost
nothing to do.  Billina has more to do, as she joins Toto in causing
trouble in some of more vulnerable little towns, but even she doesn't
have much reason to be along.  I wonder if Baum originally had plans for
episodes that would have involved the extra characters more, or if he
chose the Red Wagon passengers on a basis of might-come-in-useful
and didn't feel like revising when he got to the end and hadn't used them
all.  In spite of the construction problems, though, I find the comedy in
the episodes amusing, and like them individually.
 
Ruth Berman

Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 19:45:34 -0400 (EDT)
From: CrNoble at aol.com
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 08-24-97
 
Back to Emerald City:
 
I *am* looking forward to rereading this, and hope to catch up with the
discussion soon.  EC was one of my favorites as a child.  I especially liked
the dual plots:  Dorothy and co. traveling the countryside while the wicked
Nome King tunnels below with his armies of nomes and other bad guys.  I
always thought Baum was at a creative peak when he dreamed up the Whimseys,
Growleywogs and Phanphasms.  To this day, these bad guys remain vivid in my
imagination.  Also, I remember as a child being utterly delighted that Aunt
Em and Uncle Henry finally came to Oz.  In some way it seemed to validate and
even make possible my own desire to someday live in Oz and maybe marry
Dorothy or Ozma.  (I have been silent on this matter until now, but I finally
confess to having had a sacriligious (sp?) romantic interest in one of these
two lovely girls.
 
Besotted,
Craig

Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 19:47:40 -0500
From: "David G. Hulan" <davidhulan at ntsource.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 08-25-97
 
 
Guph is indeed a fine villain. Piglet Press's tape of it (which, by the
way, I highly recommend; it's _very_ well-done, even if I'd quibble at a
few things) gives him a sort of Peter Lorre way of speaking, which seems
to fit very well.
 
There's a goshawk that spies for the Nome King in one of the books, too,
IIRC - anybody remember which one?
 
I don't think, though, that Guph is reliable about Oz. He puts Glinda
north of the Emerald City, for instance. So I'm not sure that at that
point Ozma's wand (which she definitely had as early as OZMA) had any
fairy powers (or at least, any she knew how to use).
 
Ruth:
Right, Omby Amby and Shaggy don't do anything but interject an
occasional comment, except for Shaggy's sneeze in the Cuttenclip
village. Toto doesn't do much, either, but I guess he counts as one of
the new citizens of Oz who's getting the Grand Tour, like Aunt Em and
Uncle Henry and even Dorothy and the Wizard, none of whom seem to have
seen most of the places they go.
 
Actually, listening to the Piglet Press tape made me notice the number
of lines Shaggy and Omby Amby had more than I ever did reading the book,
since each has a distictive voice. They do talk a fair bit, though
they're not really necessary.
 
David Hulan

Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 22:32:31 -0400
From: Richard Bauman <RBauman at compuserve.com>
Subject: Today's Oz Growls
 
Now on to TECOO:  I would like to have some words with the previous owner
(The one with the purple pen.  Sigh!  I wish they had numbered the color
plates as I think I may be missing a couple.)
 
p. 29 EC - 9,654 buildings, 57,318 people and .5M people in all of OZ.  No
disease, property, money or death.  
 
The EC always seemed smaller than that to me.  
 
I continue to be bothered by Baum's need for "slicing Crinkel" in the
torture chamber and sticking pins in and pulling out hairs of Gupf. Is this
necessary?
 
p.46 Here we have Glinda "north of the EC."  
 
p. 71 Dave - All the male chickens are named Dan!  By the way, at this time
there were 1+11+86+300 chickens in the EC.  Since they can't die there are
now 666 squadrillion and two.  
 
p.81 In the non-PC line we have the pictures of Growleywogs.  They
certainly look like skinny Indians to me.  
 
p.88 It is refreshing to be reminded that there was once something called
the "Protestant Work Ethic."  This will probably come as a real shock to
some of our younger members.  Yes, there was a time when people really
wanted to work and didn't feel the government owed them a living without
any effort of their own.
 
p.149 It is not allowed to kill and eat chickens but it is allowed to eat
eggs, thus effectively killing potential chickens.  Now where have I heard
this thinking applied?  
 
p.201 Charles Dodgson wrote "Alice In Wonderland" in the 1860s if IRC. 
Does Bunnybury strike anyone as similar to Wonderland?
 
p.236 Ah Rigamaroles.  Anyone know any of them?
 
p. 242 I never realized the source of current Liberal thought, but reading
about the Flutterbudgets really makes it plain.  Think how many things our
governments are trying to protect us from that are only possibilities. 
Asbestos, all kinds of injuries, floods, global warming, the list is
endless.  I remember when New York created a Rat Abatement Department. 
Observers felt this would guarantee that NY had rats forever, else there
would be no reason for the department. 
 
p. 290 This makes it clear that Oz is in our world as otherwise airships
could not overfly it.  
 
p. 292 Refering to Glinda's book:  "As soon as an event takes place,
ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD, it is immediately found printed in my Magic Book."
 
More evidence that Oz is in our world.  
 
P. 295-6 Well here our author tries to end the series.  Or, was this a
marketing ploy?  Now we know the source of "Live Long And Prosper!"
 
Regards, Bear 

Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 20:58:30 -0700
From: Douglas or Lori Silfen <Duglor at connectnet.com>
Subject: for Oz digest
 
       My take on EMERALD CITY OF OZ......
 
************SPOILER ALERT FOR REST OF MY NOTE*********************
 
    The mustering of the villains by General Guph is fascinating.
It is the best aspect of the book IMO. Baum does a good job describing
the villains as well as fleshing out the characters of the Nome kingdom.
    The way Aunt Em and Uncle Henry come to Oz is quite charming, but
after that, Dorothy and friends travel to misc. place after misc.
place and it gets a bit boring. My favorite misc. place is the place
where Dorothy has to put the inhabitants back together. The town
of the buns and doughnuts, etc is poor in my opinion.
  The ending is kind of strange because Ozma was able to destroy
the Nome King's tunnel. I wonder why she didn't destroy it when 
their were no villains in it, just before their assault. She was
monitoring the magic picture, so I thought it was odd that she
didn't act before the villains made it to Oz. 
 
An average Oz book for me. Maybe a bit under average. Thank Ozma
that the great books 7,8,9,11,13, and 14 follow!!!
 
Doug Silfen

Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 20:58:51 -0700
From: ozbot <ozbot at ix.netcom.com>
Subject: Ozzy Digest stuff (sort of)
 
Suspence and EC--
An interesting Hitchcockian element in EC:  Hitchcock describes the
difference between suspence and surprise by liking it to a bomb going off--
if it just goes off in the middle of a dinner conversation, then it's too
much of a surprise and leaves audiences confused.  Suspence, on the other
had, lets the audience see the bomb under teh dinner table during the
conversatino, and suddenly the audience is hanging on every word.
 
The same with EC-- the travels through Oz become more and more interesting
only because we readers see the mounting threat.  
 
Danny 

Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 07:36:03 -0700
From: Bob Spark <bspark at pacbell.net>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 08-27-97
 
Bear,  Flutterbudgetism is in the eye of the beholder.  I suppose that
polio would be one of the "only perceived" perils that the government is
protecting us against until you actually contract it.  We all can't be
ruggedly individualistic militia members.
 
Now, on to _Emerald City_:
 
     There are many references to King Roquat's army.  Their proficiency
in warmaking is extolled.  Do we know of any other wars, raids, forays,
etc. that they have participated in?

     On page 54, when Aunt Em and Uncle Henry have first been
transported to Oz, Aunt Em is described as having her calico dress skirt
"tucked up".  What is this exactly?  I have a picture in mind of her
skirts tucked into the top of her panties (would that be the word used
to describe Aunt Em's underthings?).  I'm sure that concept couldn't be
right, but don't know what it means.

     Tunnels.  These Nomes are proficient at tunneling.  They construct
an enormous tunnel all the way to the center of OZ.  What happens to all
the material that they excavate?  It has to go somewhere.

     Billina's chicks.  All named "Dorothy" and "Daniel".  Reminds me of
George Foreman. He named all his sons and his dog "George" so they could
all be called to dinner at the same time.

     The idea of shoeing the sawhorse with gold.  Gold is not
particularly hard or long-wearing.  Wouldn't something else have been
more appropriate?

     While in Bunbury Dorothy defends Toto and Billina for eating the
inhabitants. 
> Toto and Billina can't be 'spected to go hungry when the town's full of good things
> they like to eat, 'cause they can't understand your stingy ways
"Stingy ways", indeed. The inhabitants had been more that accommodating.
Another example of Dorothy' propensity for invading perfectly innocuous
places and wreaking havoc.  Kind of a Baumian "manifest destiny".

     The Tin Woodman having himself nickle plated.  Is nickle
particularly lustrous?  When I look at the five cent pieces in my pocket
they look dull.
     Now to a statement that really bothers me.  On page 80:
> It seems unfortunate that strong people are usually so disagreeable and
overbearing > that no one cares for them.  In fact, to be different from
your fellow creatures is
> always a misfortune.

     Firstly, the statement about "strong people" is not born out by my
experience.  Strong people mostly seem to me to be easier to get along
with because they feel secure. Perhaps Baum was the model for Charles
Atlas' "before" example.  Maybe he got sand kicked in his face at some
beach. 

     The second part about the misfortune of being different is
offensive to me.  Maybe at the time this was written children were
forced to conform and Bear's "rugged individualism" was not a virtue.  I
doubt it.  We should value people's differences.  Indeed, on page
137-138 Baum has the Lord High Chigglewitz saying "Madam, you have
perhaps noticed that every person has some peculiarity.  Mine is to
scatter myself.  What your own peculiarity is I will not venture to say;
but I shall never find fault with you whatever you do".
 
Bob Spark

Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 09:54:01 -0600 (CST)
From: Ruth Berman <berma005 at maroon.tc.umn.edu>
Subject: ozzy digest
 
Douglas Silfen: Some possible explanations for why Ozma didn't close
up the Nome King's tunnel before the invasion instead of after -- the
Phanfasms magical abilities might have been such that they could just
have opened it up again with a counter-spell; it could have taken her a
while to figure out how to close it; or (combination of first two) perhaps
the tunnel was magically protected (perhaps the Nomes' own magic
abilities would extend that far, even after the loss of the Magic Belt?)
against magical interference?

   There are a lot of different versions of gnomes.  Tolkien called one
group of his elves "gnomes"; Pope's gnomes in "The Rape of the Lock"
are earth-spirits inculcating prudishness; Henry Kuttner's gnomes in "A
Gnome There Was" (available in collections of Kutnner's short stories and
much anthologized) are mine-inhabitants somewhat similar to Baum's
Nomes, C. S. Lewis's gnomes of Bism are from the deeps of molten lava
below the layers of solid rock, and so on and so on.  Baum's Nomes are
like other people's gnomes in not being very much like any one other
person's verions of gnomes.  But they're still all gnomes, and it takes
more than making the pronunciation more obvious by dropping off the
silent g to make a different supernatural species.  (Phanfasms and
Growleywogs, yes.  Nomes, no.)  And Baum's definition of Nomes as
ones who know makes it obvious that he was thinking of them as
Gnomes, as the dictionaries of his time usually derived "gnome" from the
Greek "gnome" (adage, wisdom, knowledge).
 
Ruth Berman

Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 15:08:38 -0500
From: "David G. Hulan" <davidhulan at ntsource.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 08-27-97
 
Bear:
I'll agree that the EC has never seemed to have the other
characteristics of a city of 50,000+, though it's said to more than once
in the FF. Especially in the absence of mechanized transportation that's
a Big City, yet it doesn't seem to take people more than a few minutes -
certainly not hours - to get from the city wall to the center. If
nothing else had been said I'd have put its size in the 10-15,000 range.
 
I think that Roquat's having Crinkle sliced up, and Blug "thrown away"
(whatever that is), and Guph's beard-hair pulled out, while not strictly
_necessary_, are useful in showing the evil character of those who did
the acts. It's not as if there are graphic descriptions of the really
fatal acts, and little kids aren't likely to be bothered by Guph's being
mildly tortured, when he's been established as a nasty sort himself. I
know I wasn't when I first read the book at age 7 or so.
 
>p.88 It is refreshing to be reminded that there was once something called
>the "Protestant Work Ethic."  This will probably come as a real shock to
>some of our younger members.  Yes, there was a time when people really
>wanted to work and didn't feel the government owed them a living without
>any effort of their own.
 
Your right-wing views are blinding you to reality, Bear. There have
always been people who felt they were owed a living without any effort
of their own (read Shaw, or Twain, for more-or-less contemporaries of
Baum), and I doubt if there are many more of them now (in proportion to
the population) than there were then. It's true that until this year, it
was possible for someone to get a small pittance from the government
without working, though trying to live on $6-800 a month for a family of
three or four, or about $300 a month in the more generous states for a
single, isn't something most people would do voluntarily. But a very
small fraction of the population ever did that for more than short
periods caused by emergencies.
 
Other than the presence of clothed rabbits I don't see much resemblance
between Bunnybury and Wonderland.
 
>p. 242 I never realized the source of current Liberal thought, but reading
>about the Flutterbudgets really makes it plain.  Think how many things our
>governments are trying to protect us from that are only possibilities. 
>Asbestos, all kinds of injuries, floods, global warming, the list is
>endless.  I remember when New York created a Rat Abatement Department. 
>Observers felt this would guarantee that NY had rats forever, else there
>would be no reason for the department. 
 
NY will almost certainly have rats forever regardless; rats have adapted
very nicely to living in congested urban environments. But anyhow,
what's with blaming all this on Liberals (other than that you blame
everything you dislike on Liberals)? I noticed that when we had a big
flood here in DuPage County (65% Republican) last year, there wasn't a
peep from the local politicians (100% Republican) when FEMA came in with
help for the people who were flooded out.
 
Anyhow, it's more a matter of whose ox is being gored than
liberal-vs-conservative. I have a friend who makes you look liberal in
most regards, but she's a horse-lover and is incensed because the
government isn't preventing horses from being sold for meat. And it's
conservatives who are all-out to prevent kids from being taught the evil
theory of evolution in school. (Not all conservatives support that, of
course, but then not all liberals support all the Byzantine government
regulations you blame on them, either.)
 
David Hulan

Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 22:37:31 -0400 (EDT)
From: CrNoble at aol.com
Subject: Re:  Ozzy Digest, 08-29-97
 
More on EC:
 
It seems very odd that the students at Professor Wogglebug's college would
learn Greek, Latin and "The Charge of the Light Brigade."  Since when did
anyone in Oz know about ancient European languages and 19th Century English
literature?  Were these subjects introduced by someone from the Outside
World, such as the Wizard or Shaggy Man?  I seriously doubt it was Dorothy or
Button Bright.
 
-- Craig

Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 22:08:23 -0500
From: "David G. Hulan" <davidhulan at ntsource.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 08-29-97
 
Danny:
I don't know - I think that if the point had been to have the rather
idle journey of Dorothy and company through Oz punctuated by the
suspense of seeing the Nome King's plot working its way to fruition,
there should be some mention of said plot after they'd left the Fuddles.
The whole business of the zebra and the crab, Utensia (my personal
favorite bit of their travels), Bunbury, Bunnybury, Flutterbudget
Center, Rigmarole Town, and everything in between is uninterrupted by
any adumbration of what Roquat is up to. If Baum was trying for suspense
in the Hitchcockian sense, I don't think he did a very good job of it.
 
And welcome back - I've been wondering where you've been!
 
Bob C.:
Oz is clearly closely connected with our world, so teaching Latin and
Greek makes sense, but there are a lot of strong arguments against its
being physically somewhere on our world - not the least of which is,
where could it be that would be consistent with events in all of the FF?
Even if you restrict yourself to Baum, it's apparently within 24 hours
of Kansas at a speed of no more than 70 mph (that's about the maximum
speed of a tornado across the ground - in fact, that's very fast for
one), or 1680 miles - probably much less, since Dorothy slept but
apparently didn't get hungry on the way.  That doesn't get you from
Kansas into the Pacific at all (especially since tornadoes usually
travel eastward), yet the Oz continent is apparently reachable from
somewhere in the Pacific in OZMA. And if you get into Thompson you get
even more impossible cases - Peter is washed overboard off Cape Hatteras
in the Atlantic and swims to Octagon Island, which is no more than a
couple of days' sail from the Oz continent.
 
Even if Oz is magically invisible, if it's on our world it has to be
_somewhere_, and there isn't any location that's consistent with all the
FF.
 
Bob S.:
The Nome King's army never fights outside his realm in the FF, though it
does in quite a few non-FF stories.
 
I think that when Baum refers to Aunt Em's skirts being "tucked up" he
means that she'd have taken a handful of the skirt, about where her
hands would naturally grab it in a normal standing position, and pulled
it up and tucked it into the belt of her apron. The skirts worn by adult
women in that day were floor-length, but this wasn't really practical
for anything active, so in the privacy of her own home she'd tuck them
up so the skirts were only mid-calf length in front. I can remember
seeing this sort of thing done in the days when long skirts were popular
back around 1970, though of course there was much less dread of having
an ankle (or almost anything else) seen in those days. There was the
same problem of tripping over one's skirts, though.
 
The gold shoes of the Sawhorse were probably attributable to the fact
that gold was the commonest and cheapest metal in Oz. It wouldn't last
terribly long, but it was easily replaced. Steel doesn't seem to be all
that readily available there.
 
I don't really want to get into arguing the morality of the Bunbury
visit. It's one of my least favorite chapters in Baum, anyhow.
 
Nickel is a metal that doesn't tarnish or corrode easily, but then so is
tin. I'm not sure what the advantage of nickel-plating tin would be.
Nickel is much harder than tin, but a plating wouldn't have that much
effect. As for luster, I think the two materials are fairly comparable -
not nearly as bright as silver or aluminum, or gold if you're not
looking for the blue-green end of the spectrum, or even chromium, but
brighter than iron or steel or zinc.
 
Baum almost always extolled the virtues of being different. The passage
you quote (about the Growleywogs, I think?) is very out of character for
him. Maybe R&B stuck it in.
 
Ruth:
I don't think we can say that it took Ozma a while to figure out how to
close the tunnel  - once the idea occurred to her she seems to have
known exactly what to do. However, it's obvious that Ozma wasn't
thinking very clearly during most of this book; she did a whole series
of dumb things, from the way she brought Uncle Henry and Aunt Em to Oz
to not consulting Glinda as soon as she found out about the Nome King's
invasion. What's one more?
 
David Hulan

Date: Sat, 30 Aug 1997 13:28:15 -0400 (EDT)
From: JOdel at aol.com
Subject: Ozzy Digest-whenever
 
I think Emerald City was the last Oz book that I managed to locate and read.
I was at least into college before I tracked it down. I was aware of the main
action of the book, of course, (Dorothy and her aunt and uncle move to Oz
permanently, and the Nome King tries to tunnel into Oz with an army of
conquerors, only to be tricked into drinking from the Fountain of Oblivion
once he gets there.) since both events are frequently mentioned in subsequent
books. In addition, one of my cousins had a copy of the abridged version
which was printed in the '40s or '50s in a very small, almost toy book
format, and that at least mentioned most of the odd villages that Dorothy's
party visited on their tour. 
 
When finally read, however, I found it disapointing, and it will never be a
favorite. Still, there is a great deal which may be said for it and it is
certainly one of Baum's more ambitious undertakings. 
 
In the first place, just to state the obvious, EC, and Patchwork Girl are
probably the two longest Oz books that Baum wrote. And there is a good deal
of material in them to work with. More significantly, City is also the first
book in the series where he used the "multiple story line" construction which
he also used to such good effect in Lost Princess and Magic, and capably, if
with slightly less distinction in Tik-Tok and Glinda. Traces of this format
even appear in Scarecrow, Tin Woodman and Rinnkitink, but not to the degree
that one could honestly call them books with multiple story lines. The
introduction of this, rather more sophisticated method of story-telling was a
valuable enrichment to the series, and seems to be aimed at a (very) slightly
higher reading level than that of the first five. (The same should be said
for Zixi, which also makes heavy use of this form.)
 
It is unfortunate that one of the main story lines used in City is so very
trivial. I'm sorry, even though the purpose of sending the Gale family off on
a tour was to get them out of the way for a while, their safari through
deepest exurbia is hard to take in one lump. Any of these IEs taken
individually is an amusing little time-waster, but there really needs to be
something with a bit more substance to it mixed inamong them (no, Dorothy's
quest for breakfast is not substantial enough). The total has the rather
gaudy facination of a string of plastic pop-pearls. Decorative, and peculiar,
but with no intrinsic value, and little durability. Even more difficult to
accept is the reversal of North and South, spreading Glinda's influence into
the Giliken Country. This seems just plain sloppy, and unforgivable in that
it could have been so easily corrected with even minimally competent copy
editing. (Question, was series writing typically this disjointed at the turn
of the century? Is Baum an exception, or --possibly-- a model of continuity
for his day?)
 
There are a few notable elements to this part of the story. We see a bit of
the Lion's sense of humor in his meeting with Aunt Em. McGraw picked up on
this a bit in Merry-Go-Round, but neither Thompson, nor the other Historians
seem to have exploited the possibilities much. Toto is being a bone-headed
dog, as usual (must be a terrier, as illustrated, although I'm not sure Neil
got the breed right) there begins to be an ugly undertone to this behavior
when you later "discover" that by this point in time he was perfectly capable
of understanding everything that was going on around him, and consiously
CHOSE to behave like a dumb beast, even to the extent of devouring sentient
beings when the opportunity arose, and refusing to communicate, even to
Dorothy, in an unambiguous manner. Billena as in Ozma, is still clearly an
adult, but just as clearly not a human adult. She a hen, one who enjoys
luxury when it is offered, but holds no real apreciation for civility, or
some of its more sophisticated concepts (like giving your children individual
names). As was seen in the Ev henhouse, her natural belligerance is evident
upon more than one occasion. Baum appears to have had a clear understanding
of both chickens and dogs, at any rate. I'm less convinced that he really
knew and understood cats. If he had, he might not have simply given them
speech, and made them sound concieted. Cats aren't, particularly. Being
predators, they seem convinced that they cannot afford to lose face, but they
seem no more concieted than most other non-canines. Particularly when the
speech he gave them was nowhere nearly so obvciously"feline" in their tone as
Bellina's sentiant chicken sentiments are in hers. 
 
One faintly off note was struck in the story of the foundation of Bunnybury.
That the country was ONLY open to ALBINO rabbits strikes an oddly
white-supremecist tone, particulary give that the book was written during a
period that the Klan was beginning to gather power throughout the south and
Midwest. Still, it is just as in keeping with Glinda's mindset, what we've
seen of it so far, that she might have given the albinos their safe, closed
country in consideration of their natural disadvantages for leading life in
the wild. (She may also have been letting her own national biases creep
through out of admiration of their pink eyes. :->) But Baum doesn't SAY so,
and one is left wondering.
 
On the other hand, the book's other main story line, that of the Nome King's
campaign to conquer Oz could hardly be inproved. This is outstanding
story-telling, and, frankly, carries the rest of the book. 
 
Ozma's reaction to the threat of invasion is so bizarre that I find it
difficult to swallow. Clearly this is supposed to demonstrate to the reader
that good will always triumph, and need not stoop to the level of its enemies
to do so, but while salvation as an act of faith makes for very fine
theology, it seems a little out of place under the circumstances. Ozma's
reaction to the situation reads more like a conviction that of course no one
would ever want to harm HER people, would they? Or even an idea that if her
enemy would not listen to sweet reason, there was nothing to do but surrender
with a good grace. This is so gross a departure in outlook from the haughty
child queen who set out with an army of 27 officers to conquer the Nome King
and rescue his royal prisoners (let alone the attitudes of that little scamp
Tip) that I flatly cannot believe it. While I can certainly accept that Ozma
will have seen and understood the futility of attempting resistance with an
army of one, that she should be seen to be taking no particular magical
measures either is incomprehensible. (She could at least have had the love
magnet fetched from the City gates to wear to meet the invaders.) It is as
though she has gone so far to the other behavioral extreme as to have slipped
all connection to reality. Butch up a LITTLE, dearie...

Date: Sun, 31 Aug 1997 16:05:02 -0500
From: Mike Denio <miked at ti.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 08-31-97
 
 
>Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 22:08:23 -0500
>From: "David G. Hulan" <davidhulan at ntsource.com>
>
>The gold shoes of the Sawhorse were probably attributable to the fact
>that gold was the commonest and cheapest metal in Oz. It wouldn't last
>terribly long, but it was easily replaced. Steel doesn't seem to be all
>that readily available there.
 
I had always assumed that Baum used the gold shows purely for effect,
instead of any practical reason. You're right in that gold wouldn't last
long enough to justify the time required to make the shoes. I suspect that
even wooden shoes would perform better. Metals we use to strengthen gold
(like copper) would make better shoes when used alone. The use of gold has
little practical function (other than ornamentation and as a conductor).
 
>Nickel is a metal that doesn't tarnish or corrode easily, but then so is
>tin. I'm not sure what the advantage of nickel-plating tin would be.
>Nickel is much harder than tin, but a plating wouldn't have that much
>effect. As for luster, I think the two materials are fairly comparable -
>not nearly as bright as silver or aluminum, or gold if you're not
>looking for the blue-green end of the spectrum, or even chromium, but
>brighter than iron or steel or zinc.
 
Actually, I've found nickel plating to be equal to superior to chrome. It
has a slightly darker color, but this gives it a much richer look. It is
mildly susceptible to tarnish when contaminated (like a fingerprint), but
so is chrome. The nickel plated item I have has a plating which is thicker
than chrome plate (I don't know if this is generally the case), and thus it
has a greater tendency to crack. Still, I prefer nickel plating to chrome
for its color.  
 
On the other hand, silver is horribly susceptible to tarnish, and requires
constant maintenance. Aluminum looks nice after A LOT of polishing, but it
dulls if not sealed (hence the clear paint on aluminum cans). Gold of
course would be a good choice if the color were suitable. 
 
>Date: Sat, 30 Aug 1997 13:28:15 -0400 (EDT)
>From: JOdel at aol.com
>
>Ozma's reaction to the threat of invasion is so bizarre that I find it
>difficult to swallow. Clearly this is supposed to demonstrate to the reader
>that good will always triumph...
 
I agree. The biggest problem with many of the later Oz books (_EC_,
_Patchwork_, and especially the Thompson titles) is that the characters no
longer have to think in order to solve their problems. Either Glinda shows
up and snaps her magic fingers, or some other solution just falls into
their collective laps, and everyone heads off to the palace to party.
 
Someone brought up the potential for an ethical and philosophical
discussion of the Bunburry chapter, but I feel that Ozma stealing the minds
of all her would-be invaders should raise greater ethical questions. Then
again, it is just a story.
 
_Emerald City_ is one of my favorite all-around Oz books. I really enjoy
Baum's sarcasm, which is in full gear here, but fades quickly in his later
work. I'm also fascinated by the extent to which socialism had integrated
itself into Baum's writing - obviously the fad of the period. Wasn't it
only forty years or so between _Emerald City_ and _Animal Farm_? I'm
constantly amazed at how people can have such strong definitive perceptions
of the ideal society which invariably look ridiculous to following
generations. We are all truly products of our times. On the other hand,
other aspects of human behaviour (like the Flutterbudgets) seem to be
timeless.
 
Good book.

Date: Sun, 31 Aug 1997 16:24:52 -0500
From: "David G. Hulan" <davidhulan at ntsource.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 08-31-97
 
David L.:
Nickel when polished is shiny, but its reflectivity isn't nearly as high
as silver (around 98% when freshly polished, though it tarnishes fast)
or aluminum (90% when polished, and it doesn't tarnish fast). IIRC the
reflectivity of nickel is around 50-60%. (If anybody really wants to
know I can look it up, but I'd have to go downstairs and it doesn't seem
worth the bother unless someone is really curious.)
 
Craig (and others who mentioned the point):
It seems to me that there's every bit as much reason for Ozites to study
Greek and Latin as for Americans. In either case the reason for studying
the languages is partly to have access to the literature of those
cultures in the original, and partly to improve one's understanding of
English, which owes a great deal of its vocabulary to them. Since Ozish
is the same as English, the latter reason would apply in Oz as much as
in America or Britain. And the great literature of Rome and Greece would
be just as great in Oz as here as well. It's not as if Latin and Greek
are studied here to enable one to speak with ancient Romans and Greeks
if we happen to meet up with them. (True that there are modern speakers
of a form of Greek, and the RC church still uses a form of Latin, but
neither American schools of Baum's day nor, I'm sure, Prof. Woggle-bug's
academy generally taught Modern Greek or Church Latin. They taught the
classical languages.)
 
Of course, these days very few Americans study Latin, and fewer Greek,
but at the time EC was written most who went to secondary school studied
Latin, and most who went to college studied Greek as well.
 
Joyce:
Your comments on EC seem bang-on to me.
 
Neill seemed to have a hard time making up his mind what breed of
terrier Toto was. In _Wizard_ Denslow makes him a Scottie or Cairn or
some such - one of the fuzzy square kind, anyhow. Neill starts out
making him a Boston terrier in _Road_, and continues that in _EC_, but
in _PG_ he's something else - not a breed I'm familiar with, if there is
such a breed - and by _Lost Princess_ he seems to be more or less of a
mutt.
 
It seems bizarre to me that when Ozma found out about the Nome King's
planned invasion she wouldn't at least have alerted Glinda to what was
going on. Granted, Glinda probably knew about it anyhow from the Great
Book of Records (though IIRC that book is first mentioned in _Tik-Tok_;
it's just possible that it didn't exist at the time of _EC_), but in
that case why didn't _she_ come to the EC to counsel with Ozma, even if
she weren't called on? Whether she's protector of Oz or protector of
Ozma, it would seem to be in her job description. (Of course, maybe she
was brewing up some powerful magic that she'd have used if the Scarecrow
hadn't had his inspiration. But if so, she never mentioned it. OTOH,
maybe that was to keep morale high in the EC; if you know that someone
is going to save you even if your plans go awry, then you have less
incentive to work hard to save yourself. Good conservative doctrine
there, right, Bear?)
 
Jeremy:
I agree that Baum was no fool, but I don't really think Roquat and his
armies were much of a prediction of the World Wars. More likely a
reflection of the historical wars like the Crimean, Napoleonic, Seven
Years', Spanish Succession, Grand Alliance, and Thirty Years', just to
go back a couple of centuries from the time he wrote. All of those were
cases where multiple nations with differing goals banded together to
fight on the same side of a war, sometimes against a single opponent and
sometimes against a hostile alliance. (And I don't assert that the wars
I list are the only ones of that kind in that period, though I think
they were the most important ones.)
 
David Hulan

Date: Sun, 31 Aug 1997 21:32:28 -0400
From: "Melody G. Keller" <harmonyarts at compuserve.com>
Subject: Ozzy Digest, 08-31-97
 
Jeremy: 
>Roquat and his army:
A direct prediction of the World Wars . . .  Baum was no fool.<
Jeremy:
 
"Is is time we went into the world and brought sorrow and dismay to its
people. Too long have we remained by ourselves upon this mountain top, for
while we are thus secluded many nations have grown happy and prosperous,
and the chief joy of the race of Phanfasms is to destroy happiness. So I
think it is lucky that this messenger from the Nomes arrived among us just
now, to remind us that the opportunity has come for us to make trouble. We
will use King Roquat's tunnel to conquer the Land of Oz. Then we ewill
destroy the Whimsies, the Growleywogs and the Nomes, and afterward go out
to ravage and annoy and grieve the whole world." 
 
The First and Foremost of the Phanfasms
 
Because many agree the world went mad, or died, in 1914, I agree with
you--the First and Foremost's words do seem creepily prophetic, especially
since "Emerald City of Oz" was copyrighted in 1910. 
 
Melody Grandy

Date: Mon, 01 Sep 1997 09:03:41 -0600
From: Richard_Tuerk at tamu-commerce.edu (Richard Tuerk)
Subject: _The Emerald City of Oz_
 
On 29 Aug. David Hulen wrote:
>I don't know - I think that if the point had been to have the rather
>idle journey of Dorothy and company through Oz punctuated by the
>suspense of seeing the Nome King's plot working its way to fruition,
>there should be some mention of said plot after they'd left the Fuddles.
>The whole business of the zebra and the crab, Utensia (my personal
>favorite bit of their travels), Bunbury, Bunnybury, Flutterbudget
>Center, Rigmarole Town, and everything in between is uninterrupted by
>any adumbration of what Roquat is up to. If Baum was trying for suspense
>in the Hitchcockian sense, I don't think he did a very good job of it.
 
I think this assesment is basically accurate.  IN this book, Baum really
doesn't seem to have been too interested in making the two plots work
together, except that both provide him with an opportunity to presenting to
his readers a travelog through parts of Oz and of some neighboring
kingdoms.  He wanted to be entertaining and exciting, but he does not seem
to have been concerned with having the tour of Oz contribute to the
suspense.  Perhaps he thought the suspense surrounding the Nomes' invasion
plans so great that he wanted to provide his young readers with a rest, an
opportunity to calm down before the next episode involving the Nomes.
 
Rich Tuerk

Date: Tue, 02 Sep 1997 09:00:45 -0700
From: "Stephen J. Teller" <steller at pittstate.edu>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 08-31-97
 
> From: "David G. Hulan"
> 
> Nickel is a metal that doesn't tarnish or corrode easily, but then so is
> tin. I'm not sure what the advantage of nickel-plating tin would be.
> Nickel is much harder than tin, but a plating wouldn't have that much
> effect.
 
Nickel plating was done to inhibit corrosion.  The Tim Woodman was very
liable to rust (something very unusual for the non-ferrous metal tin. 
Volkov made more sense when he changed him into the Iron Woodman.  Did
"tin cans" in the 1890s rust?
 
Baum certainly intended EC to be his last Oz book, and therefore went
out of his way to give the readers a greater feeling for the nature of
the country than he had previously done.  Fot that reason, the tour de
OZ that is given to Uncle Henry and Aunt Em is also intended for the
readership.  Baum had a strong sense of Whimsy, and here gave it free
rein (even to the extent of having a race of Whimsies).  In many ways
the Oz chapters of EC are more like THE MAGICAL MONARCH OF MO than
anything else in Baum's series.  I agree with David that Utensia was
among my favorite chapters of the books; it is the punniest passage in
the entire canon.
 
Steve T.

Date: Tue, 02 Sep 1997 10:10:01 -0500
From: Gordon Birrell <gbirrell at post.cis.smu.edu>
Subject: Ozzy Digest
 
Some comments on EC:
This book is especially noteworthy, I think, in that it provides the basic
model for many of the Thompson books:  the Irate Beginning Chapter (some
monarch or other exploding with rage), the dual plot lines, the succession
of episodes depicting one quaint little kingdom after another
 
I agree with David H. that the Bunnybury episode doesn't have much in common
with _Alice in Wonderland_ except for the white rabbits, but EC as a whole
comes closer to Lewis Carroll than Baum's other books in its biting satire
of the misbehavior of adults.  How many of us have known people who fall to
pieces as a form of defensive behavior, like the Fuddles?  Or
people--adults--who resort to infantalism when asked to be responsible, like
the Bunny King?  (I love the way he first appears, weeping and lying on his
back kicking his legs in the air like a baby!)  The prolixity of the
inhabitants of Rigmarole Town and the paranoia of the Flutterbudgets are
further very familiar examples of adults behaving badly.
 
For that matter, I think the inclusion of Greek and Latin in the curriculum
of Professor Wogglebug's college is not necessarily out of reverence for the
classical tradition, particularly since these languages are acquired very
expeditiously by swallowing a pill.  Baum was undoubtedly satirizing the
pedagogy of foreign-language instruction at the turn of the century, which
typically involved heavy doses of grammar (memorizing grammatical tables)
and laboriously translating uplifting passages from the ancient texts.  Like
the memorization and recitation of low-grade inspirational verse ("The Boy
Stood on the Burning Deck," "The Charge of the Light Brigade"), this kind of
rote learning was essentially a brain-dead activity, and Baum was quite
right in suggesting that it might as well have been accomplished by taking a
pill for all the good it did in teaching people how to think, or how to feel.
 
Incidentally:  Bunbury has *got* to be an allusion to _The Importance of
Being Earnest_.
 
"[The wheelbarrow is] made of nabiscos with a zuzu wheel":  Does anyone know
what a zuzu wheel was?  And if "nabisco" was a common noun, what did it
mean?  A generic square cracker?
 
Joyce is undoubtedly correct in saying that Ozma's eerie passivity in
accepting the attack of Roquat's assembled forces is one of the most
problematic aspects of this book.  Can anyone imagine Tip acting like this?
And are we to believe that a ruler who is so clueless about defending
herself spends her days helping other people resolve their quarrels?  The
only answer I can think of here is that Baum was sacrificing Ozma's
character in order to justify his decision to discontinue the Oz series.  By
making Ozma seem so helpless and defenseless against outside aggression, he
underscored the need to make Oz invisible and out of reach forever.
 
I also agree with Mike Denio that there are some serious ethical problems
raised in the way Ozma and the others take care of the invading forces.
Admittedly these are very scary enemies--the Phanfasms in particular could
have been conceived by Stephen King--but the Water of Oblivion calls to mind
the practice of neutralizing aggressive behavior by frontal lobotomies.
 
--Gordon Birrell

Date: Sun, 31 Aug 1997 18:46:24 -0700
From: ozbot <ozbot at ix.netcom.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 08-31-97
 
David wrote:
>If Baum was trying for suspense
> in the Hitchcockian sense, I don't think he did a very good job of it.
 
Well, comparatively, Baum achieves a level of suspence that hasn't been
explored in earlier books, due mostly to juggling the parallel stories--
just one aspect of suspence that Hitchcock might use. I agree that if this
was Baum's chief aim-- suspence-- it could be manufactured better (Baum's
craft of writing sometimes leaves a bit to be desired)  In a way, it seems
like the suspence that is there is almost an accident-- again, by way of
the parallel plots.  Someone mentioned that Baum could have spotlighted the
Fountain's role a bit earlier-- this is an example of what could have
hieghtened the book's structure. 
 
Danny

Date: Wed, 03 Sep 1997 10:34:50 -0700
From: Nathan Mulac DeHoff <vovat at geocities.com>
Subject: Ozzy Digest (9/3)
 
Craig:
I don't really see anything all that odd about Ozites studying subjects 
like Greek and Latin.  The people of Oz seem to speak English, which has 
some of its roots in these languages.  As for learning "The Charge of the 
Light Brigade," this knowledge of Outside World literature is certainly 
not an isolated incident in the Oz series.  King Dox of Foxville is 
familiar with Aesop's fables, and the Dictator of Dicksy Land reads a 
book by Dickens.  Anyway, the Education Pills were invented by the 
Wizard, who certainly has knowledge of Outside World subjects.
 
Anyone notice that the Ozites were apparently familiar with baseball in 
_Emerald City_, but seemed to be unfamiliar with the sport in Thompson's 
books?
 
Joyce:
Baum does use multiple plotlines in _Emerald City_, but does not seem to 
have perfected the technique.  The adventures of Dorothy's party comprise 
much more of the book than do Guph's travels.  Also, it is clearly 
documented when Dorothy's party eats or sleeps.  We have no idea when (or 
if) Guph did these things, and how long his journey took.
 
I actually thought that Thompson developed the character of the Cowardly 
Lion a little more than Baum did (although, admittedly, Thompson's Lion 
acts very much like most of the other large animals in her books).  The 
McGraws' Lion reminds me more of Thompson's Lion than of Baum's.
 
        Nathan Mulac DeHoff
        vovat at geocities.com or lnvf at grove.iup.edu

Date: Thu, 04 Sep 1997 09:28:18 -0500 (CDT)
From: Robin Olderman <robino at tenet.edu>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 09-04-97
 
Every time I see a mention of how Carrollian Bunbury is, I think, "Yeah,
but the REAL Carroll episodes are in COWARDLY LION." Even Neill seems to
have caught on...I'm at school now and don't have access to the books, but
there's a drawing of a gal who could be Carroll's Duchess just as well as
the Tenniel version.  The Doorways i.e. is especially Carrollian, I think,
with its dragging through keyholes and a feeling of senselessness and
frustration. Anyone else see it this way? It feels so like ALICE with a
rational being observing irrationality. (Kinda like I feel in school some
days!)   --Robin

Date: Fri, 05 Sep 1997 18:02:28 +0200
From: Bill Wright <bw at computas.no>
Subject: RE: Ozzy Digest, 09-04-97
 
        Stephen,
        >  What is more disturbing is the incredible coincidences upon
which the resolution of so many of his plots depend.<
 
        I wonder how much of this can be attributed to the audience he
was writing for:  generally 10 to 15 year olds.  Today perhaps we are a
bit more sophisticated and know that problems are not so fortuitously
resolved.  But perhaps in those earlier days his approach was more in
tune with the presumed "innocence" of the reader.
 
        Gordon,
        I agree with your comments on EC, and similar comments by other
Digests.  I read this book at least 20 times while planning and
producing the EC audio book.  There are really a lot of funny things in
it.  In the recording studio sessions the whole cast from time to time
would break down into such laughing fits that we had to take a break
just to calm down and get back to the business of recording the book.
(PS:  the various things in Bunbury were popular food products of the
period, e.g. Zuzu Wheel.)
 
        Regards,
        Bill in Ozlo

Date: Fri, 05 Sep 1997 13:41:44 -0400
From: Lisa Bompiani <bompi at microserve.net>
Subject: Ozzy Digest
 
In reference to the Bunnybury/Carroll connection, there are some I think
more than just the white rabbits (I kept hearing Python's "It's just a bunny
rabbit!" while I read it).  Namely, the small entrance, the white rabbit who
led Dorothy there as Alice was led through the hole and Dorothy needing to
shrink her size to enter the town.  I found the King's requests to keep his
clothes and chair hilarious.  it's funny how people complain abou tpositions
in life, but when given opportunities to leave, still want the so-called
benefits of that position.  Then, he changes his mind about leaving the
city.  Could this be some variation on the "no place like home" idea or am I
way off? 
 
Peace & Love,
 
Bompi

Date: Fri, 05 Sep 1997 19:31:29 -0500
From: David Hulan <davidhulan at ntsource.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 09-04 & 05-97
 
9/4:
Steve:
Tin doesn't really rust; that's why it's used as a coating for cans. It's
only a plating on the cans, though, and a soft one at that, so cans that
had been handled a fair bit would rust. If Nick was pure tin he wouldn't
have rusted either. But nickel plating would have the advantage of being
much less easily scratched, which is probably why he chose it.
 
Gordon:
>
>"[The wheelbarrow is] made of nabiscos with a zuzu wheel":  Does anyone know
>what a zuzu wheel was?  And if "nabisco" was a common noun, what did it
>mean?  A generic square cracker?
 
My parents always used "nabisco" as the name for what I think are
technically called "Nabisco sugar wafers" - the kind of cookie where each
side looks like a mini-waffle, with a very sugary filling in between.
They'd certainly make up into a wheelbarrow fairly well. I'm not sure that
Baum had the same usage in mind, but I thought I'd throw it in.
 
The Whimsies, Growleywogs, and Phanfasms are characterized as Evil Spirits
with no redeeming qualities, which I suppose is why it's never bothered me
that they lost their memories. The Nomes, who seem to be mixed good and bad
like most people, didn't drink from the Fountain. And, of course, no one
was forced to drink, just encouraged.
 
Nathan:
>Anyone notice that the Ozites were apparently familiar with baseball in
>_Emerald City_, but seemed to be unfamiliar with the sport in Thompson's
>books?
 
In _Road_ Shaggy's skill at catching the Scoodlers' heads and tossing them
down the gulf is attributed to his having played a lot of baseball.
 
>I actually thought that Thompson developed the character of the Cowardly
>Lion a little more than Baum did (although, admittedly, Thompson's Lion
>acts very much like most of the other large animals in her books).  The
>McGraws' Lion reminds me more of Thompson's Lion than of Baum's.
 
Baum's lion talks a cowardly game, but generally acts bravely. Thompson's
lion seems to be genuinely cowardly, especially with regard to
thunderstorms - in both _Royal Book_ and _Cowardly Lion_ he panics and puts
his companion(s) in danger during a storm.
 
David Hulan

Date: Mon, 08 Sep 1997 09:25:43 -0600 (CST)
From: Ruth Berman <berma005 at maroon.tc.umn.edu>
Subject: ozzy digest
 
Gordon Birrell: It's hard to see any allusion to "Bunbury" in Wilde's sense,
but considering Baum's interest in theater, you'd think he must have
known about it.  I recall a reference in one of the "Bugles" explaining the
reference to Saratoga chips as an early brand name of potato chips.
From that example, I assume that nabisco referred to the Nabisco
company rather than to a common noun (Nabisco is the offshoot of the
National Biscuit Company, isn't it?), and suspect that "zuzu" was also a
brand name.  (I didn't find it in the "Webster's Unabridged," anyhow.)
 
Ruth Berman

Date: Mon, 08 Sep 1997 20:27:25 -0700
From: Nathan Mulac DeHoff <vovat at geocities.com>
Subject: Ozzy Digest
 
Ruth:
"Nabisco" probably did come from the brand name, even though Baum used a 
lower-case "n."  Also, in _Gnome King_, Thompson referred to "ivory 
soap."  She was most likely referring to the brand name, since I've never 
heard of soap actually being made from ivory (even though Shampoozle did 
say that his subjects could make soap out of anything).
 
BTW, did anyone else notice that Dorothy visited the Parker H. Rolls (as 
in the Parker HOUSE Rolls)?
 
I think Saratoga chips might still be around, but I'm not sure who makes 
them.  I'm pretty sure it isn't Ruggedo, especially since he doesn't have 
his magical powers anymore.
 
BTW, Ruggedo threatens to turn someone into a potato on three separate 
occasions (Kaliko in _Tik-Tok_, Peter in _Gnome King_, and someone, 
possibly the pirates, in _Pirates_).  Of course, potatoes grow 
underground, so they might have been one of Rug's favorite foods.
 
-- 
Nathan Mulac DeHoff
vovat at geocities.com or lnvf at grove.iup.edu

"I'm having a wonderful time, but I'd rather be whistling in the dark."

Date: Mon, 08 Sep 1997 21:55:48 -0500
From: Gordon Birrell <gbirrell at post.cis.smu.edu>
Subject: Ozzy Digest
 
Ruth Berman:
When I said that Bunbury had to be an allusion to Wilde's play, I didn't
mean to imply that there is any thematic connection.  More likely, Baum was
taking a word that everyone (at least adults) knew and putting a very
amusing spin on it by taking its components literally.
 
It may seem as if the tension of the book is undermined--so to speak--by the
fact that the ungoing advance of the enemy troops isn't mentioned at all
during the many chapters that describe the various eccentric towns that
Dorothy and her party visit.  Still:  if the Haff/Martin map is at all
accurate, one can't help noticing that during the last leg of their journey
(from the Tin Woodman's castle back to the Emerald City) Dorothy and the
rest are unwittingly traveling directly above the tunnel as it heads toward
the center of Oz--a decidedly creepy touch.
 
I'm surprised that nobody has mentioned Neill's illustrations yet.  This is
surely the most sophisticated work he did for the Oz series.  That depiction
of Aunt Em confronting the Cowardly Lion is nothing short of surrealistic,
and the extraordinary illustration of Guph approaching the Phanfasm bridge
is like something out of Bosch.  (Did anyone else notice the strange figure
at the lower left: a phantom hunter lying on his stomach drawing a bead on
the alligator?)
 
--Gordon Birrell

Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 07:43:17 -0400 (EDT)
From: earlabbe at juno.com (Earl C. Abbe)
Subject: Ozzy Digest - Turbulent Water
 
In the 9/2-4 Digest, Gordon Birrell questions the morality of using the
"nuclear bomb" of the Water of Oblivion on the invading Nomes and their
allies.  I share Gordon's unease.  Perhaps Ozma's total inability to
mount any defense against the invasion excuses the Water's use --  It was
either use the Water, or allow Oz's total destruction.
 
Earl Abbe
(I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy!)

Date: Tue, 16 Sep 1997 19:58:16 +0600
From: rri0189 at ibm.net
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 09-04-97
 
Stephen J. Teller wrote:
>Did "tin cans" in the 1890s rust?
 
Tin-plated iron cans rust like the very devil once the tin is
breached.  Much faster than plain iron.
 
Gordon Birrell wrote:
>Does anyone know what a zuzu wheel was?
 
I have a vague notion I've encountered a "zuzu" somewhere or other in
the last 49 years....
 
>And if "nabisco" was a common noun, what did it mean?  A generic square
>cracker?
 
It certainly is not a common noun:  it stands for "National Biscuit
Company", and if EC were published today, Nabisco's lawyers would be
screaming bloody murder.  I'm pretty certain that "a nabisco" would
refer to a saltine, which makes sense for the wheelbarrow.
 
// John W Kennedy -- Hypatia Software -- "The OS/2 Hobbit"

Date: Wed, 17 Sep 1997 08:38:08 +0600
From: rri0189 at ibm.net
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 09-09-97
 
>I think Saratoga chips might still be around, but I'm not sure who makes 
>them.
 
There are, or were just a year or two ago, chips available under that
name.  The potato chip as we know it (and that's "potato crisp" outside
the U.S.) was invented at a resort in Saratoga, N.Y., when a diner
complained that his french fries ("chips" outside the U.S.) were too
thick.  The chef sliced a potato into thin wafers and fried them up,
intending them as a sarcastic rejoinder, but they made a big hit.
I do not know whether the contemporary "Saratoga Chips" are an old
brand name surviving to this date, or an old common name being used
as a modern brand name.
 
// John W Kennedy -- Hypatia Software -- "The OS/2 Hobbit"

Date: Tue, 23 Sep 1997 23:35:59 -0400
From: Tyler Jones <tnj at compuserve.com>
Subject: Oz
Sender: Tyler Jones <tnj at compuserve.com>
 
Earl:
It may not have been possible to use the Belt to return the invaders while
they were marching for two reasons:
 
1. In _Emerald City_, it says that the Magic Belt itself would not really
add to the power of the Phanfasms, so it may not have worked while their
knowledge of magic was strong. It may have been necessary to mind wipe them
so that they could offer no defense.
 
2. If they had done that, the Belt would be completely drained (if you
accept the HACC theory that the belt was drained of power after this and
did not recover until the Thompson administration). The invaders would have
simply returned, and the Belt would have been useless to stop them the
second time.
 
--Tyler Jones

Date: Wed, 24 Sep 1997 18:45:57, -0500
From: NQAE93A at prodigy.com (MR ROBERT J COLLINGE)
Subject: Ozzy Digest, 09-24-97
 
I am still waiting for my copy of "Sea Fairies" from BOW, so I have not read it yet.

A few final questions about EC.

If Toto was supposedly the first dog in Oz, Why were the bunnies of 
Bunnybury afraid of dogs?

and...

The Rigamarole houses were Munchkin houses, Why is Rigamarole in the 
Quadling country on the Oz map?
 
Bob C.

Date: Thu, 25 Sep 1997 07:53:05 -0400 (EDT)
From: earlabbe at juno.com (Earl C. Abbe)
Subject: Ozzy Digest Submission
 
In the 9/25 Digest, Tyler Jones says, <In _Emerald City_, it says that
the Magic Belt itself would not really add to the power of the
Phanfasms.>
However, the Phanfasms seem to have made little use of that significant
power, if they really do have such magic.
 
He also suggests that the Magic Belt would have been exhausted by one
mass transportation of the invaders and so, could not be used to send
them home and keep them there without some additional factor, such as the
Fountain of Oblivion.
This may be so, but there is no indication that Ozma knew this.  She did
not try that or anything.  Something should have been done.  The
transportation of a few eggs into the tunnel every day probably would
have cost the Belt little magical energy and could have considerably
slowed the tunnel construction, to give the Ozians more time to prepare. 
Or even just to delay the inevitable, if it was truly inevitable.  This
was the nadir of our beloved monarch's reign.
 
Earl Abbe

Date: Fri, 26 Sep 1997 20:51:06 -0500
From: David Hulan <davidhulan at ntsource.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 09-25-97
 
Bob C.:
>If Toto was supposedly the first dog in Oz, Why were the bunnies of
>Bunnybury afraid of dogs?
 
Toto may have been the first domestic dog in Oz (though there are hounds in
_Merry-Go-Round_ that presumably had been there all along, and there
probably are other dogs in other books that don't come to mind offhand),
but we know that there were wolves in Oz (the WWW had a pack of them, and
the Glass Cat meets one on the way into Gugu's forest), and wolves and dogs
are closely enough related that they can produce fertile hybrids. (Arguably
they're the same species, though I don't think most taxonomists lump them.)
Even though Toto - whether he's Denslow's Scottie or Cairn or Neill's
Boston terrier - doesn't look much like a wolf, he probably smells enough
like one to trigger primal fears in a rabbit.
 
>The Rigamarole houses were Munchkin houses, Why is Rigamarole in the
>Quadling country on the Oz map?
 
It just says the houses were Munchkin shaped - but in illustrations, at any
rate, all the houses throughout Oz seem to have that same domed shape, at
least in the more settled parts. Stranger, actually, is that after they
leave Flutterbudget Center it says they're in the Gillikin Country, though
the map shows FC in the Quadling Country as well. I think this is a case of
Baum just misspeaking himself; the whole flow of the story works better if
most of their tour is in the Quadling Country.
 
Earl:
The Phanfasms do almost nothing once they leave Mt. Phantastico but march
through the tunnel and get thirsty. If they're really more powerful than
the Magic Belt, then it would seem reasonable that they might just banish
the dust, but that would ruin the story...
 
David Hulan

Date: Sun, 28 Sep 1997 17:21:31 -0700
From: Nathan Mulac DeHoff <vovat at geocities.com>
Subject: The Past Few Ozzy Digests
 
Robert Collinge:
Toto was certainly not the first dog to live in Oz.  Jack Pumpkinhead 
encountered a green dog while riding the Sawhorse through the Emerald 
City in _Land_.  For some reason, Baum often made generalizations about 
the Land of Oz, which often contradicted his earlier writing.  In 
_Dorothy and the Wizard_, he stated that the Sawhorse was the only horse 
in Oz, but the Cowardly Lion and Tip are both familiar with horses, 
suggesting that there were other horses in Oz.  Thompson, Neill, and the 
McGraws placed plenty of horses and dogs in Oz.
 
On a similar note, _Royal Book_ contains a remark that there were no 
ferries in Oz, even though there were some in Baum's books, notably 
_Land_ and _Lost Princess_.  Also, in _Lost King_, it is stated that 
there are no stores in Oz, which also untrue.  Generally, when an author 
states that a certain thing does not exist in Oz, this statement need not 
be taken at face value.
 
Earl:
I agree that the Phanfasms did not use much of their supposed power.  
Pretty much all of the magic that they worked just created illusions.
--
Nathan Mulac DeHoff
vovat at geocities.com or lnvf at grove.iup.edu

"I'm having a wonderful time, but I'd rather be whistling in the dark."

Date: Sat, 23 Oct 2004 15:57:41 EDT
From: AGannaway7 at aol.com
To: regalia at pauahtun.org
Subject: [Regalia] EMERALD CITY online sleuthing

On 10/19/04, Ruth Berman wrote:

<<That anecdote reminded me that the Utensia and Bunbury chapters  have 
Baum's heaviest concentration of puns (with the possible exception of  some 
Wogglebug material), so I took advantage of the existence of on-line  
versions of the public-domain Oz books to look up those chapters, and in the  
Buns I notice some odd terms that may have been explained when "Emerald  
City" was the book under discussion, but I don't know remember what they  
were:

the wheelbarrow made of nabiscos with a zuzu wheel (we still  have nabiscos, 
but what's a zuzu? -- I seem to remember that someone  explained before, but 
don't remember what the explanation was),

the  graham gems who were twins (we still have graham crackers, but what are 
the  gems?)

and doughleanders and doughderas in the garden -- the first  probably 
represents oleanders, but what's the second?>>

I went back to the "Ozzy Digest" archives for September 1997, when EMERALD  
CITY was the BCF. Our own David Hulan touched on at least one of those  
unfamiliar terms at the time:

<<My parents always used "nabisco" as the name for what I think  are
technically called "Nabisco sugar wafers" - the kind of cookie where each
side looks like a mini-waffle, with a very sugary filling in between.
They'd certainly make up into a wheelbarrow fairly well. I'm not sure that
Baum had the same usage in mind, but I thought I'd throw it in.>>

John W. Kennedy, however, had a different answer:

<<[Nabisco] certainly is not a common noun:  it stands for "National 
BiscuitCompany", and if EC were published today, Nabisco's lawyers would be
screaming bloody murder.  I'm pretty certain that "a nabisco" would
refer to a saltine, which makes sense for the wheelbarrow.>>

Then I did a Google search, and actually found a definitive answer on zuzus. 
Zuzus (or Zu Zus?) were ginger snaps made by Nabisco. See this image:

As for the graham gems/twins, I found the following passage at 

*********
In English cookbooks, sugar cookies were known by many names, most often: 
jumbal, jumble, jambal, jemelloe, gemmel. Jumbals were hard sugar biscuits. They 
were baked thick and hard to make them suitable for journeys and could be 
stored for about a year. They were also typically twisted into knots, presumably 
to make them a little easier to break and eat. The primary differences between 
English sugar cookies and their continental counterparts

  were the
spices, use of nuts (lacking in English versions), and shapes.

"Jumbles...sometimes called knots, a type of biscuit popular in the 17th and 18th
centuries. They were made from a light mixture of butter, sugar, eggs, and flour,
flavoured with rosewater and aniseed or caraway seed. The mixture was made into thin
rolls and shaped into rounds or knots before baking; the name derives from gemmel,
twin, here referring to a couble intertwined finger ring."
---Oxford Companion to Food, Alan Davidson [Oxford University Press:Oxford] 1999 (p. 423)

*********

That seems to tie in pretty well with what Baum was writing. I was unable to figure
out what kind of plant or flower that Baum was punning on with "doughderas."

Atticus Gannaway

Date: Sat, 23 Oct 2004 16:23:56 EDT
From: AGannaway7 at aol.com
To: regalia at pauahtun.org
Subject: [Regalia] EMERALD CITY online sleuthing P.S.

I tried Googling various words that rhyme with "doughdera," and hit on  
"rhodera," which seemed to relate to rhododendrons. But it may be a typo for  
"rhodora," which is an actual flower and the subject of a poem by Emerson (whom  
Baum quoted in his QUEER VISITORS FROM THE MARVELOUS LAND OF OZ comic strips,  
specifically the episode in which the visitors meet Santa Claus). The poem is  
online here:

Atticus Gannaway