Day 1 - Pajuka & Mombi meet again in afternoon - Snip kidnaped - night in forest
  General Whiffenpuff leaves for Emerald City at night
Day 2 - Snip & party encounter weenix around noon, meet Hoopers, cross sea
  - Catty Corners - they travel at night until Mombi throws Snip down well
Day 3 - Snip arrives in Blankenburg - he is awakened by Blanks about 9 AM - he meets 
  ora and the golden feather flies off - Dorothy leaves Perhaps City ("On the
  same bright morning that the golden goose feather had come flashing down into Ozma's
  garden") - she visits America, brings Humpy to life, returns, meets Kabumpo -
  Ozma left a message by Pajuka's feather at breakfast - she & court wished to
  Morrow - Dorothy's & Snip's parties meet around noon - rendezvous (with Mombi
  & Pajuka) at Palace in afternoon - Ozma & Co. arrive in EC two hours after
  Kabumpo's party - Pastoria disenchanted - abdication 
Day 4 - Parade in honor of the King of Oz - Mombi extinguished - Snip leaves for
  Kimbaloo with General Whiffenpuff, Invisible Cook & Kabumpo after lunch

Note: According to the text, Pajuka's penfeather does not actually leave Snip's grasp
until the same morning that Snip arrives in Blankenburg. Since the text states that
"it was morning and nearly nine o'clock" before Snip woke up in Blankenburg
and lost the feather, we must assume that Ozma breakfasted rather late that day.

From: "Nathan Mulac DeHoff" <xornom at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 12-29-99
Date: Thu, 30 Dec 1999 23:21:06 GMT
 
And, speaking of the Wizard's characterization, David also wrote:
 >>Least Fav. Oz Character and why? Depends on what you mean. Mooj, >Wutz,
 >>and the Erbs are the characters I'd least like to encounter. Thompson's
 >>version of the Wizard is probably the worst-executed character in >the
 >>books, in that he's on-stage a fair bit and acts badly most of the >time
 >>when he is, contrary to Baum's characterization of him (at least >after
 >>the >first book).
 
Mooj does seem to be one of the more sinister Oz villains, from the little
we've seen of him.  As for the Wizard thing, I was actually going to bring
that up as part of the _Lost King_ discussion, as that seems to be the first
book in which the distinctly Thompsonian Wizard plays a major part.  I might
as well do that now, since it will probably be time for _Lost King_
discussion when the next Digest arrives.
 
The Wizard, as Thompson presents him, tends to be very jealous and
competitive.  Note that, during _Lost King_, he doesn't want the Morrow
mystery solved without his help, and ends up bringing everyone to a strange
place without thinking ahead.  His competitive side is best demonstrated
when he is trying to achieve the same ends as another magic worker (most
notably Jinnicky in _Purple Prince_ and Waddy in _Speedy_).  This new side
to the Wizard is interesting, but maybe not quite in line with what Baum had
originally intended.  Why the change?  Well, Thompson was clearly working
from elements in _Land_ when she wrote _Lost King_, and perhaps her change
in the Wizard was so that he would be more believable as the one who brought
Ozma to Mombi (as explained in _Land_).  Another possibility is that
Thompson just didn't write humble, resourceful straight men all that well.
Note that Baum's two major examples of this character type, the Shaggy Man
and Cap'n Bill, were only mentioned in passing throughout the entire
nineteen Thompson Oz books.
 
I'll probably have more thoughts on _Lost King_ before the next Digest is
sent out.  It's really one of my favorite Thompson titles, and I have a lot
to say about it.
 
Nathan

From: "Nathan Mulac DeHoff" <xornom at hotmail.com>
Subject: The Lost King of Oz (SPOILERS)
Date: Fri, 31 Dec 1999 02:12:07 GMT
 
Just a few more comments to add some fuel to the upcoming _Lost King_
discussion:
 
One part that I found fairly disturbing was that the Kimbles seemed to have
no problem with eating a talking goose.  The books are never too clear on
where the meat in Oz comes from, but I think this is the only case in which
people are actually willing to have a sentient animal killed for food.  Note
that Snip is not surprised to find that the proposed dinner can talk, only
to find that it recognizes Mombi, and knows that she enchanted the King.
 
In Chapter 1, Thompson states that "[t]here are no stores in Oz."  This not
only contradicts many other books, but also other information in _Lost
King_.  First of all, Mombi threatens to turn Snip to sixpence and spend him
at the next village.  True, this doesn't necessarily mean that there are any
stores there, but it seems likely.  The more conclusive proof that this
statement is unfounded occurs in Blankenburg, where Tora has a tailor SHOP.
 
Really, most of the "no whatever in Oz" statements are contradicted at some
point in the series, often BEFORE the statement appears.  To give just a few
examples:
 
A few Baum books (as well as Thompson's _Royal Book_) state that the
Sawhorse is the only horse in Oz, which seems unlikely given the information
in the first two books.  While no real horses actually appear in those
books, there are several hints that the Ozites are familiar with the
animals.  When fed oatmeal during _Wizard_, the Cowardly Lion remarks that
oats are food for horses, not lions.  Tip recognizes the Sawhorse as a
horse, and the person who created the wooden equine must also have known
what a horse looks like.  Still, the fact that the Emerald City-ites have no
idea what to feed a horse in _Dorothy and the Wizard_ seems plausible.  It
isn't that there are no horses in Oz, just none in the Emerald City area.
Note that Oz was isolated in the reign of the Wizard, and probably continued
to be that way during the early years of Ozma's reign.  My guess is that
there had been horses in the outlying regions of Oz, but they were very rare
in the more central regions.  Note that there are many horses in Thompson's
books, but most of them tend to live in more remote regions of Oz.  Once
these more remote Oz regions were discovered by Ozma, however, horses were
probably introduced into the more central regions.  In Neill's books, they
seem to be fairly common throughout the country, and there are also mules.
 
Really, I think that this idea can explain some of the other
generalizations.  For instance, consider the money problem.  In _Road_, the
Tin Woodman states that there is no money in Oz, but we see currency used in
later books.  This is most common in Thompson's works, but it is also used
in Jinxland during _Scarecrow_.  I think it is likely that, while one
inhabitant of the Emerald City might well perform a service for his
neighbors without being paid, a merchant coming in from Jinxland or another
outlying kingdom, located nowhere near the Royal Storehouses mentioned in
_Emerald City_, would prefer an immediate material reward.
 
Two of the odder generalizations, which really can't be explained away in
that manner, occur when Baum states that Toto is the first dog in Oz, and
Billina the first chicken.  _Wizard_ places both a hen and a rooster in the
Emerald City, and _Land_ puts a green dog in that same city.  Thompson's
statement that there are no ferries in Oz (found in _Royal Book_) is also
strange, considering that there had been ferries in both _Land_ and _Lost
Princess_.
 
Okay, that's all I have to say at the moment.  Sorry for the multiple posts,
but I'm having trouble writing everything all at once.  Maybe I should hold
off on more _Lost King_ comments until the discussion officially starts.
 
Nathan

Date: Sun, 02 Jan 2000 14:58:09 -0800
From: Dave Hardenbrook <DaveH47 at mindspring.com>
Subject: Ozzy Things
 
At 02:12 AM 12/31/99 +0000, Nathan wrote:
 >In Chapter 1, Thompson states that "[t]here are no stores in Oz."  This
 >not only contradicts many other books, but also other information in _Lost
 >King_.
 
If she *had* to say anything on the subject, she should have said "there are
*few* stores in Oz"... "All" and "no" are dangerous words!  :)
 
                 -- Dave

Date: Mon, 03 Jan 2000 15:26:10 +1100
From: Gehan <calamity at eureka.lk>
Subject: The Lost King of Oz & other Ozzy Things SPOILERS
 
I think we should be able to start 'Lost King of Oz' discussions, now that
almost everyone has finished with the Ozzy Survey I created. 'Lost King' is
one of my fav. RPT books, along with 'Kabumpo in Oz' 'Cowardly Lion' 'Hungry
Tiger' and 'Wishing Horse'. I think the dialogue is the BEST feature in this
book.....Its betetr than ANY RPT Book I've EVER read, IMO, but the
characters/plotlines/inicidents/ending/adventures are really interesting
too. However, I dont like the way RPT keeps disenchanting everyone. Here's a
list of characters she's disenchanted:
 
The Scarecrow/Chang Wang Woe(she ALMOST disenchanted him) Peg Amy
Urtha the Flowery Princess/Princess of Perhaps City Tora the Tailor/King Pastoria
The forest maiden/Princess from 'The Giant Horse of Oz' Tattypoo/Queen Orin
Sir Hokus/Prince of Corumbia
 
There are many more in other books, which I cant quite place my finger on. I
personally dont like her iedia of enchanting and DISenchanting people,
because it CAN get quite annoying at times.....especially if the character
was one fo your favourites.....It must be a habit of hers. The whole
Tattypoo/Orin theory doesnt fit in with the Oz Books, and the Sir
Hokus/Prince of Corumbia theory totally contradicts 'The Royal Book of Oz'.
I also dont like the way she makes people forget their past whenever they're
transformed.
 
Just my two cents....
 
~Gehan~

Date: Mon, 03 Jan 2000 15:26:14 +1100
From: Gehan <calamity at eureka.lk>
Subject: More Ozzy Things
 
Tyler:
I also think that Dorothy is 11-12, Betsy is 12-13 and Trot is 7-10. My own
chronology chain for the Oz Books are:
1897 - The Wizard of Oz (I assume that Dorothy was 7+)
1898 - The Land of Oz
1899 - Ozma of Oz (Dorothy is 9)
1900 - Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz (Dorothy is 10)
1901 - The Road to Oz & The Emerald City of Oz (Dorothy is 11 and a half)
1902 - Little Wizard Stories of Oz & The Sea Fairies (Trot is 8)
1903 - The Patchwork Girl of Oz & Sky Island (Trot is 9)
1904 - Tiktok of Oz, The Scarecrow of Oz & Rinkitink in Oz (Trot is 10 and Betsy is 12)
1905 - The Lost Princess of Oz & The Tinwoodman of Oz
1906 - The Magic of Oz & Glinda of Oz
1907 - The Royal Book of Oz, Kabumpo in Oz & The Cowardly Lion of Oz
1908 - Grampa in Oz, The Lost King of Oz & The Hungry Tiger of Oz
1909 - The Gnome King of Oz & The Giant Horse of Oz
 
If 'Gaint Horse' took place around the time RPT wrote the story, no way
could Orin have been enchanted and turned into Tattypoo 25 years ago since
then, as Dorothy herself came to Oz over 25 years ago since 'Giant Horse'
and she met Tattypoo. So I place 'Giant Horse' in 1909 because Orin was
supposed to have been transformed into Tattypoo 25 years ago since the time
the story took place, and the Wizard himself states in 'Dotwiz' that when he
came to Oz, there were two good witches ruled the North and South, and two
bad witches ruled the East and the West. Well perhaps Mombi DID rule the
NORTH at the time he came to Oz, yet he didnt want to even MENTION her,
because he was guilty of handing baby Ozma over to her. I believe that the
Wizard left Ozma in Mombi's care AFTER Tattypoo banished her(or Tattypoo
would have disenchanted Tip when she came to Mombi's hut and chased her
away), so according to MY own HACC, this would be around 1884-1885. This
would mean that Tip would be around 13-14 by 'Land of Oz', if it DID take
place in 1898 as I say, and that seems to fit in well enough since Baum
identifies him as a 'youth' and not a 'little boy', and Ozma herself is
supposed to be about 13-14.
 
I also think that although the wicked witches conquered the four countries
BEFORE the Wizard came to Oz, Mombi didnt turn King Pastoria into a tailor
untill AFTER the Wizard came to Oz, though she may have turned Pajuka into a
goose before. I believe that King Pastoria and his queen were hiding at
Morrow, during the Wizard's reign. Here's MOPPET from then:
 
King Pastoria's wife gave birth to Ozma around 1883-1885 since Ozma was a
baby when the Wizard left her with Mombi, around the same time. However,
Mombi found out Pastoria's hiding place in Morrow at the same time that Ozma
was born, and though she threw Pastoria down a well, his queen ran away to
the Wizard with her baby Ozma, and perhaps she explained to him who she was,
and died soon after, leaving Ozma in the Wizard's care, who promptly handed
her over to Mombi, afraid that she will realise that he was only a humbug
wizard when she was a little older. And Mombi was only too glad, because
she'd had been looking for Ozma since her mother ran away with her.
You may wonder how Ozma says she was with Lurline's fairy band a thousand
years ago, if she was born in 188?. Simple! Lurline could have de-aged Ozma
back to a little baby and injected her into King Pastoria's wife's womb, as
most Oz fans believe.
 
Thats ONLY MY theory anyway.....It maybe too complicated for you to
understand....
 
~Gehan~

Date: Mon, 3 Jan 00 10:35:10 CST
From: "Ruth Berman" <berma005 at maroon.tc.umn.edu>
Subject: lost king of oz
 
Some "Lost King" comments.  We've had a thread of discussion about
influence of Carroll on RPT.  This is one of the books where that
influence is especially clear.  The Backwoodsmen, with their back-talk
and backward locomotion are like the early chapters of "Through the
Looking Glass," although "back woods" is (I think) an Americanism.
Dorothy's sudden increase and decrease in size are like Alice's
(although caused differently and not happening more than once).
Snip's fall down the well into a country of unpleasant people with an
unpleasant queen and a set of peculiar laws is like Alice's fall down
the rabbithole.  There are also at least a couple of verbal echoes.
Snip, while falling, reflects, "After this I shall think nothing of falling
out of a button tree or down a flight of steps."  Alice's thought is "After
such a fall as this, I shall think nothing of tumbling downstairs!"  (But
RPT avoids the characteristically Carrollian turn where Alice goes on to
think that she wouldn't say anything about it even if she fell off a
house, and the narrative comments that that's very likely true.)
Dorothy, after getting back to her child-size, says, "I can't imagine
what's happened to me, but then everything is very queer lately."  This
resembles a couple of the things Alice says to the Caterpillar when
she has trouble explaining who she is: "I know who I _was_ when I got
up this morning, but I think I must have changed several times since
then" and, when the Caterpillar denies that changing into a butterfly
would be confusing, "All I know is, it would feel very queer to me."
The book also draws on Baum's stageplay of "The Wizard," in naming
the King Pastoria, and does an interesting job of extrapolating from
Baum's very brief mentions of how the witches did away with Ozma's
father to come up with the title character.
 
Happy new year,
Ruth Berman

Date: Mon, 3 Jan 00 14:47:38 CST
From: "Ruth Berman" <berma005 at maroon.tc.umn.edu>
Subject: generalizations in oz
 
Nathan DeHoff: Suggestion that RPT's Wizard reflects the comments
on him in "Land" -- interesting possibility.  Maybe also some reflection
of the Wizard as characterized in the stageplay? // Morality of eating a
talking goose -- a difficulty that runs through a lot of the Oz books,
starting with the Lion's disappearance into the woods in "Wizard" to
get food for himself the narrative refuses to specify.  It isn't clear if
Baum and his successors were just dodging this point entirely, or
were assuming (without wanting to specify) that carnivores in a
country like Oz must be morally able to eat intelligent prey (although
for omnivores the case would be less compelling).  In Lewis's Narnia
books, there is a sharp difference between Talking Beasts and
ordinary speechless, unintelligent beasts, but the Oz authors probably
weren't thinking along that line.
 
Dave Hardenbrook: "If she *had* to say anything on the subject she
should have said `there are *few* stores in Oz' -- well, RPT probably
did have to say _something_ on the subject.  Otherwise, she could
probably have expected some readers (perhaps the ones whose
parents ran stores?) to ask why Kimbaloo peddled their buttons
instead of sending them to stores to sell for them or setting up a store
in Kimbaloo and letting customers come to them.  As you and Nathan
comment, "few" would have been better than "no" in almost all the
generalizations of that sort scattered through the Oz books.  On the
other hand, it might be narratively awkward to stop and explain, "so
few that for practical purposes throughout Oz or at least in this section
of it it amounts to none," and just as awkward to omit explanation of
the "so few it doesn't matter" variety.  I'm inclined to suspect that
saying "no" and leaving a footnote of "well, almost none" to be
assumed by nitpickers like us is a better solution.  (Nathan suggested
that Tora's tailor shop itself contradicts the generalization, but I don't
think it can be really considered a "store."  He's selling a service rather
than a stock of "diversified goods for retail sale.")
 
Ruth Berman

Date: Mon, 03 Jan 2000 19:48:53 -0500
From: "John W. Kennedy" <rri0189 at attglobal.net>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-02-2000
 
Nathan Mulac DeHoff wrote:
 > In Chapter 1, Thompson states that "[t]here are no stores in Oz."  This not
 > only contradicts many other books, but also other information in _Lost
 > King_.  First of all, Mombi threatens to turn Snip to sixpence and spend him
 > at the next village.  True, this doesn't necessarily mean that there are any
 > stores there, but it seems likely.  The more conclusive proof that this
 > statement is unfounded occurs in Blankenburg, where Tora has a tailor SHOP.
 
I'm not sure that's a contradiction.  A "shop" is not necessarily a
"store".
 
--
-John W. Kennedy
-rri0189 at ibm.net
Compact is becoming contract
Man only earns and pays.  -- Charles Williams

Date: Tue, 04 Jan 2000 16:02:07 -0600
Subject: Oz
From: "David Godwin" <d.godwin at minn.net>
 
Lost King:
It's my feeling that RPT did a credible job of trying to fill in the details
about "whatever happened to Pastoria," but there are still unanswered
questions she did not address (such as how a fairy who has existed from the
beginning of the world can have an apparently human father) and she even
succeeds in creating more problems (such as where is Morrow and why haven't
we heard of it before - does it have that name just for the sake of a pun? -
as if she were opening a whole new world and mythos of which we have
heretofore heard nothing - and will hereafter hear nothing more). Anyway,
it's an improvement over the RPT books that came before. I think in my
sequential reading of the works of Ms. Thonpson, it was at about this point
that I began to reach the opinion that only Baum's books describe the "real"
Oz, and anything that came after that is merely a children's fantasy written
by someone who wasn't in the know the way LFB was.
 
- David G.

From: CruentiDei at cs.com
Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2000 00:30:03 EST
Subject: Oz
 
Gehan:
Ozma's history is a little muddled. I'll put Thompson's statement about her
living for almost a thousand years in th same drawer with her usual window
dressing. Since my goal is to create a Unified History of Oz, the current
answer that best satisfies the most books is that Ozma is a regular little
girl, but that Ozma's mother is at least part-fairy. Rumors, and other
fairies named Ozma, help to give her the illusion of eternity. Or possibly
she is a fusion, a fairy who has inhabited a mortal girl.
 
Age, experience and wisdom do not always go together, however. The president
of the company I work for is younger than several of the people there, but he
is the best programmer I have ever seen.
 
Nathan:
Money in Oz has been discussed before. I quote from myself from the Ozzy
Digest, March 17 - 23, 1999
 > Former Digester Eric Gjovaag wrote an excellent commentary about money in
 > an issue of the Baum Bugle. Essentially, he said that the value of money
 > had been depressed after Ozma ascended the throne. According to Eric,
 > Ozzies for the most part grow or make what they need, and trade for the
 > rest. Eric downplays the idea in _Emerald City_ that all items of
 > production are sent to the Emerald City for redistribution. However, money
 > remains in small amounts to fill in the gaps when things are slightly out
 > of balance.

From: "Nathan Mulac DeHoff" <xornom at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-04-2000
Date: Wed, 05 Jan 2000 06:16:57 GMT
 
Gehan:
 >However, I dont like the way RPT keeps disenchanting everyone. Here's a
 >list of characters she's disenchanted:
 >
 >The Scarecrow/Chang Wang Woe(she ALMOST disenchanted him)
 >Peg Amy
 >Urtha the Flowery Princess/Princess of Perhaps City
 >Tora the Tailor/King Pastoria
 >The forest maiden/Princess from 'The Giant Horse of Oz'
 >Tattypoo/Queen Orin
 >Sir Hokus/Prince of Corumbia
 >
 >There are many more in other books, which I cant quite place my finger on.
 >I
 >personally dont like her iedia of enchanting and DISenchanting people,
 >because it CAN get quite annoying at times.....especially if the character
 >was one fo your favourites.....It must be a habit of hers. The whole
 >Tattypoo/Orin theory doesnt fit in with the Oz Books, and the Sir
 >Hokus/Prince of Corumbia theory totally contradicts 'The Royal Book of Oz'.
 >I also dont like the way she makes people forget their past whenever
 >they're
 >transformed.
 
The Sir Hokus thing seems to be a change that even Thompson herself later
regretted.  Note that she makes a brief mention of Sir Hokus (not the Yellow
Knight) as being among the Emerald City celebrities trapped by Badmannah.
Of course, Neill also uses the old Sir Hokus in his books.  As for
Tattypoo/Orin, while I know that some Digesters are bothered by this change,
I don't know that it "doesn't fit in with the Oz Books."  Really, Baum
effectively discarded the character after his first few books, so I suppose
we can't fault Thompson too heavily for changing her.  Of course, Dave
Hardenbrook's main objection is that Thompson seemed to have a problem with
there being any main characters in Oz that weren't young, beautiful princes
or princesses.  The restoration of Urtha bothered me somewhat; I can't
exactly see why she would have wanted to give up her flower fairy form,
which had some distinct advantages (unless it was done so she could bear
children, but I doubt Thompson had that in mind).  Thompson DIDN'T change
the Scarecrow's form, and I don't really think that the criticism of Tora
being disenchanted is entirely valid, since the whole point of Tora was to
be the enchanted form of Pastoria (even the name reflects this, as Dorothy
points out within the text).  Transformation does seem to be a bit of an
over-used plot device within Thompson's books, though, and they're often
treated in much the same way.
 
 >1908 - Grampa in Oz, The Lost King of Oz & The Hungry Tiger of Oz
 
I don't really think this works for _Lost King_.  There wasn't a
fully-formed movie industry in Hollywood back in 1908, was there?
 
 >I also think that although the wicked witches conquered the four countries
 >BEFORE the Wizard came to Oz, Mombi didnt turn King Pastoria into a tailor
 >untill AFTER the Wizard came to Oz, though she may have turned Pajuka into
 >a
 >goose before.
 
In _Lost King_, Pajuka states that, after she transformed him, she sent him
away and enchanted the King.  My guess is that she did both transformations
in close succession.
 
Ruth Berman:
 >(Nathan suggested
 >that Tora's tailor shop itself contradicts the generalization, but I don't
 >think it can be really considered a "store."  He's selling a service rather
 >than a stock of "diversified goods for retail sale.")
 
That's true.  Are there any shops that would definitely be considered stores
within the Oz series?  The goods shop in _Jack Pumpkinhead_ strikes me as a
possible example, but that didn't appear until after _Lost King_.
 
Nathan

Date: Wed, 05 Jan 2000 18:45:32 +1100
From: Gehan <calamity at eureka.lk>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-04-2000
 
Ruth Berman and Enid Blyton:
Well, your right. RPT DOES adapt Lewis Carrol's iedias in several of her
books. I've also noticed her style of writing, and her way of using puns is
more of a 'British' style.....much like Lewis Carrol and Enid Blyton(who
would have made a SPLENDID Oz Historian, as she is the world's BEST
children's author. If she wrote any Oz Books, the Books will be famous RIGHT
THROUGHOUT the world, I'm sure.....She's very popular in SriLanka and many
Asian/Diverse countries.....Her stories have also been translated into many
diverse languages, so I'm sure she would have been a SPLENDID Oz Author, as
she has a VERY VERY vivid imagination, as clearly seen in her fairy stories.
 
~Gehan~

Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2000 14:38:50 -0500 (EST)
From: <sahutchi at iupui.edu>
cc: Dave Hardenbrook <DaveH47 at mindspring.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-04-2000
 
Gehan:
 > You may wonder how Ozma says she was with Lurline's fairy band a thousand
 > years ago, if she was born in 188?. Simple! Lurline could have de-aged Ozma
 > back to a little baby and injected her into King Pastoria's wife's womb, as
 > most Oz fans believe.

I think your last phrase is an overstatement.  It was Melody Grandy's idea
and there may be many who agree with her, but (particularly if we count
all those NOT on the digest), "most" is probably wrong.
 
 > The book also draws on Baum's stageplay of "The Wizard," in naming
 > the King Pastoria, and does an interesting job of extrapolating from
 > Baum's very brief mentions of how the witches did away with Ozma's
 > father to come up with the title character.

Pastoria was, of course, mentioned in Land.
 
Scarecrow:  "But isn't Pastoria dead and gone?"
Glinda:  "That is the popular belief."
 
I think RPT was going on this.
 
 > were assuming (without wanting to specify) that carnivores in a
 > country like Oz must be morally able to eat intelligent prey (although
 > for omnivores the case would be less compelling).  In Lewis's Narnia
 > books, there is a sharp difference between Talking Beasts and
 > ordinary speechless, unintelligent beasts, but the Oz authors probably
 > weren't thinking along that line.

I thought there was an implication that they got meat that grows on trees,
like the lunch pail trees, only different.  Or perhaps that's unique to
Ooogaboo.
 
Scott

Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2000 18:47:56 -0500
From: "J. L. Bell" <JnoLBell at compuserve.com>
Subject: our goose is cooked
 
Gehan Cooray wrote:
<<I dont like the way RPT keeps disenchanting everyone. Here's a list of
characters she's disenchanted:

         The Scarecrow/Chang Wang Woe(she ALMOST disenchanted him)
         Peg Amy
         Urtha the Flowery Princess/Princess of Perhaps City
         Tora the Tailor/King Pastoria
         The forest maiden/Princess from 'The Giant Horse of Oz'
         Tattypoo/Queen Orin
         Sir Hokus/Prince of Corumbia

There are many more in other books>>
 
There are indeed. Note that in each of these cases the person is
disenchanted into royalty, and in many an old or unusual person is changed
into a young and traditionally beautiful one. If Thompson had kept writing,
I half suspect, there would be far fewer ordinary-looking middle-aged
commoners left in Oz, and lots more princes and princesses.
 
Nathan DeHoff wrote:
<<The Wizard, as Thompson presents him, tends to be very jealous and
competitive.  Note that, during _Lost King_, he doesn't want the Morrow
mystery solved without his help, and ends up bringing everyone to a strange
place without thinking ahead.  His competitive side is best demonstrated
when he is trying to achieve the same ends as another magic worker (most
notably Jinnicky in _Purple Prince_ and Waddy in _Speedy_).  This new side
to the Wizard is interesting, but maybe not quite in line with what Baum
had originally intended.  Why the change?  Well, Thompson was clearly
working from elements in _Land_ when she wrote _Lost King_, and perhaps her
change in the Wizard was so that he would be more believable as the one who
brought Ozma to Mombi (as explained in _Land_).  Another possibility is
that Thompson just didn't write humble, resourceful straight men all that
well. Note that Baum's two major examples of this character type, the
Shaggy Man and Cap'n Bill, were only mentioned in passing throughout the
entire nineteen Thompson Oz books.>>
 
I think the best explanation for the Wizard's lack of foresight in LOST
KING is not that's he feel "jealous" [as Thompson states on 111], but that
he feels *guilty* about his role in interrupting the Pastorian dynasty. He
"did not like to recall the part he had played in the affair at all" [120].
"He always felt uneasy and unhappy when the old witch [Mombi] was
mentioned" [119], and indeed he starts acting "nervously" [113] and
"uneasily" [114] shortly after the Scarecrow mentions Morrow, a kingdom the
Wizard "remembered...perfectly" [111]. He desperately wants to atone for
his earlier wrong by finding Pastoria, so much so that he stops thinking as
well as he usually does.

         The Wizard indeed shows a jealous streak later when he's working
alongside Jinnicky and Waddy. It seems significant that he's working
*alongside* them; the stakes in the rivalry are simply bragging rights
because they're not trying to defeat each other. In Baum's books, as in
Neill's and others, the Wizard's pride in his magic and pleasure in his
audiences are clear. But why don't we see that competitiveness in Baum's
stories? Perhaps because the Wizard never meets a *male* magic-worker who's
a friendly rival. Dr. Pipt is quickly rendered powerless, and Ugu, Kiki
Aru, and various Imps and Nomes are enemies. The Wizard seems to accept
being second to Glinda and (in a different way) Ozma, but he may well feel
competitive toward another man. It's a boy thing.

         You make a very good point about Thompson not using Shaggy and
Cap'n Bill. Another mature male she almost never takes on an adventure is
the Tin Woodman (he has a role in OZOPLANING because of tradition and
marketing, and injects the only clear dose of Oz into ENCHANTED ISLAND).
Baum got some good laughs out of all those men and their quirks, but their
personalities didn't lend themselves to Thompson's more knockabout form of
comedy, in which most men are just bearded kids.
 
On the question of money in LOST KING, Thompson seems ambivalent about the
issue. She makes clear references to money and shops, but she also keeps
trying to present the economy as quaintly non-commercial.

         Kinda Jolly "had made a great fortune in buttons" [13], and Rosa
Merry "almost as much of a fortune in bouquets" [14--a lady mustn't earn
more than her husband!]. These fortunes are amassed in "coins" [17]. Yet,
as Nathan DeHoff noted, in this same section Thompson also declares, "There
are no stores in Oz" [16].

         The king's purchase of his dinner similarly points in all
directions. Kinda Jolly "had been to market" [37--see also Mombi's "market
woman" comment on 59], but Pajuka "had come straight from a neighboring
farm" [21]. The king doesn't seem to buy the goose with his coins because
he reports, "Cost me a thousand gold buttons" [38].

         The economic picture seems clearer when the scene shifts to the
Emerald City. (Blankenburg clearly isn't a free market.) Pastoria declares
he'll open "the finest tailoring shop in Oz," and for several chapters he's
been planning suits for Snip, Dorothy, and his other friends. "I'll make
you *all* suits," he promises his new friends [273]. And all this is
gratis, as life in the capital of Oz usually is.
 
Nathan DeHoff wrote:
<<I found fairly disturbing...that the Kimbles seemed to have
no problem with eating a talking goose. . . . Note that Snip is not
surprised to find that the proposed dinner can talk, only to find that it
recognizes Mombi, and knows that she enchanted the King.>>
 
Snip also "had a feeling that there was something human about" this goose
[21]. That seems to be Thompson's way of reassuring us that formerly human
geese are different from natural, edible geese. Which is not to say I feel
very reassured.
 
Gehan Cooray wrote:
<<I also think ...Mombi didnt turn King Pastoria into a tailor untill AFTER
the Wizard came to Oz, though she may have turned Pajuka into a goose
before.>>
 
****SPOILER**** The two men are disenchanted simultaneously when Snip
throws the robe around Tora and says, "I command you to resume your natural
shape!" [267] To me that implies their transformations were part of the
same spell, and thus happened together.

         Pajuka has testified, "we were in a small greenwood...when you
changed me to a goose. But as you drove me a way immediately, I never knew
what became of the King." That might imply separate spells except that
Mombi immediately concluded, "Then it was green magic!" [51] That indicates
certainty that she'd transformed Pastoria on the same occasion when she'd
enchanted Pajuka. Otherwise, she wouldn't have been so sure it was in the
same place.
 
Gehan Cooray wrote:
<<Lurline could have de-aged Ozma back to a little baby and injected her
into King Pastoria's wife's womb, as most Oz fans believe.>>
 
There's no evidence that "most Oz fans" believe this, or even believe
Pastoria had a wife. She's certainly never mentioned in LOST KING. You
don't accept Snow's story of Ozma's adoption in MAGICAL MIMICS, as I
recall, but that's still a common canonical starting-point for the question
of Ozma's parentage.
 
J. L. Bell                  JnoLBell at compuserve.com

From: CruentiDei at cs.com
Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2000 21:35:28 EST
Subject: Oz
 
Gehan:
People forgetting their past when transformed might be part of the
enchantment. This would help assure the spellcaster that the transformation
would be permanent. The victim would never know to get "un-enchanted" and
friends and family would look in vain for the victim.
 
Tyler Jones

Date: Thu, 6 Jan 2000 13:37:50 -0600
From: David Hulan <davidhulan at ntsource.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-02 & 04-2000
 
01-02:
Nathan:
I agree with your remarks about Thompson's version of the Wizard - this is
particularly true in _Lost King_ and _Purple Prince_, less so in
_Ozoplaning_. I'm not sure about Thompson's inability to write humble,
resourceful straight men, though. Grampa, Tora, Benny (not exactly a man,
but I think he qualifies), Sir Hokus, and Captain Salt all seem to fall
into the same general character class as the post-Land Baum Wizard, Cap'n
Bill, and Shaggy Man. And they're all pretty well done.
 
 >One part that I found fairly disturbing was that the Kimbles seemed to have
 >no problem with eating a talking goose.  The books are never too clear on
 >where the meat in Oz comes from, but I think this is the only case in which
 >people are actually willing to have a sentient animal killed for food.
 
Well, maybe, onstage. We might dismiss Jinjur's threat to have the
Woggle-bug turned into turtle soup as a joke, but there's a reference in
_Wishing Horse_ to Pigasus's having been captured by a farmer at one point
with an eye to fattening him to eat.
 
I concur with your analysis of the "there are no..." things in Oz.
Virtually all, if not all, of those statements are presumably only true for
limited areas of Oz, and possibly only for limited periods of time.
(Perhaps an epizootic wiped out all the chickens in Oz, or at least the EC
area, between _Wizard_ and _Ozma_? We know that chickens could die of
disease as late as just before EC, since one of Billina's had done so since
she'd last seen Dorothy.)
 
01-04:
Gehan:
Who's the forest maiden/Princess from _Giant Horse_ who's disenchanted? I
don't recall any such, though maybe I'm forgetting - must be a very minor
character if so. You left out Marygolden, who gets disenchanted _twice_ in
_Yellow Knight_, and Ruggedo, who's disenchanted in _Handy Mandy_ - one
probably shouldn't count all the ones who are enchanted and then
disenchanted in the course of the same book in _Pirates_, _Purple Prince_,
and _Ojo_. And I probably haven't remembered them all.
 
I agree with you about Tip's age, by the way. He seems rather too
interested in the pretty girls in Jinjur's army for a 10-11 year old boy of
the turn of the last century.
 
Comments on _Lost King_:
I reread this one long enough ago (not long after the _Grampa_ discussion
started to peter out) that I've forgotten a lot of detailed comments that I
might otherwise have made. (I didn't take notes.) I thought this the best
of Thompson's early books the first time I read through the series as a kid
and I haven't changed my mind in the course of many rereadings as an adult.
Not until _Yellow Knight_ did she approach the same level of quality again,
though most of her books after that (except for _Ozoplaning_) were as good
or better.
 
One point I remember I disagree with is her placing Trot's home in San
Francisco. Maybe RPT never read _Sky Island_, but it's clear from that book
that Trot didn't live in a city; in fact, she didn't even live in a village
but a mile or more from the nearest settlement, and that was only a
village. It might be that she lived on the SF peninsula, but the
description of her home sounds to me more like the Southern California
coast of Orange or San Diego counties. In _Glass Cat_ I placed her near
Laguna Beach, but I'd accept anywhere from just north of San Diego to just
south of Morro Bay, or from Monterey to Marin County, as long as it wasn't
in the LA or San Francisco conurbations. (There's clearly a seaport nearby,
so I don't think it's anywhere between Morro Bay and Monterey, or north of
Marin.) It also has to be somewhere where there are cliffs of moderate
height and offshore islands readily visible from them, but there are quite
a few places like that along the California coast. Laguna Beach happens to
fit the description quite well, but it's not the only place that does.
 
Incidentally, if Trot really had told Dorothy about movies then it seems
unlikely that _Scarecrow_ should be placed as early as 1904, as Gehan did
in his chronology. I know that movies were around that early, but I don't
think they'd be found in a village. Of course, Trot may just have heard
about them and not seen them herself.
 
Dorothy's sudden growth spurt is an interesting phenomenon; the hard part
to explain is why there was what seems to have been about an hour's lag
between her arrival back in California and her suddenly starting to grow.
 
David Hulan

Date: Thu, 06 Jan 00 12:59:18 (PST)
From: Dave Hardenbrook <DaveH47 at mindspring.com>
Subject: Ozzy Things
 
OZMA:
Scott quoted from _Land_:
 >Scarecrow:  "But isn't Pastoria dead and gone?"
 >Glinda:  "That is the popular belief."
 
At least Baum left the door open for himself and his successors by leaving
it as a "popular belief"...
 
                              -- Dave

From: "Nathan Mulac DeHoff" <xornom at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-06-2000
Date: Thu, 06 Jan 2000 23:46:37 GMT
 
Tyler:
 >Ozma's history is a little muddled. I'll put Thompson's statement >about
 >her living for almost a thousand years in th same drawer with her usual
 > >window dressing.
 
I believe that, in _Pirates_, Thompson mentions both Ruggedo and Ato as
being 1000 years old.  That might just be her way of saying that they've
lived a long time.
 
 >Since my goal is to create a Unified History of Oz, the current answer that
 >best satisfies the most books is that Ozma is a regular >little girl, but
 >that Ozma's mother is at least part-fairy.
 
Is there any reason why her father couldn't be part-fairy?  That would
certainly explain why the Blankenburg water didn't work on him, since,
according to the Wizard in _Lost Princess_, fairies can't be made invisible
against their will.
 
Kenneth:
 >Note: According to the text, Pajuka's penfeather does not actually >leave
 >Snip's grasp until the same morning that Snip arrives in Blankenburg.
 > >Since the text states that "it was morning and nearly nine o'clock"
 >before >Snip woke up in Blankenburg and lost the feather, we must assume
 >that Ozma breakfasted rather late that day.
 
Another strange thing about that day was that, right around the time that
Pajuka's feather left Snip, Tora's ears told him that an elephant had
carried off a little girl.  Dorothy didn't meet up with Kabumpo until after
her encounter with the Scooters, however, and one of them mentioned that it
was eleven o'clock.  It should have been before nine, I suppose, but
Thompson might not have checked too carefully.  I suppose that the Scooters
could easily have been incorrect about the time; after all, they didn't have
any clocks.
 
J. L. Bell:
 >The economic picture seems clearer when the scene shifts to the Emerald
 >City. (Blankenburg clearly isn't a free market.) Pastoria >declares he'll
 >open "the finest tailoring shop in Oz," and for several >chapters he's been
 >planning suits for Snip, Dorothy, and his other friends. "I'll >make you
 >*all* suits," he promises his new friends [273]. And all this is gratis, as
 >life in the capital of Oz usually is.
 
The only time I can think of when money was clearly used in the Emerald City
itself was in _Forbidden Fountain_.
 
David Hulan:
 >Well, maybe, onstage. We might dismiss Jinjur's threat to have the
 >Woggle-bug turned into turtle soup as a joke, but there's a reference >in
 >_Wishing Horse_ to Pigasus's having been captured by a farmer at one >point
 >with an eye to fattening him to eat.
 
That's true.  I had forgotten about that.  I suppose that Thompson never
clearly stated that the capture had occurred in Oz (it could have been in Ev
back when Pigasus lived with Jinnicky, I guess), but it seems likely.
 
 >Who's the forest maiden/Princess from _Giant Horse_ who's >disenchanted? I
 >don't recall any such, though maybe I'm forgetting - must be a very >minor
 >character if so.
 
Definitely a very minor character, the disenchantment of the forest maiden
is mentioned very briefly when Thompson is describing Tattypoo's good deeds.
 
Nathan

Date: Thu, 6 Jan 2000 19:25:13 -0500
From: "J. L. Bell" <JnoLBell at compuserve.com>
Subject: time, dinner, time for dinner
 
Kenneth R. Shepherd provided his usual handy chronology:
<<******WARNING: SPOILERS FOR "LOST KING" ********
Day 1 - Pajuka & Mombi meet again in afternoon - Snip kidnaped - night in
forest - General Whiffenpuff leaves for Emerald City at night
Day 2 - Snip & party encounter weenix around noon, meet Hoopers, cross sea
- Catty Corners - they travel at night until Mombi throws Snip down well
Day 3 - Snip arrives in Blankenburg - he is awakened by Blanks about 9 AM -
he meets Tora and the golden feather flies off - Dorothy leaves Perhaps
City ("On the same bright morning that the golden goose feather had come
flashing down into Ozma's garden") - she visits America, brings Humpy to
life, returns, meets Kabumpo - Ozma left a message by Pajuka's feather at
breakfast - she & court wished to Morrow - Dorothy's & Snip's parties meet
around noon - rendezvous (with Mombi & Pajuka) at Palace in afternoon -
Ozma & Co. arrive in EC two hours after Kabumpo's party - Pastoria
disenchanted - abdication
Day 4 - Parade in honor of the King of Oz - Mombi extinguished - Snip
leaves for Kimbaloo with General Whiffenpuff, Invisible Cook & Kabumpo
after lunch
         Note: According to the text, Pajuka's penfeather does not actually
leave Snip's grasp until the same morning that Snip arrives in Blankenburg.
Since the text states that "it was morning and nearly nine o'clock" before
Snip woke up in Blankenburg and lost the feather, we must assume that Ozma
breakfasted rather late that day.>>
 
I was looking forward to this report because there's a chronological twist
to LOST KING I couldn't figure out. Tora hears from his left ear "that an
elephant has run off with a little girl" [179]--which seems to be a
reference to Kabumpo and Dorothy in the previous chapter [171].

         That implies that all of chapters 10-12 take place before nine
o'clock on that fateful morning, which is about when Tora's ears are
winging their way back to him. Dorothy has to take leave of her friends in
Perhaps City, make her way down "the steep mountain path" [127--also
remember Percy's difficult departure in GRAMPA], find the Wish Way, go to
Hollywood, bring Humpy to life, bring him back to Oz, escape the
Backwoodsmen, meet the Scooters, and find Kabumpo, all before 9:00 AM. I
think the only way Dorothy could do those impossible things before Ozma's
breakfast is if time itself ran backwards. But that may be what happens in
the Back Woods.

         Trying to make her timing work might be why Thompson has Snip go to
sleep right after his arrival outside Blankenburg [175]. She asks us to
believe that Snip's terrifying fall and ride through the Well-come didn't
leave his heart racing--he quickly falls asleep. After a quick glance to
confirm "no immediate danger" in the woods, the boy supposedly feels safer
sleeping there than seeking a bed in the nearby town. This episode might
have been more realistic--but perhaps too scary--if Snip had blacked out as
he hit Blankenburg, from fear or a bump on the head.

         Two more chronological mysteries: Tora says that he "came to
Blankenburg" shortly *before* the queen (name given as both Vanette and
Vanetta) discovered the water that rendered her and her subjects invisible
[192-3]. That implies the people who would be blank were already living in
a town called Blankenburg--mighty convenient.

         Also, Ozma remembers the Morrow hunting lodge as "where we used to
hide from Mombi when I was a little girl!" [119] But LAND told us she'd
been kidnapped as a baby, before the age of clear memory. And wouldn't she
remember Mombi more clearly as the nasty guardian who'd reared her?
Nevertheless, when Ozma sees Mombi, she shows no especial reaction [253],
unless we count her later willingness to "finish her once and forever!
[278--more about that to come.]

         And one chronometer mystery: Humpy has "a dollar watch" [249]. Why
would a studio equip a dummy with a watch, especially when he was supposed
to be falling for a medieval king? Shades of SPARTACUS!
 
Finally, a few more remarks on the issue of eating talking animals. Snip
actually seems to go through a change of heart on this issue. As Nathan
DeHoff noted, at first he seems comfortable thinking of Pajuka as dinner.
But on the night after their departure he starts "dreaming he, himself, was
a goose being chased up a pink mountain by a giant with a blue ax" [56].
Leaving aside the breast imagery, Thompson seems to imply that the boy's
starting to see dinner from the dinner's perspective.

         Snip's philosophical transformation seems complete when he deems
the cats of Catty Corners "hateful" because they eat gold fish out of their
ponds [85].

         In addition, Pajuka is said to be "embarrassed" at what he's eating
from the bottom of a stream besides water roots [65]. Those dainties are
presumably live snails, worms, and other creatures geese eat. It's unclear
whether Pajuka feels ashamed because those creatures are *not* what prime
ministers eat, or because he knows that civilized Ozians feed off breakfast
bushes instead of off each other.
 
J. L. Bell                  JnoLBell at compuserve.com

Date: Fri, 07 Jan 2000 08:41:11 +1100
From: Gehan <calamity at eureka.lk>
Subject: Ozzy Things
 
Nathan:
 >I don't really think this works for _Lost King_.  There wasn't a
 >fully-formed movie industry in Hollywood back in 1908, was there?

  Perhaps there was, IF Oz was placed in an exact replica of earth, as Dave
believes. And there WERE motion pictures as early as that, though they
weren't AS developed....
 
 >In _Lost King_, Pajuka states that, after she transformed him, she sent him
 >away and enchanted the King.  My guess is that she did both transformations
 >in close succession.

  Thats what I thought about. So my guess is that Pajuka was hiding with
Pastoria and Ozma in Morrow as well, and they were all enchanted at the same
time. (I said Pajuka MAY have been enchanted before)
 
~Gehan~

Date: Fri, 07 Jan 2000 08:41:14 +1100
From: Gehan <calamity at eureka.lk>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-06-2000
 
David (Hulan):
SPOILERS FOR THOSE WHO HAVENT READ 'GIANT HORSE OF OZ':

 >Who's the forest maiden/Princess from _Giant Horse_ who's disenchanted? I
 >don't recall any such, though maybe I'm forgetting - must be a very minor
 >character if so.

  Yes, she was one of the most minor characters of Oz. She didnt play a role
in the story, it was just mentioned how a forest maiden knocked on
Tattypoo's hut and asked for food. Tattypoo with one look realised that the
maiden was under some wicked enchantment, and consulted her books of
Sorcery, turned the forest maiden back to her proper self(she turned out to
be a princess under some a spell) and sent her back to her father's kingdom
on a 'fast wish'. Thats all thats mentioned about her.
 
 >You left out Marygolden, who gets disenchanted _twice_ in
 >_Yellow Knight_, and Ruggedo, who's disenchanted in _Handy Mandy_ - one
 >probably shouldn't count all the ones who are enchanted and then
 >disenchanted in the course of the same book in _Pirates_, _Purple Prince_,
 >and _Ojo_. And I probably haven't remembered them all.

  Thats what I said, there were many more RPT who were 'disenchanted' apart
from the ones I mentioned. Anyway, I havent read 'Yellow Knight' 'Pirates'
'Purple Prince' or 'Ojo' yet....Though I will be getting 'Purple Prince' and
'Pirates' in a few days......
 
~Gehan~

Date: Fri, 07 Jan 2000 09:34:41 +1100
From: Gehan <calamity at eureka.lk>
Subject: More Ozzy Things
 
David(Hulan):
'Giant Horse of Oz' could NOT have taken place AFTER 'Royal Book' yet before
'Kabumpo' as 'Giant Horse' reveals that Mombi was put out with a pail of
water for all her mischievous acts, and that was in 'Lost King of Oz'.
Perhaps 'Lost King' took place 'Royal Book' and 'Giant Horse' took place
soon after.......
 
Thoughts on Ozma and Dorothy:
Dont you think that RPT SLIGHTLY changes Dot's and Ozma's personalities in
her books? For example:
 
Dorothy states in 'Wizard of Oz' that she does NOT want to kill anyone, even
for the sake of returning to Kansas. Infact, she gets shocked and terrified
when the Good Witch of the North says that her HOUSE dropped on a Wicked
Witch who held the MUnchkins in bondage for years, and she actually
apologizes. Yet in 'Cowardly Lion', she immediately throws a pail of water
on Notta Bit More, thinking he's a witch thanks to his costume, and even in
'Lost King', she's the one who suggested that Mombi should be put out with a
pail of water.

Then Ozma states in 'Emerald City of Oz' that no one has a right to kill
anyone no matter how evil they are, and yet in 'Cowardly Lion' she states
that a wicked witch MUST be destroyed, and she doesnt stop ONCE to think
about melting Mombi away.

Both acts are very Un-Dorothyish and very Un-Ozma-ish. True, Dorothy may
have cahnged since 'Wizard' and Ozma may have realised that there's no other
way to PUNSIH  a wicked person other than killing her, having experienced
the many times Ruggedo returned for revenge, no matter WHAT they did to
punish him. Anyway, if Ozma was to kill anyone, she should throw a dozen
eggs at Ruggedo, instead of having killed Mombi, Glegg e.t.c, since Ruggedo
is wickeder, but anyway.....I prefer if Dot and Ozma would ALWAYS have
remained the way Baum WANTED them to remain.....
 
~Gehan~

Date: Fri, 07 Jan 2000 18:51:43 +1100
From: Gehan <calamity at eureka.lk>
Subject: To John Bell
 
John Bell:
Yep, I dont accept Jack Snow's Ozma Theory in _Magical Mimics_ because he
states that King Pastoria ruled Oz when Queen Lurline enchanted it, though
its clear from Baum's and Thompson's books that Oz was enchanted centuries
ago, and Ozma herself tells the Wizard in 'DotWiz' that Mombi kidnapped her
grandfather first, and that she kidnapped King Pastoria much later. She
says.....

'But Mombi will still my grandfather's jailor and after that, my father's
jailor....'
 
~Gehan~

From: CruentiDei at cs.com
Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2000 21:11:31 EST
Subject: Oz
 
Nathan:
I guess either one or both of Ozma's parents could be part-fairy. In
_Scarecrow_, Baum said that Ozma was descended from "a long line of fairy
queens". I assumed that this meant through her mother, but it could easily be
through Pastoria's female ancestors as well.
 
Money was also used when people paid green pennies for green lemonade in
_Wizard_.
 
Gehan:
Yes, I think that Ozma and Dorothy underwent some personality changes when
RPT took over the series. Dave Hardenbrook is of the opinion that RPT wrote
Ozma as a much weaker person than Baum did, but apparantly more willing to
eliminate people, such as Glegg, Mombi or Mooj.
 
--Tyler Jones

From: "Gili Bar-Hillel" <abhillel at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-09-2000
Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2000 01:45:02 PST
 
I think it was Nathan who wrote:
 
 >The only time I can think of when money was clearly used in the Emerald
 >City
 >itself was in _Forbidden Fountain_.
 
I'm pretty sure, but I can't check now because I'm at work, that when
Dorothy first comes to the Emerald City in "The Wizard of Oz" she sees
children buying green lemonade with green pennies.

Date: Mon, 10 Jan 00 10:01:16 CST
From: "Ruth Berman" <berma005 at maroon.tc.umn.edu>
Subject: san diego in oz
 
J.L. Bell: Interesting comments on distinction between Wizard's over-
hastiness here as perhaps motivated by regret for past actions rather
than competitiveness.
 
Scott & Gehan: Besides the name "Pastoria" from the stageplay
(although, as Scott pointed out, Pastoria is mentioned by name in
"Land"), RPT may have been influenced by the stageplay to think of
Pastoria who might be imagined as managing to return to Oz life.
 
David Hulan: Interesting point that
RPT identifies Trot's hometown as San Francisco, whereas Baum's
descriptions of Trot's home are based on the San Diego area.  He
doesn't (I think) actually name the area, so it's not surprising that RPT,
not having lived around there, didn't pick up the indications.  Scott
Olsen had an article on the Castle Coronado hotel in the "Baum
Bugle" a good many years back, pointing out some of the specific
indications of SD-area for Trot's home, and recently an article in the
San Diego Historical Society Magazine went into more detail.  The
most detailed description is in "Sea Fairies," where the caves Trot and
Cap'n Bill discuss correspond to the caves actually in the area.
("Scarecrow" isn't as detailed, but also mentions caves in the cliffs).
For Oz-as-if-real purposes, the simplest explanation is probably that
San Francisco is a typo for San Diego.
 
Nathan DeHoff: Your suggestion that Pastoria could be part-fairy --
Ozma's reference to the first Ozma as the ancestor of all of "us"
sounds as if he must be.  (Of course, there's a discrepancy there
between Baum's reference to Ozma's father as King Pastoria, and his
reference to the rulers of Oz as all named either Oz or Ozma, but
Pastoria could presumably be short for Oz-Pastoria or the like.)
 
Ruth Berman

Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2000 12:48:27 -0500
From: "J. L. Bell" <JnoLBell at compuserve.com>
Subject: lost time in LOST KING
 
Nathan DeHoff wrote:
<<The only time I can think of when money was clearly used in the Emerald
City itself was in _Forbidden Fountain_.>>
 
There are transactions using "green pennies" in chap. 11 of WIZARD, but
that was no doubt before the period you're considering. Incidentally, one
such penny reappears in my story "Jack Pumpkinhead's Day in Court" in
OZ-STORY 5, but as a probability generator instead of as currency.
 
Gehan Cooray wrote:
<<I dont accept Jack Snow's Ozma Theory in _Magical Mimics_ because he
states that King Pastoria ruled Oz when Queen Lurline enchanted it, though
its clear from Baum's and Thompson's books that Oz was enchanted centuries
ago>>
 
Why couldn't Pastoria have ruled Oz in his kind, absent, and increasingly
weak way for centuries? We assume that Ozians' ability not to age is
related to Ozma's rule, but TIN WOODMAN implies Lurline had granted that
boon much earlier. One possibility to consider: The dark age of dominance
by wicked witches may have caused Ozians to be less eager to be immortal
[why live forever if you're going to live in fear?], and therefore led to a
widespread return of aging and dying.
 
Tyler Jones wrote:
<<People forgetting their past when transformed might be part of the
enchantment. This would help assure the spellcaster that the transformation
would be permanent. The victim would never know to get "un-enchanted" and
friends and family would look in vain for the victim.>>
 
That would indeed be valuable if the goal of the enchantment is to hide or
do away with the person, as in Mombi's spells on Ozma and Pastoria. But
another sort of enchantment seems intended to humiliate a person by giving
him an unnatural shape, as in her transformation of Pajuka or in Mrs.
Yoop's spells. Amnesia seems to be an option during enchantments, or
perhaps a separate, simultaneous spell.

         Another factor: some things (babies, trees, nuts) have little or no
memory, so transforming someone into one of those might accomplish the
amnesia without requiring a separate spell.
 
Nathan DeHoff wrote:
<<Dorothy didn't meet up with Kabumpo until after her encounter with the
Scooters, however, and one of them mentioned that it was eleven o'clock.>>
 
One Scooter says, "It's only ten o'clock" [159], and after that encounter
Dorothy and Humpy "walked along for more than an hour" [165] before meeting
Kabumpo. These remarks make LOST KING's chronology even more confused than
I thought because they occur well after the Backwoodsmen. Thanks for noting
the Scooter's time reference.
 
On a different timing issue, HALLIWELL'S FILMGOER'S COMPANION says
Hollywood became a center of motion picture production in 1912. That was at
least two years after Dorothy had decamped from America to Oz, and four
years after Gehan's proposed dating of LOST KING.

         I tend to be less aggressive in my attempts to chronologize the Oz
stories, but even thinking of LOST KING as taking place around 1925 leaves
the question of how Dorothy immediately recognizes Hollywood as "in
California" [129]. When she came to the Emerald City, it was still a tiny
cottage town on the outskirts of a midsized city, hardly a place a Kansas
farmgirl would have heard of. The best explanation seems to be that Dorothy
had heard about Hollywood the town from Trot, who also explained Hollywood
the industry [134]. Why didn't Dorothy quickly think of motion pictures
when she saw the men on horesback in Hollywood? Perhaps because Trot had
told her about the town in another context: as where Mr. Baum had gone to
live.
 
Gehan Cooray wrote:
<<Dont you think that RPT SLIGHTLY changes Dot's and Ozma's personalities
in her books?>>
 
In LOST KING the most obvious example for me is when "Dorothy closed her
eyes and clung to Snip" as Kabumpo was about to crush Mombi [225]. Wouldn't
Baum's Dorothy have stamped her foot and told the elephant not to do the
same? Dorothy also seems unable to get her own breakfast off a bush,
waiting for Snip do that for her [200]. I think these are signs of
Thompson's gender expectations.

         I'm not convinced that Dorothy's suggestion about killing Mombi
"like I did the other witches" [277] is as much out of character, however.
As I pointed out during our COWARDLY LION discussion, Dorothy threw water
at the Wicked Witch of the West deliberately and in anger. She didn't know
that would be fatal, was "very sorry" and "truly frightened"--but also
immediately calm enough to mop up the witch's remains. In OZMA Dorothy
turned Nomes into eggs without regret. She helped incinerate the Gargoyles.
As we see in GLINDA and elsewhere, Dorothy has a child's wish to jump to
quick, stark solutions, and getting rid of Mombi is one of those.

         For Ozma, the choice to liquidate Mombi indeed seems unlike the
kind-to-a-fault ruler who was ready to let the Nomes conquer the Emerald
City, and even more unlike "the boy [who] generously promised to provide
for Mombi in her old age if he became the ruler of the Emerald City" in
LAND. In TIN WOODMAN we saw Ozma willing to punish Mrs. Yoop in proportion
to her evil deeds, so there's one precedent. Perhaps memories of ill
treatment from Mombi when she was Tip make the young queen more vindictive
than usual.

         Some people have suggested that the off-stage erasure of Mombi
[278] doesn't really take place, that the Scarecrow and Sir Hokus simply
sent her away without her shoes. I have a related question: Is Mombi really
a witch at this point? And would water have any effect on her?

         In LAND Glinda promised to make her "drink a powerful draught which
will cause you to forget all the magic you have ever learned," and indeed
in LOST KING Mombi complains, "I've forgotten all my witchcraft" [26]. Yet
even at that point in the text, Thompson refers to the old cook as "the
witch." Mombi continues to fear water, which would be a severe handicap for
a cook [76] (though she also gets "thirsty" [96]). This seems to imply
that, in Thompson's Oz at least, becoming a witch sets a woman off
permanently from other people, and makes one permanently aquaphobic.
Mombi's status doesn't depend on actually knowing or practicing witchcraft.
 
         Does that square with Baum's portrayal of witches? He seems clear
that witches can be good or bad depending on their underlying personality.
He doesn't list witches among immortals as a type of fairy--implying they
at least start out as regular women. And in LAND he states, "Mombi was not
exactly a Witch, because the Good Witch who ruled that part of the Land of
Oz had forbidden any other Witch to exist in her dominions. So Tip's
guardian, however much she might aspire to working magic, realized it was
unlawful to be more than a Sorceress, or at most a Wizardess," implying a
certain flexibility of definition that Thompson's depiction lacks.

         It's never quite clear in WIZARD why water causes the Wicked Witch
of the West to melt away, or if it would have the same effect on other
witches. Does becoming a witch automatically make one vulnerable to water?
Is that Wicked Witch simply too old to stick together when wet? Or is there
something about the practice of witchcraft (e.g., working for a long time
with dangerous fuming potions) that produces the vulnerability? Mombi tried
to regain her knowledge of witchcraft, but LOST KING shows her
experimenting only with ordinary kitchen substances [20, 78, 95], so she
had actually been away from the practice for years. Perhaps by Baum's
standards the Scarecrow and Sir Hokus couldn't have melted Mombi if they'd
tried.
 
J. L. Bell                  JnoLBell at compuserve.com

From: "Nathan Mulac DeHoff" <xornom at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-09-2000
Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2000 18:47:09 GMT
 
J. L. Bell:
 >         Two more chronological mysteries: Tora says that he "came to
 >Blankenburg" shortly *before* the queen (name given as both Vanette and
 >Vanetta) discovered the water that rendered her and her subjects invisible
 >[192-3]. That implies the people who would be blank were already living in
 >a town called Blankenburg--mighty convenient.
 
Or maybe Tora just referred to it by its present name, so as not to cause
confusion.  It's also possible that it was named Blankenburg after the water
of invisibility, but none of the current residents knew this (sort of like
how none of the Baffleburghers knew what the Forbidden Flagon had been used
for, although it was well-known a few generations earlier).  I've been
thinking of writing a story in which it is stated that Blankenburg was once
known as Brandenburg, and that Randy's mother had come from there, but isn't
really any FF basis for this.
 
 >         Snip's philosophical transformation seems complete when he deems
 >the cats of Catty Corners "hateful" because they eat gold fish out of their
 >ponds [85].
 
Dorothy also resolves not to eat fish, after hearing that the Scooters'
sails grow when they eat them.  This does not seem to be a moral thing,
however.  Incidentally, did Dorothy stick to this resolution, or does she
eat fish in later books?
 
Gehan:
 > >In _Lost King_, Pajuka states that, after she transformed him, she sent
 >him
 > >away and enchanted the King.  My guess is that she did both
 >transformations
 > >in close succession.
 >  Thats what I thought about. So my guess is that Pajuka was hiding with
 >Pastoria and Ozma in Morrow as well, and they were all enchanted at the
 >same
 >time. (I said Pajuka MAY have been enchanted before)
 
Doesn't _Lost King_ state that Pastoria had been enchanted before the
arrival of the Wizard, and Ozma after that arrival, though?
 
 >'Giant Horse of Oz' could NOT have taken place AFTER 'Royal Book' yet
 >before
 >'Kabumpo' as 'Giant Horse' reveals that Mombi was put out with a pail of
 >water for all her mischievous acts, and that was in 'Lost King of Oz'.
 >Perhaps 'Lost King' took place 'Royal Book' and 'Giant Horse' took place
 >soon after.......
 
But _Lost King_ obviously took place after _Kabumpo_, because the Emerald
City celebrities all knew Kabumpo in the former book, and the Elegant
Elephant mentions Pompa and Peg's marriage.  (Incidentally, note that
Kabumpo implies that he, Pompa, and Peg all live in Pumperdink, which
contradicts the end of _Kabumpo_, but is right in line with what she later
writes in _Purple Prince_.)
 
Nathan

Date: Tue, 11 Jan 2000 16:16:30 +1100
From: Gehan <calamity at eureka.lk>
Subject: Ozzy Things
 
Nathan:
 
 >Is there any reason why her father couldn't be part-fairy?  That would
 >certainly explain why the Blankenburg water didn't work on him, since,
 >according to the Wizard in _Lost Princess_, fairies can't be made invisible
 >against their will.

  Hmm....I dont see why King Pastoria CANT be part-fairy. Perhaps all her
MALE ancestors are part fairies, while her female ancestors are
full-fairies. That would explain L. Frank Baum's and Ruth Plumly Thompsons
statements in 'Scarecrow of Oz' and 'Royal Book' : Ozma decends from a long
line of fairy kings and queens.
 
Untill next time,
 
~Gehan Cooray~

Date: Wed, 12 Jan 00 22:22:58 (PST)
From: Dave Hardenbrook <DaveH47 at mindspring.com>
Subject: Ozzy Things
 
WITCHES:
John Bell wrote:
 >Dorothy threw water at the Wicked Witch of the West deliberately and
 >in anger.
 
Yes, her motivations are not as watered down (pun intended) as they are
in the MGM film.
 
 >"Mombi was not exactly a Witch, because the Good Witch who ruled that
 >part of the Land of Oz had forbidden any other Witch to exist in her
 >dominions. So Tip's guardian, however much she might aspire to working
 >magic, realized it was unlawful to be more than a Sorceress, or at most
 >a Wizardess,"
 
Sounds to me like Mombi is engaging in a bit of legal word-juggling,
since I'm sure Tattypoo(*) meant to outlaw *all* magic.
 
Mombi: Your honor, it was my understanding that the Power of Life did
        not fit the legal definition of "witchcraft".
 
What gets me most about the above quote from _Land_ is that it implies
that a sorceress or wizardess is lower than a witch...
My perception has always been that sorceresses (e.g. Glinda) are at the
top of the ladder (except perhaps for All-Powerful Genies).
 
 >Perhaps by Baum's standards the Scarecrow and Sir Hokus couldn't have
 >melted Mombi if they'd tried.
 
It depends on what produces the "meltability" -- The Adepts tell me
it's the witch becoming mean and nasty, regardless of magic; but they
could be wrong...

                              -- Dave
* I *do* mean Tattypoo: In my scenario, Locasta is gone by the time
   of the start of _Land_...

From: Ozmama at aol.com
Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2000 20:37:04 EST
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-12-2000
 
John Bell:<< Does becoming a witch automatically make one vulnerable to water?
  >>    In _Wishing Horse_, RPT has Pigasus say "All we have to do is find
some water. ....Quick, Dorothy, look and see if there is any water around
here, then as soon as Gloma pops her nose in the door we'll put her out as
neatly as you did that other witch." Dorothy's objection "But those other
witches were bad and Gloma seems really good and beautiful" is made on the
grounds that it'd be a shame to snuff a good witch, rather than that of water
not working on all witches.  If you or yours are witches, folks, I guess
you'd better avoid water.   :)  --Robin

Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2000 21:48:09 -0500
From: Michael Turniansky <turnip at bcpl.net>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-12-2000
 
Nathan and John Bell:
 
 >
 > J. L. Bell:
 >  >         Two more chronological mysteries: Tora says that he "came to
 >  >Blankenburg" shortly *before* the queen (name given as both Vanette and
 >  >Vanetta) discovered the water that rendered her and her subjects invisible
 >  >[192-3]. That implies the people who would be blank were already living in
 >  >a town called Blankenburg--mighty convenient.
 >
 > Or maybe Tora just referred to it by its present name, so as not to cause
 > confusion.  It's also possible that it was named Blankenburg after the water
 > of invisibility, but none of the current residents knew this (sort of like
 > how none of the Baffleburghers knew what the Forbidden Flagon had been used
 > for, although it was well-known a few generations earlier).  I've been
 > thinking of writing a story in which it is stated that Blankenburg was once
 > known as Brandenburg, and that Randy's mother had come from there, but isn't
 > really any FF basis for this.
 >
 
    One need look no further than the book of Genesis to find some examples of
cities referred to by name before the incident that supposedly gave them that
name:
 
    The city of Zoar is named in Gen. 14:2,8 (although admittedly also called
"Bela"), before lot names it in 19:22

      Abraham names the city Beer-sheva (21:31), but then Isaac went there in
26:23, and apparently HE is the one who names it (26:33)
 
                    --Mike "Shaggy Man" Turniansky

Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2000 21:07:23 -0800
From: Bill Wright <piglet at piglet.com>
Subject: Trot's Home
 
Ref the notes in recent Digests by Ruth Berman and David Hulan regarding
the location of Trot's home.  The full text of the San Diego Historical
Society Magazine that relates to this is posted on my website.  If
you're interested, the URL is:

It is titled:  L. Frank Baum's La Jolla: Halfway to Oz
 
Bill Wright
PS: I'm no longer in Ozlo.....

Date: Thu, 13 Jan 2000 16:18:25 +1100
From: Gehan <calamity at eureka.lk>
Subject: Ozzy Things
 
Money in Oz:
Here's another example for money in Oz....The Ferryman demanded money in
order for him to carry Tip, Jack Pumpkminhead and the Saw Horse over the
river, and Jinjur says 'There is enough money in the King's treasury to buy
every girl in our army a dozen new gowns'. My own MOPPET is that Ozma
prevented money from being used in Oz....atleast in MOST parts of Oz, but
she has obviously SOME kingdoms to continue using money.
 
Tyler
 >Yes, I think that Ozma and Dorothy underwent some personality changes when
 >RPT took over the series. Dave Hardenbrook is of the opinion that RPT wrote
 >Ozma as a much weaker person than Baum did, but apparantly more willing to
 >eliminate people, such as Glegg, Mombi or Mooj.
 
Well, I personally dont believe that Ozma is 'weaker' in RPT's books, but I
DO believe that RPT made her more vindictful.....
 
Ruth Berman:
Perhaps Ozma's father's REAL name was OZtoria or PastoZia, but perhaps they
sounded too much like a girl's name and hence, was changed to Pastoria.
 
John Bell:
My own MOPPET is that Queen Lurline or some other powerful fairy made ALL
wicked witches allergic to water long, long ago and it became a
hereditary(sp?) thing. Theres no evidence in the FF books that GOOD witches
are allergic to water.
 
Dave and Mombi:
Your right, Baum makes it seem as if witches and wizardesses are more
powerful than sorceresses. And its not like Mombi to try NOT to be a witch
just for Tattypoo's sake....
 
~Gehan~

Date: Thu, 13 Jan 2000 13:35:16 -0500
From: "J. L. Bell" <JnoLBell at compuserve.com>
Subject: a la recherche du roi perdu
 
David Hulan wrote:
<<The best evidence is that Glinda didn't have her book of records until
after the events of _Land_; if she had, she wouldn't have needed spies, and
she should have known where (and who) Ozma was all along as well. She seems
to have acquired it sometime between _Land_ and _Emerald City_.>>
 
LOST KING has tantalizing hints at a different scenario: it says Glinda
learned of Mombi's spells by "looking through her magic record books" [32].
These are presumably the same volumes the sorceress spoke of in LAND, but
there she claimed the information was gathered by spies. As you know, one
of my pet theories is that Glinda had the Great Book of Records far earlier
than she revealed to Dorothy in EMERALD CITY, perhaps even before WIZARD
and LAND, and that her remarks about spies in the latter book were a way to
conceal its existence.

         Why then would Glinda have been unable to identify Ozma under her
enchantment? LOST KING also shows that Mombi took steps to prevent the
sorceress from interfering. She enchanted Pajuka in such a way that he
couldn't tell Glinda or Ozma (or, presumably, other good magic-workers)
[53]. She managed also to avoid alarming the golden quill that was meant to
warn Pajuka and Pastoria of danger, which the prime minister had in one of
his beloved pockets when he was enchanted [261]. It seems well within the
realm of possibility that Mombi blocked Glinda's magic from uncovering
Ozma's whereabouts.

         Of course, one could assume that the "magic record books" line is a
misstatement by Thompson, not the only one in LOST KING.
 
Now for my general assessments of LOST KING. Because Thompson's plot
depends heavily on characters and situation she inherited from Baum, and
because none of the book's new characters is as much fun as (or would
return like) Kabumpo and Sir Hokus, my first reading many years ago left me
somewhat flat. But in terms of plot I now judge it one of her most
successful entries in the series.

         At one point in LOST KING Thompson juggles four different
storylines: Snip and Tora; Ozma and her courtiers; Dorothy, Humpy, and
Kabumpo; and Pajuka and Mombi [196]. She establishes the power of Mombi's
baking powder early [94], so Snip's crucial use of it at the end [250]
seems fair (though I'd also have made it clear there was more than one
purple can of it in her basket). Thompson also creates some fine
cliff-hanger chapter endings just after bringing them us to a new height of
suspense, as when she reveals that Mombi has tumbled to Snip's scheme to
warn Ozma [99--also 237].

         Finding the lost king is a foregone conclusion, especially since
Neill's cover shows us a grandfatherly man wearing a crown (and tailor's
tools, a plot giveaway). But reminding ourselves the king will be found by
the end of this book is little comfort. As in KABUMPO, the young hero we
meet at the start embarks on a collision course with Ozma and her life in
the Emerald City. As much as we want to see Pajuka disenchanted and his
master restored, we also hear him say Ozma "can go back and play with her
dolls" [67]. Scraps speaks for us when she warns Ozma about "fatherish
stuff" and says, "Who wants a King anyway, I like you!" [121] So each time
Thompson switches storylines she heats up the conflict within us: whom do
we root for *really*? Not until the penultimate chapter can we be sure that
"everything will be the same" in the Emerald City, as at the end of every
Oz book since LAND [273].

         LOST KING truly is a mystery story (unlike LOST PRINCESS), in that
the author leaves clues which we can follow to figure out the identity of
the enchanted king as the characters do. Of course, Oz folk aren't very
good detectives. They're easily thrown off by the red herring of Humpy.
Pajuka, despite feeling "unaccountably drawn to the gentle old tailor"
[235], is convinced by appearances that the kingly dummy is his master.
Like Bill the Weather-cock crowing that every girl he meets is a princess,
this bird prostrates himself on his bill and screams, "The King's himself!
Long live the King!" when the Wizard tries the spell on Humpy [257].

         Even after Humpy is eliminated as a suspect, the Ozians have a hard
time reasoning through their clues. The golden feather had told Ozma and
her party that, "The King of Oz is in the palace" [240]. But they try the
robe on Sir Hokus, on whom the feather was writing at that time [264--which
hints that Thompson was already considering the possibility of
disenchanting Sir Hokus], and Tora wants to try the Scarecrow as well
[263]. The Scarecrow suggests using the Magic Picture to find the king
[122], but it takes a long time for the Wizard to have that idea again
[266--note that again he acts hastily without explaining what he's doing].
(I suspect the Picture wouldn't have been able to reveal the king anyway
because of Mombi's powerful spell, and because Ozma would surely have tried
that question at least once before.) Fortunately, Tora and Snip work out
the mystery by getting around the group's artificial mental blocks.

         There are a number of lesser mysteries in LOST KING as well.
Thompson shows characters trying to work through their plights rationally.
Dorothy has to figure out the wishing sand. Her first conclusion is only
half-right: "I was on Wish Way before and know all about wishing"
[144--presumably an allusion to ROYAL BOOK]. She needs correcting by the
Wizard, "who was glad to have some part in clearing up the mysteries"
[270]. Later, faced with the Backwoodsmen's language, Dorothy thinks,
"There's some trick to it" and gradually reasons it out [151]. We
eventually learn why the golden feather has been flying among three of the
four storylines [261]. The one mystery solution I think is a cop-out is how
Snip can rescue Tora out of Blankenburg: "Kindliness and generosity always
dull green magic" [270]. If so, why wasn't the enchantment on Pastoria
easier to break?

         Finally, is it ever stated why Tora wasn't affected by the Blanks'
water [194]? That he's part fairy is one possibility--perhaps the parts
being his ears from Queen Lurline [269]. Another is that Lurline put a
spell of protection on him during that visit. Note that Lurline, Ozma's
"Fairy Godmother" [121], knew where her father was but never mentioned it.
 
As well as being a mystery, LOST KING is also a search for a father. That
is the journey Ozma successfully makes, of course, reuniting with the one
parent she somehow remembers from her infancy.

         But the book is also a search for a father for Snip. To say he's
been missing a paternal figure may seem odd given how hard Thompson works
to portray Kimbaloo as a jolly kingdom and Kinda Jolly as its jollier
patriarch. Yet I keep seeing signs that Snip is actually kept rather
distant from that king. Thompson states that the Kimbles are "all boys and
girls" [16], but she gradually reveals there's a class of crown officials
and servants between them and their rulers: the Town Laugher and Crier,
Mombi the cook, General Whiffenpuff, and a page [41]. The children live in
separate cottages, are sent away each morning to peddle buttons and
bouquets, and return to play *outside* the castle [16-7]. As a special
treat, the king buys one goose--dinner for himself, Rosa Merry, and the
household but hardly enough to feed 500 children. The Kimbles must peek "in
the window to see what all the fun was about" [38], which resembles the
first act we see Snip doing [20].

         Snip turns out to be a royal favorite--"the brightest boy in
Kimbaloo and the best button picker" [44]--but there's no clue he knows of
his king's special fondness for him. He doesn't feel close enough to Kinda
Jolly to approach him even after fearing Mombi has turned the king into a
collar button [20-1]. Such distance between Snip and his ruler makes it
easier to understand why he doesn't yell for help from Mombi, whom he knows
has no magical powers [35]. Instead, he feels "curiously light hearted and
gay" toward the start of this journey [58]. Obviously, deep down Snip feels
he's onto something better by leaving.

         Along the way, Snip picks up father-figures to whom he can feel
close. He hugs Pajuka impulsively [49], and refuses to leave Tora behind in
Blankenburg [185]. The end of LOST KING assures us he'll end up living in
the Emerald City with both paternal stand-ins, plus Humpy as a bonus.
Though Snip returns to Kimbaloo as he'd always planned [60], he also hears
something he may never have heard Kinda Jolly say: "I need you!" "I'll miss
you!" [279]

         Of course, finding a father can turn one's life topsy-turvy. In
LOST KING, that quest literally makes the royal house disappear. Even Ozma,
of all people, complains of life being so queer [255]. The fathers she and
Snip find are not protectors; they rely on their children's leadership.
Pastoria, "nodding absently," tells Ozma, "Anything you say" [278]. Snip
and Ozma thus have to grow up emotionally, to leave some element of
childhood behind even as they become someone's children again. That theme
is echoed physically in Dorothy's odd episode in Hollywood, growing
suddenly to adulthood and rescuing the figure of a king [139-40].
Fortunately, in the Emerald City everyone can stay young and happy forever,
exercising power but still being children.
 
J. L. Bell                  JnoLBell at compuserve.com

From: "Nathan Mulac DeHoff" <xornom at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-12-2000
Date: Thu, 13 Jan 2000 19:11:45 GMT
 
J. L. Bell:
 >There are transactions using "green pennies" in chap. 11 of WIZARD, but
 >that was no doubt before the period you're considering.
 
Yes, I was thinking specifically of times that money was used in the Emerald
City AFTER the "no money in Oz" rule was established by the Tin Woodman in
_Road_.  Money shows up all over Oz before that particular volume.
 
Dave Hardenbrook:
 > >"Mombi was not exactly a Witch, because the Good Witch who ruled that
 > >part of the Land of Oz had forbidden any other Witch to exist in her
 > >dominions. So Tip's guardian, however much she might aspire to working
 > >magic, realized it was unlawful to be more than a Sorceress, or at most
 > >a Wizardess,"
 >
 >Sounds to me like Mombi is engaging in a bit of legal word-juggling,
 >since I'm sure Tattypoo(*) meant to outlaw *all* magic.
 >
 >Mombi: Your honor, it was my understanding that the Power of Life did
 >        not fit the legal definition of "witchcraft".
 >
 >What gets me most about the above quote from _Land_ is that it implies
 >that a sorceress or wizardess is lower than a witch...
 >My perception has always been that sorceresses (e.g. Glinda) are at the
 >top of the ladder (except perhaps for All-Powerful Genies).
 
The _Land_ reference was only one of two rankings of magic-workers in the
series, the other being _Cowardly Lion_'s indication that a Cookywitch was
"next in wizardry to a sorceress."  Of course, that statement in itself is
somewhat confusing, because it implies that the magic used by sorceresses
and cookywitches is "wizardry," even though neither of them are wizards.
The classifications are probably quite arbitrary (especially in Thompson's
books; she often seems to use words like "wizard," "sorceror," and
"necromancer" interchangeably).
 
Nathan

From:  CruentiDei at cs.com
Date: Fri, 14 Jan 2000 23:10:32 EST
Subject: Oz
 
John Bell:
Some have theorized that the non-aging magic waxed and waned throughout the
centuries. This explains some discrepancies in and out of the FF. Also,
Ozma's comments about Mombi being her father's and grandfather's jailer cast
at least a little bit of doubt on Pastoria ruling Oz for so many centuries.
It seems to me that if Oz had one continuous ruler, even a relatively weak
one, more of the little kingdoms would know of Oz, and most do not.
 
You have a good point about the humiliation factor. Bobo/Bilbil, for example,
seemed deeply ashamed of his transformed shape and was never likely to ask
for help.
 
Dave:
The whole magic thing has been discussed on the digest before, at least in
the early days. The best answer seems to be that for the most part, all of
the titles are interchangeable, except that they generally fall into
categories. People like Waddy and the Wizard are called "Wizards" and their
magic is mechanically oriented. MOmbi and other witches seem to be oriented
around transformations and mixing potions in pots. Sorcerers seem to be the
most powerful, although certainly anyone could simply CALL themselves a
sorcerer.
 
The advent of RPT and the all-powerful magic belt overrides that, however. By
that time, the Ozzy powerful could do just about anything that they wanted.
 
Tyler Jones

Date: Sat, 15 Jan 00 13:48:19 (PST)
From: Dave Hardenbrook <DaveH47 at mindspring.com>
Subject: Ozzy Things
 
OZMA:
Gehan wrote (in response to Tyler):
 >Well, I personally dont believe that Ozma is 'weaker' in RPT's books, but I
 >DO believe that RPT made her more vindictful.....
 
Well, "weaker" is a bit strong... "Less assertive" is more what I had in
mind... Also, my theory is that RPT wrote Ozma that way AT OZMA'S REQUEST.
Because Zurline and others in the forest of Burzee aren't too happy about
how well she's governing Oz without their assistance, and so Ozma pretends
to be not so hot a ruler to stem her collegues' jealousy.
 
John wrote:
 >Why then would Glinda have been unable to identify Ozma under her
 >enchantment? LOST KING also shows that Mombi took steps to prevent the
 >sorceress from interfering... It seems well within the
 >realm of possibility that Mombi blocked Glinda's magic from uncovering
 >Ozma's whereabouts.
 
This is consistant with my idea that Mombi enchanted Glinda, the Adepts,
and the Book of Records to conceal Mombi's banishment of Locasta and
replacement with Tattypoo.
 
MAGICAL NOMCLATURE:
Tyler wrote:
 >The whole magic thing has been discussed on the digest before, at least in
 >the early days. The best answer seems to be that for the most part, all of
 >the titles are interchangeable, except that they generally fall into
 >categories...
 
I'll point out to the relative newcomers that in those early days I concocted
a "Reichter Scale" of magic (It's still in my Oz FAQ), but Tyler and others
pointed out its weaknesses.  My current feelings is that tendancies are for
sorceress to be high in power and genies highest of all, but wizards and
witches have a pretty wide range.
 
                              -- Dave

From: Ozmama at aol.com
Date: Sat, 15 Jan 2000 19:42:35 EST
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-15-2000
 
John:<< Snip and Ozma thus have to grow up emotionally, to leave some element of
  childhood behind even as they become someone's children again.  >>
Nice analysis, John.  I enjoyed it.  This line, in particular, has me
thinking.  What other Oz books share bildungsroman  (sp.?) characteristics?
Who else grows up emotionally in an Oz book?  Btw, the giving away of the
plot never bothered me as a kid, and it still doesn't.  If Shakespeare could
do it (think _Romeo and Juliet_ and all the histories and many of the
tragedies) why not Thompson?!
            --Robin

Date: Sun, 16 Jan 2000 08:51:50 +1100
From: Gehan <calamity at eureka.lk>
Subject: Ozzy Things
 
Helloz!
 
Magic:
I believe that a sorceress/sorcerer is the MOST powerful, wizards come in
second, and witches come in last. If witches were more powerful than
wizards, then the Wicked Witches of the East and West wouldn't have
hesitated to have a 'duel of magic' with Oscar Diggs, when he came to Oz.
Another question. The Good Witch of the North tells Dorothy in 'WIZARD' that
she's not as powerful as the Wicked Witch of the East, or she would have
freed the Munchkins from the wicked witch's wrath long ago. I know Baum
doesn't make the GWN an all-that powerful character, but Thompson states
that she's more powerful than Mombi, and indeed she appears to be in 'Giant
Horse', and I believe that Mombi was perhaps even MORE powerful than the
Witch of the East and the Witch of the West, from all the evidence given in
the FF. Actually, it should have been Tattypoo who conquered Singra, and
Glinda who conquered Mombi.

Then the Soldier with Green Whiskers tells Dorothy in 'WIZARD' that Glinda
is the MOST powerful out of all the 'witches' in Oz. Then why didn't she
conquer teh Wicked Witches of the East and the West? And if she knew that
the Wizard was a humbug all along, why didn't she try to expose him? Maybe
she thought that it was better that the Wicked Witches of the East and West
remained in 'fear' that the Wizard was greater than they were, and that IF
she exposed the Wizard, one of the Wicked Witches would try to take their
place. But IF Glinda conquered the Wicked Witches of the East and West,
being more powerful than they were, then that would make her Good Sorceress
of the South, West and East, and perhaps she thought it was too much to
handle. LOL! But in the later Oz Books, she not only seems to help the
Quadlings, she also seems to help all the OTHER Ozites....thats probably why
Ozma made her 'Chief Sorceress of Oz' as well as 'Sorceress of the South'.
However, I do NOT believe that Glinda had the Great Book of Records before
'Land'....
 
Dave:
 >>This is consistant with my idea that Mombi enchanted Glinda, the Adepts,
 >and the Book of Records to conceal Mombi's banishment of Locasta and
 >replacement with Tattypoo.
 
Just a quick question on 'The Unknown Witch of Oz'. Since 'Giant Horse' is
a copyrighted book, are you permitted to include events from 'Giant Horse'
in your book? I dont think Tattypoo is mentioned in any of the RPT books
which are in PD...

And BTW, assuming that the GWN Dot met was Locasta, wouldn't she recall that
she came to Oz more than 25 years ago, since 'Giant Horse' and that the Good
Witch she met could NOT have been Tattypoo? And wouldn't Orin realise that
SHE wasn't the GWN who welcomed Dorothy?
 
Cheerioz!
 
~Gehan~

Date: Sat, 15 Jan 2000 22:11:35 -0600
Subject: Oz Witches
From: "David Godwin" <d.godwin at minn.net>
 
Witches and Water:
Wow! That last Digest slipped right by me and I didn't get a chance to reply
before now, so please excuse the fact that I am coming in late on this
topic.
 
Is there any precedent for Baum's idea that witches are melted by water? If
not, is it possible that the idea was suggested to him by the term "water
witching," used to designate dowsing?
 
It occurred to me that the phenomenon of physically melting away upon
contact with no more than a couple of gallons of water is distinctly
non-human. Human beings, so they say, are 70 percent water, a condition that
would hardly be tolerable for a witch; they couldn't even exist. Therefore,
goes my theory, witches are a breed apart, a different species entirely from
H. sapiens. This idea may be borne out by the fact that, unless killed, they
seem to be immortal and are universally female, yet bear no children.
Perhaps they are not even from this planet.
 
For that matter, what would happen if someone threw water on Glinda? Are
there two species of witches (Venefica bona and Venefica mala), one allergic
to water and one not?
 
David G.

From: CruentiDei at cs.com
Date: Sun, 16 Jan 2000 21:48:33 EST
Subject: Oz
 
Gehan:
I'm not sure that Lurline, or any other fairy, would have had the power to
make water destroy all wicked witches. That would imply that either fairies
are the fundamental source of magic, or the most powerful. There is plenty of
evidence in and out of the FF that fairies are just one of many magic workers
and not the end-all and be-all of magic.
 
Dave:
I have only one objection to a scale of magic based on title. I can't really
see that the title, in and of itself, would simply grant a person a higher
level of power that some other title. Anybody can stand up and say "I'm a
sorcerer" or whatnot. What would prevent all magic-users from picking the
most powerful title? Of course, it can be argued that not all magic-workers
have "the right stuff" to become a sorcerer.
 
It does seem, though, that many disciplines of magic seem to follow
traditional titles. Witches, Wizards, etc. seem to work on the same things.
Overall, I'd say that your scale is for the most part accurate, although
there could be some weak sorcerers or super-powerful magicians out there.
 
Tyler Jones

Date: Mon, 17 Jan 2000 08:45:21 -0500
From: "J. L. Bell" <JnoLBell at compuserve.com>
Subject: LOST art
 
Bill Wright, thanks for the URL for the San Diego/Baum article.
 
Robin Olderman wrote:
<<Dorothy's objection "But those other witches were bad and Gloma seems
really good and beautiful" is made on the grounds that it'd be a shame to
snuff a good witch, rather than that of water not working on all witches.
If you or yours are witches, folks, I guess you'd better avoid water.>>
 
Dorothy never goes through with the experiment, but this exchange certainly
implies Thompson's characters thought water worked on any witch. But can we
be sure that Mombi is still a witch in LOST KING? Like Gloma, she practiced
wicthcraft for many years. Unlike Gloma, she's forgotten her magic. Baum's
conception of witches did not involve signing one's soul over to the devil,
which would have at least left a paper trail and a date on which we could
say, "This is when she became a witch, forevermore."
 
I liked reading the list of elements Thompson seems to have borrowed from
the ALICE books for LOST KING. I see the influence of another fairy tale in
the weed- and vine-covered castle at Morrow [112-3], like the one in
"Sleeping Beauty." The "long silver casket" that rises from the table in
that castle [118] also seems familiar, but I can't tell if that's "Snow
White" or DRACULA.

         Turning to friendlier palaces, LOST KING tells us the population of
Ozma's: 49 courtiers, 112 servants, and uncounted pages [103]. Anyone care
to list courtiers introduced in the books so far to see how many we've yet
to meet? This book also mentions for the first time a clock in the palace's
highest tower [105] and a library, which no palace should be without [255].
LOST KING gives Dorothy back her "white kitten," in case anyone's keeping
track [165].
 
Neill drew full-page art for many previous books, but page 19 is LOST
KING's *only* full-page illustration, and it looks like it might be from a
previous project that happened to involve witches. He used charcoal in this
drawing but in few others [77, 207, 305].

         The rest of Neill's art seems to be of three sorts:
* triangular chapter-openers. That odd shape gives a constricted feel to
many of the drawings [esp. 197], but Neill also breaks that frame when he
wants to [90, 228, 245, 276].
* art elsewhere in the chapters, which is all the same proportion
regardless of whether there's more space to fill on the last page of a
chapter [e.g., 110, 186].
* color plates, which my edition doesn't have. I may have first read LOST
KING in a library edition with plates, however, since I have a vivid visual
memory of the weenix.

         The sparsity of full-page art, even in the frontmatter; the uniform
size of the other art, not tailored to chapter lengths; and the simple
endpapers, showing only two characters instead of a crowd, lead me to
wonder if Neill had less time to illustrate this book.

         Some other notable details in Neill's art:
15--I like how he drew the buttons, like a bunch of grapes.
111--The message in the art doesn't match the words in the text.
139--Here's another of Neill's characteristic daisies with faces.
238--Thompson says the Scarecrow was "climbing an old wind-mill nearby,"
and Neill puts more fun into that image by showing the straw man riding one
sail of the mill. The composition also fits nicely into his chapter-opening
triangle.
244--Why are Snip and [I therefore assume] Dorothy hanging from the palace
walls, instead of being inside where the text places them? Not the first
inexplicable appearance in Neill's drawing (going back to the Wogglebug's
early arrival in LAND), but perhaps the most dangerous.
 
J. L. Bell                  JnoLBell at compuserve.com

From: "Nathan Mulac DeHoff" <xornom at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-15-2000
Date: Mon, 17 Jan 2000 17:37:39 GMT
 
Robin:
 >  >>    In _Wishing Horse_, RPT has Pigasus say "All we have to do is find
 >some water. ....Quick, Dorothy, look and see if there is any water around
 >here, then as soon as Gloma pops her nose in the door we'll put her out as
 >neatly as you did that other witch." Dorothy's objection "But those other
 >witches were bad and Gloma seems really good and beautiful" is made on the
 >grounds that it'd be a shame to snuff a good witch, rather than that of
 >water
 >not working on all witches.  If you or yours are witches, folks, I guess
 >you'd better avoid water.   :)  --Robin
 
There's no indication that the water would have worked on Gloma, though.
Dorothy didn't exactly experiment on a random sample of witches.
 
Nathan

Date: Tue, 18 Jan 00 15:16:08 CST
From: "Ruth Berman" <berma005 at maroon.tc.umn.edu>
Subject: hollywood in oz
 
Robin Olderman: The lines from "Wishing Horse" on meltability of
witches -- since the passage is dialogue between Dorothy and Pigasus
rather than authorial fiat, it's possible to argue that D&P might be
mistaken.  The last time this topic came up, people pointed out that
Glinda (who is called Witch in "Wizard," although mostly Sorceress --
with still some Witching -- in the later books) goes near water in
various books with no signs of nervousness, and the title witch of "Zixi"
does, too.  So there's probably room for a good deal of
dfudgefactoring.
 
J.L. Bell: On how Dorothy knew Hollywood was a California town --
your suggestion that Trot might have told her Baum moved there is a
reasonable one.  But it's also possible that Dorothy might have gone
through it (or seen signs for transfer to it) in traveling in California after
close of "Dorothy/Wizard."  (Hmmm -- was Los Angeles connected at
the time to the "Atchison Topeka and the Santa Fe," as Judy Garland
sang about it in "The Harvey Girls"?  If so, from Hugson's she and her
uncle might have gone to LA to get home to Kansas by train.  And
what was that line of Mel Blanc's on the Jack Benny show about
changing for Kukamonga etc.?  And doesn't it seem a pity the Judy
Garland had to pair up with the heroic hero in HG instead of getting
the Ray Bolger character?)
 
Ruth Berman

Date: Wed, 19 Jan 00 15:03:29 (PST)
From: Dave Hardenbrook <DaveH47 at mindspring.com>
Subject: Ozzy Things
 
LOCASTA:
Gehan wrote
 >Just a quick question on 'The Unknown Witch of Oz'. Since 'Giant Horse' is
 >a copyrighted book, are you permitted to include events from 'Giant Horse'
 >in your book? I dont think Tattypoo is mentioned in any of the RPT books
 >which are in PD...
 
The consensus seems to be that as long as I only mention the events of
_Giant Horse_ in passing, and that Orin/Tattypoo doesn't appear onstage
at all, I'm probably okay copyright-wise.
 
 >And BTW, assuming that the GWN Dot met was Locasta, wouldn't she recall that
 >she came to Oz more than 25 years ago, since 'Giant Horse' and that the Good
 >Witch she met could NOT have been Tattypoo?
 
Dorothy's been in Oz and remained the same age so long she probably lost
track of time.  And Locasta and Tattypoo were identical to anyone who didn't
know both ladies well (i.e. no one except Mombi), so no one noticed the
change.
 
 >And wouldn't Orin realise that
 >SHE wasn't the GWN who welcomed Dorothy?
 
No, because Mombi made Tattypoo retain Locasta's memories (Locasta had
amneisia in the time period from her banishment to Orin's restoration), and
some of these memories lingered in Orin's mind even after she was restored.
(The "switcheroo spell" seems to have this side-effect.)
 
OZ WITCHES:
David Godwin wrote:
 >Is there any precedent for Baum's idea that witches are melted by water? If
 >not, is it possible that the idea was suggested to him by the term "water
 >witching," used to designate dowsing?
 
I heard that it was because water is a symbol for life.
 
 >For that matter, what would happen if someone threw water on Glinda?
 
Or Locasta?  Or Zixi?  Or Hermione?  Or Professor McGonagall?  (Sorry...
drifting into the wrong universe there...) :)  Presumably this is a
phenomenon soley of Oz witches (otherwise potion-brewing would be too risky,
wouldn't it?)... In the Sid and Marty Krofft universe _par example_,
Witchiepoo gets at various times dunked in water with no ill effects,
except that her wand "doesn't work when it's soggy".
 
My guess is that meltable witches are Magical Creatures (like Fairies, Orks,
Kalidahs, Limoneags, etc.), whereas most other witches are human with learned
powers.
 
                              -- Dave

Date: Wed, 19 Jan 2000 22:35:53 -0500
From: Michael Turniansky <turnip at bcpl.net>
Subject: Ozzy witches and whys
 
Gehan:
 
 >
 > Then the Soldier with Green Whiskers tells Dorothy in 'WIZARD' that Glinda
 > is the MOST powerful out of all the 'witches' in Oz. Then why didn't she
 > conquer teh Wicked Witches of the East and the West? And if she knew that
 > the Wizard was a humbug all along, why didn't she try to expose him? Maybe
 > she thought that it was better that the Wicked Witches of the East and West
 > remained in 'fear' that the Wizard was greater than they were, and that IF
 > she exposed the Wizard, one of the Wicked Witches would try to take their
 > place. But IF Glinda conquered the Wicked Witches of the East and West,
 > being more powerful than they were, then that would make her Good Sorceress
 > of the South, West and East, and perhaps she thought it was too much to
 > handle.
 
      Just because she more powerful than them *individually* doesn't mean she can
take on their combined assault (10>7, 10 >6, but 10<7+6).  Ever play three-handed
chess?  Concentrate on one opponent, and the third picks up the pieces of the
attrition.  Indeed, this is basically what happened in the Norman conquest of
Britain.  King Harold couldn't handle fighting both the Norseman in the north, and
the Norman French in the south.  Or, again, Hitler trying to fight both in the
Soviet Union and maintaining his lines in western Europe (although he was weakened
by this time).  It stands to reason, then, that Glinda would keep Oz in power,
knowing that the deference shown by the witches to the wizard would prevent them
concentrating their takeover attempts vs. her (or conversely, they would attemp
successfully take over the wizard, leaving them vulnerable to Glinda disabling
them).  OTOH, it also seems that Glinda is quite aloof in the pre-Dorothean
period, until the house shifted the balance of power, and so really couldn't care
less.   Perhaps she kept him on as a puppet ruler as in pre-Meiji Japan (gee, and
to think I hated history as a kid.  Guess some of this stuff soaked in...)
 
   Dave Godwin:
 
 > Is there any precedent for Baum's idea that witches are melted by water? If
 > not, is it possible that the idea was suggested to him by the term "water
 > witching," used to designate dowsing?
 >
 
      It may have its origin in medeival trial by water to test if someone is a
witch ("So, if she weighs the same as a duck, she's made of wood, and is a witch.
Burn her!  Burn her!")
 
 >
 > It occurred to me that the phenomenon of physically melting away upon
 > contact with no more than a couple of gallons of water is distinctly
 > non-human. Human beings, so they say, are 70 percent water, a condition that
 > would hardly be tolerable for a witch; they couldn't even exist
 
      Not necessarily.  We are 70 percent water precisely BECAUSE much the rest of
the stuff we are made off pretty much dissolves readily in water, allowing lots of
vital functions to take place.  If we were to be dehydatred and left with just the
other compounds, and then the water poured back onto that powder, there would be
nothing discernible left....If you prick them, do they not bleed?  Oh, sorry,
that's Jews, not witches...
 
                  --Mike "Shaggy Man" Turniansky

Date: Thu, 20 Jan 2000 09:42:43 +1100
From: Gehan <calamity at eureka.lk>
Subject: Ozzy Things
 
Water and Witches:
 
Dave once told me that witches have to be 'shrivelled' up in order to be put
out with a pail of water, and Baum himself states that the Wicked Witch of
the West's blood had all dried up long ago, and if I remember correctly,
blood has 90% water. That seems to be the only 'reasonable' theory, but
another theory is that all wicked witches are allergic to water by birth,
and I also agree with David (Godwin) that witches are a totally different
type of beings. In Roald Dahl's 'The Witches', witches are supposed to be
deamons in human form, who look like women and are able to act like women,
yet they are an entirely different race of 'creatures'. However, another
theory is that the Wicked Witch of the West was the only witch who was
allergic to water, since all her blood had dried up and since she was old
and 'shrivelled' up. Even after Dot poured water on her, she said "didn't
you know that water would mean the death of me?". Baum never implies that
ALL witches are allergic to water, does he? If Mombi was allergic to water,
how could she have taken the magic drink which Glinda gave her? Practically
ALL drinks/liquids have water in them......

But that theory is ONLY possible, assuming that Baum's books are the 'true'
'historically accurate' 'official' set of Oz Books. But anyway, my own
MOPPET is that all wicked witches who live in the same continent of
imagination where Oz is located, are all allergic to water by birth. I dont
think that 'good' witches are allergic to H2o however.
And anyway, Glinda is a sorceress, so she can't be put out with water. I
don't think Tattypoo is 'meltable' since she is actually a princess
transformed into a witch. What about Locasta, Dave?
 
~Gehan~

From: Ozmama at aol.com
Date: Thu, 20 Jan 2000 00:52:51 EST
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-19-2000
 
John Bell:<< But can we be sure that Mombi is still a witch in LOST KING?
Like Gloma, she practiced wicthcraft for many years. Unlike Gloma, she's
forgotten her magic. >>

Which brings us right back to the basic question.  What is a witch?  How does
one become a witch?  Once a witch, always a witch?  Is one born a witch, or
does one attain/learn a set of skills that make one a witch?
 
Water and witches: I think Ruth Berman says it all with "So there's probably
room for a good deal of fudgefactoring."
 
About Glinda: I don't think she's a witch.  Sorceress works better, at least
for me.  She's unique.  I've always believed that she is some kind of
Ozma-protector or helper figure.  She takes no action in Oz until Ozma is
stolen--doesn't seem to care at all who's ruler once Ozma's disappeared--but
swings into action rather strongly when it becomes apparent to her that Ozma
has been found. (I think Glinda's giving up so easily on finding Ozma in the
first place is inconsitent with her behavior towards the young queen/princess
in other books.)  She never really acts as a caretaker for Oz itself and only
acts on a grand scale (Barrier of Invisibility) when Ozma asks her for help.
Actually, I can't think, offhand, of any time that Glinda uses her magic
other than directly in Ozma's service.   --Robin

From: JOdel at aol.com
Date: Thu, 20 Jan 2000 11:54:01 EST
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-19-2000
 
Point 1. I suggest that Glinda got the Great Book of Records to the point she
was ready to go public with it only shortly before OZMA, and that it was at
the demonstration of its capabilities that Ozma learned of the fate of the
Queen of Ev and her children, went off half-cocked, and started putting
together her invasion of the Nome King's realm. I really doubt that she had
it any earlier than that.
 
Point 3. L.A. was connected to the rest of the nation's railroad system in
'86. And if Dot and her uncle came as far south as the Santa Barbara area to
visit the Huggsons, they may very well have continued on into L.A. to connect
with an eastern-bound line. However, none of the big railroad lines (i.e.,
not the streetcar system) ever went through Hollywood. Someone may well have
told the travelers about the way that the film industry was moving into the
area for the sake of the climate, however.

Date: Thu, 20 Jan 00 11:24:32 CST
From: "Ruth Berman" <berma005 at maroon.tc.umn.edu>
Subject: witches in oz
 
David Godwin: I don't think anyone before Baum claimed that witches
melt in water, but I think he may have been drawing on the belief that
a witch could be detected by being dunked in water.  (The usual
version of this was belief was that someone who drowned in the
process was innocent and someone who survived was guilty, although
sometimes the belief went the other way round.)
 
J.L. Bell: Counting courtiers is difficult.  There are people on Ozma's
council of advisors who might not be counted as "courtiers" (Dorothy,
Wizard, Scarecrow, Jack Pumpkinhead, Tik-Tok, Wogglebug, Shaggy
Man, Hokus), rulers not usually resident in the palace who might
nevertheless be counted as among the advisors (Glinda, Tin
Woodman, Pastoria), palace residents who are probably not on the
council of advisors (Betsy, Trot, Button Bright, Shaggy's brother,
Dorothy's aunt and uncle, not to mention all the animals, although the
Lion, Sawhorse, Toto, and maybe Eureka and Glass Cat have
probably given more good advice in the course of assorted stories
than some of the official advisors).  There aren't really any
just-plain-Ozites named as being courtiers, although un-named there
are a Royal Steward, High Chamberlain, and indefinite number of
bystander courtiers.  The servants include the Soldier and Guardian,
Jellia, and assorted un-named footmen, valets, gardeners (and kitchen
boy Kapo in HT and the departed Susan Smiggs in GK).
 
Dave Hardenbrook: Your idea that witches-who-would melt are non-
humans with meltability as a particular characteristic of that species
(and that some witches are humans and non-melting) sounds like a
possibility.  I like better the ideas that came up when the topic of
witches was discussed before, that meltable witches are the ones who
have been working with evil magics for many years and that it is
because they are so shriveled from vast age and/or from long
exposure to toxic ingredients that they are meltable.  (On the theory
that Ozites became deathless only after Ozma's accession, the age
factor might be no longer relevant.)
 
Ruth Berman

Date: Thu, 20 Jan 2000 22:15:49 -0500
From: "J. L. Bell" <JnoLBell at compuserve.com>
Subject: which witch?
 
David Godwin wrote:
<<It occurred to me that the phenomenon of physically melting away upon
contact with no more than a couple of gallons of water is distinctly
non-human. Human beings, so they say, are 70 percent water, a condition
that would hardly be tolerable for a witch; they couldn't even exist.
Therefore, goes my theory, witches are a breed apart, a different species
entirely from H. sapiens. This idea may be borne out by the fact that,
unless killed, they seem to be immortal and are universally female, yet
bear no children. Perhaps they are not even from this planet.
 
For that matter, what would happen if someone threw water on Glinda? Are
there two species of witches (Venefica bona and Venefica mala), one
allergic to water and one not?>>
 
Baum's books, at least, seem to indicate that witchcraft is a body of
knowledge, not a state of being nor a separate species. We've already noted
how flexibly Mombi and Glinda referred to themselves. The Wizard becomes a
wizard without ceasing to be a man (and a mortal, furthermore). In GLINDA
the Su-dic explains, "A witch has to use her fingers, and a pig has only
cloven hoofs," implying that what defines a witch is her actions.

         Being able to remain young and/or alive seems to be an outgrowth of
that knowledge. And the witches have different ways of accomplishing that,
judging by their success:

         * The Soldier with the Green Whiskers reports in WIZARD, "Glinda is
a beautiful woman, who knows how to keep young in spite of the many years
she has lived."

         * Zixi also maintains youthful beauty after six centuries--but
unlike Glinda can't produce the same image in a mirror.

         * The Good Witch of the North and the Wicked Witches of the East
and West, in contrast, look very old. Indeed, the Wicked Witches seem to be
held together only by their magic, the latter "so old...that she dried up
quickly in the sun" after Dorothy's house proved such a shock to her
system.

         I suspect water was a similar shock to an already fragile Wicked
Witch of the West. But I don't think Baum ever said water would have the
same effect on other witches. Blinkie must be disposed of in a different
manner. Coo-ee-oh, a Krumbic Witch, shows no fear of water (a good thing,
since she lives on a submerging island).

         How Thompson's conception of witches (Tattypoo, Gloma, and Mombi,
most prominently) fits with Baum's is a different question. She presents
water as death to all witches. She calls Mombi a witch even though the old
cook has forgotten her witchcraft. I suspect Thompson also makes a strict
distinction between old, ugly, bad witches on the left hand, and young,
beautiful, good witches on the right. (The one exception, Tattypoo, turns
out to be young and beautiful after all.)
 
Robin Olderman asked:
<<What other Oz books share bildungsroman  (sp.?) characteristics? Who else
grows up emotionally in an Oz book?>>
 
Tandy in CAPTAIN SALT is the most obvious example, in a book that borrows
heavily from Kipling's coming-of-age novel CAPTAINS COURAGEOUS (not to
mention his JUNGLE BOOK).

         Pompa and Tatters have to do some growing up to realize who their
real loves are.

         But most of Thompson's books, like most of Baum's, are about
returning to or restoring a familial home, not growing up and leaving one.
 
More thoughts on LOST KING. In her foreword, Thompson thanks kids for their
feedback: "It is fine to know which of the dear old Oz celebrities you like
best" [9]. Quite  possibly as the result of that those letters, she brings
back Kabumpo, the first of her characters living outside the Emerald City
to play a major role in two books.

         It's quickly clear that Kabumpo's a bachelor at loose ends now that
his best friend has a wife: "Since Pompa married Peg there's been no
excitement at all. Fact is, I was just on my way to the Emerald City to see
whether I could stir up a little fun" [169-70]. Fun-loving though he is,
the Elegant Elephant is still the pompous pachyderm we met in KABUMPO.
Dorothy has to coax him into treating Humpy nicely [168] and helping "those
shabby fellows" [206]. Fortunately, Kabumpo's snobbery also makes him an
excellent ally in finding a lost king [224]. It'll take another adventure
or two for his character to mellow.

         In addition to bringing back Kabumpo, Thompson clearly read up on
LAND before she wrote LOST KING. We can see that study not only in the
Mombi/Pastoria plot, but also in how she reintroduces "Dr. Nikidik's
wishing pills" [113]. I believe we'll see these turned into the Wizard's
own wishing pills as Thompson's stories go on.

         On the other hand, Thompson seems to have skipped some details from
LAND. The Wizard suffers no stomachache from those pills, and doesn't have
to count to make his wish. The Winkie Country is in the East, and the
Munchkin in the West [31]. And she states that Prof. Wogglebug left Mombi's
name out of his history of Oz [32]. I find that hard to believe, given that
the vanquishing of Mombi was the one known adventure in Oz that involved
(ahem) Prof. H.M. Wogglebug, T.E.

         One last reference back: as she often does, Thompson mentions a
setting from her last book, in this case Perhaps City [104]. She also says
Dorothy was visiting her "old friends in Perhaps City" [126], which implies
a significant amount of time has passed since the events of GRAMPA.
 
As I wrote a few installments ago, none of Thompson's new characters in
LOST KING shows Kabumpo's staying power, even though they all ended up in
the Emerald City. Still, they get the job done in this book. A coupla
observations about those characters--

         Thompson implies that geese are narcoleptic, and that's why Pajuka
falls asleep on his feet as a goose [55 et seq] and as a newly restored man
[271]. She might have extrapolated this trait from how geese sleep standing
up, but that's hardly unique among birds. Has anyone else come across
another reference to falling asleep suddenly as particularly goosy?

         Dorothy tells Humpy, "You know, you're awfully like Scraps and the
Scarecrow" [137]. And indeed they're all stuffed, and we see all of them
early in their conscious lives. But Humpy seems to know what he's talking
about when he protests that, unlike those folks, he's "hair-brained" [152].
He literally doesn't have the sense to lift his face out of the dirt [141].
And even though he comes up with some good ideas to help Dorothy, he never
develops a personality besides "dummy."

         Nothing more to say about Snip except that Thompson states he wears
a "stiff little hat" [21--also 64, 175, 199] and boots [34]. Neill draws
him bare-headed and in shoes. Thompson also states Dorothy has a hat [151,
164] and boots [154], but Neill shows her wearing shoes and quickly losing
the hat [126].

         Tora's ears are first mentioned as "two butterflies," and he speaks
of them as if each delivers separate news [179]. Neill seems to have seen
more potential in drawing them as a single butterfly, which is indeed
rather nice [195]. Thompson writes that Snip likes Tora "in spite of his
strange ears," which is an attitude toward harmless oddity that seems
rather un-Ozian [183]. Of course, Snip also thinks that "people without
clothes [are] savages" [176], so he's not the most open-minded little boy.

         On the topic of tailoring, I'll close with a scene of Snip and
Pastoria I wrote for an unpublished manuscript (also potentially
unpublishable, in that it includes Snip and Pastoria). My characterizations
of them take off from how we last see the pair in LOST KING. Pastoria is
again behaving "absently" [278]. He's also kind to a fault, even Snip and
Pajuka agree [66-7]; since Blankenburg, therefore, the button boy has felt
an urge to protect the old tailor. I sense that responsibility might bring
out Snip's snippy side, just as when he meets Dorothy "sulkily" [198--also
207, 208, 210].

         To set the scene, my American visitor, Paul, has expressed a wish
for clothing to replace what he happened to be wearing when he arrived in
Oz. The Scarecrow replies sympathetically:

         " . . . They do say clothes make the man, and that's certainly so
in my case. I know just the fellow to help you. Pastoria! Here's a sew-sew
job for you!"

         "What's that?" the white-haired tailor answered. A little boy
carrying a large sewing basket pulled him over.

         "Our new visitor wants some ordinary clothing," the Scarecrow
explained.

         "If you have ordinary clothing," Paul added. He stared at the
little boy's brown suit, studded with more buttons than a computer
keyboard. The boy scowled back at Paul. "I need a suit that's...suitable."

         "My pleasure, young fellow," Pastoria assured him. He looped his
tape measure around Paul's stomach. The button boy took out a small book
and a green pencil. "Waist...24 inches."

         "24 inches, your highness."

         "Why 'your highness'?" Paul whispered to the boy.

         "Why, he used to be king of Oz!"

         "Then how come he's sewing clothes?"

         "Because I much prefer it," answered the tailor. "Inseam...25
inches. I still have my ears, young fellow. They haven't flown off for
years. Inseam..."

         "25 inches," repeated the boy.

         Pastoria gaped at his tape. "Excellent guess, Snip!" He stretched
Paul's arm out and measured. "Right arm...27 inches."

         "By the way," Paul said, "I, um, don't have any money."

         "We don't take money," Snip snapped.

         "I don't have a credit card, either."

         "Left arm...also 27 inches. What handy arms. Just come by our shop
for your suit," Pastoria assured Paul, "Wednesday."

         "Wednesday?"

         The tailor stroked his beard in concern. "Maybe Tuesday."

         "But I need something to wear today."

         "Might you have come last Friday?" Pastoria asked sadly. "I suppose
not. Perhaps you can borrow clothing from another young fellow. Where did
Button-Bright go?" . . .
 
J. L. Bell                  JnoLBell at compuserve.com

From: CruentiDei at cs.com
Date: Sun, 23 Jan 2000 21:46:09 EST
Subject: Oz
 
Gehan:
Dave Hardenbrook can probably give you some of his ideas about the relative
power of "The two GWN's" and he can probably explain your other GWN
questions. Glinda may have been the single most powerful magic-worker in all
Oz, but she may not have been able to take on both the WWW and WWE (with the
three WWS's right in her backyard).
 
GLinda may not have had her Great Book before _Land_, or maybe it was a
primitive version that she upgraded over the years.
 
Water, water everywhere, and not a witch to melt:
I doubt that Glinda would melt if doused with water, although that would
explain why she lives so close to a bone-dry desert. From what we know, water
seems to affect only wicked old witches, and Glinda is none of that above.
THat is, assuming that there is an intrinsic difference between witches,
sorcerers, wizards, etc. as opposed to just a disciplinary difference.
 
Tyler Jones

Date: Mon, 24 Jan 00 12:22:14 (PST)
From: Dave Hardenbrook <DaveH47 at mindspring.com>
Subject: Ozzy Things
 
OZ WITCHES:
Gehan wrote:
 >Dave once told me that witches have to be 'shrivelled' up in order to be put
 >out with a pail of water, and Baum himself states that the Wicked Witch of
 >the West's blood had all dried up long ago, and if I remember correctly,
 >blood has 90% water.
 
This was the Adepts' assesment, and they tell me that it takes a long
time *and* really vast evil to reached that sufficiently "shrivelled" state.
Mombi probably didn't hack it on either count.  So they believe that she
couldn't be "washed out" and that she's still out there somewhere.
 
 >In Roald Dahl's 'The Witches', witches are supposed to be
 >deamons in human form, who look like women and are able to act like women,
 >yet they are an entirely different race of 'creatures'.
 
Dahl's assesment of the nature of witches is so irreconsilable with both
the Oz and Hogwarts universes, that I totally reject it... ( Besides, I
hated the film. :) )
 
 >What about Locasta, Dave?
 
She's not nearly ancient enough, and she's sufficently good to prevent
"shrivelling"...
 
Michael Turniansky write:
 >Just because she more powerful than them *individually* doesn't mean she can
 >take on their combined assault (10>7, 10 >6, but 10<7+6).  Ever play three-
 >handed chess?
 
Yes I have, and I like your analogy!
 
Tyler wrote:
 >Dave Hardenbrook can probably give you some of his ideas about the relative
 >power of "The two GWN's" and he can probably explain your other GWN
 >questions.
 
I consider that Locasta is less powerful than Glinda, Zim, Reera, the Adepts,
and the Wizard, but more powerful than Gloma, Gaylette, Zixi, and Polychrome.
She was slightly more powerful than Tattypoo... This is partly because only
Locasta knows "The Magic of Everything", which in my books is kind of the
"Quantum Mechanics" of Magic.  With her acquired knowledge of witchcraft
coupled with her native fairy magic, Ozma is about equal in power to Locasta.
 
                              -- Dave

From: "Nathan Mulac DeHoff" <xornom at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-24-2000
Date: Mon, 24 Jan 2000 23:20:03 GMT
 
Gehan:
 >That seems to be the only 'reasonable' theory, but
 >another theory is that all wicked witches are allergic to water by birth,
 >and I also agree with David (Godwin) that witches are a totally different
 >type of beings. In Roald Dahl's 'The Witches', witches are supposed to be
 >deamons in human form, who look like women and are able to act like women,
 >yet they are an entirely different race of 'creatures'.
 
Regarding the question as to whether or not witches are ordinary mortals,
the WWW makes a bar of iron "invisible to mortal eyes."  Although not
explicitly stated, this seems to imply that she can see it, and is not a
mortal.
 
 >If Mombi was allergic to water,
 >how could she have taken the magic drink which Glinda gave her? Practically
 >ALL drinks/liquids have water in them......
 
Perhaps it's only pure water that affects witches.  At one point in _Lost
King_, Mombi drinks coffee, and that certainly has water in it.  That still
leaves open the question of what she does when it rains, though.
 
Ruth:
 >There aren't really any
 >just-plain-Ozites named as being courtiers, although un-named there
 >are a Royal Steward, High Chamberlain, and indefinite number of
 >bystander courtiers.  The servants include the Soldier and Guardian,
 >Jellia, and assorted un-named footmen, valets, gardeners (and kitchen
 >boy Kapo in HT and the departed Susan Smiggs in GK).
 
There's also a kitchen boy named Iva in _Wishing Horse_ (which is the same
book in which Kapo appears, I think), and a pompous footman named Puffup in
_Handy Mandy_.
 
Tyler:
 >I doubt that Glinda would melt if doused with water, although that would
 >explain why she lives so close to a bone-dry desert.
 
Glinda participates in the water party at Singing Brook in _Scalawagons_,
which seems to have no effect on her.
 
Nathan

From: Ozmama at aol.com
Date: Mon, 24 Jan 2000 18:44:27 EST
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-24-2000
 
In a message dated 1/24/00 3:09:45 PM Central Standard Time,
OzDigest at mindspring.com writes:
 
Gehan:<< Then the Soldier with Green Whiskers tells Dorothy in 'WIZARD' that
Glinda is the MOST powerful out of all the 'witches' in Oz. Then why didn't she
conquer teh Wicked Witches of the East and the West? And if she knew that
the Wizard was a humbug all along, why didn't she try to expose him?  >>
This makes me more secure in my MOPPET that Glinda is more an Ozma protector
than an Oz protector.  As long as Glinda didn't perceive a direct connection
to Ozma's wellbeing, she didn't take action.  (But I'll never figure out why
she seems to have given up so readily on finding Ozma.)
 
--Robin

From: Ozmama at aol.com
Date: Mon, 24 Jan 2000 18:51:02 EST
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-24-2000
 
I'd asked<<  Who else grows up emotionally in an Oz book?>>
 
  John responded:<Tandy in CAPTAIN SALT is the most obvious example.... >>

      Duh!  How could I forget him?!   And thanks for sharing the scene
from your unpublished ms.  Very enjoyable.  --R.

Date: Tue, 25 Jan 2000 13:59:24 -0500
From: "J. L. Bell" <JnoLBell at compuserve.com>
Subject: witches and kings
 
Robin Olderman wrote of Glinda:
<<She never really acts as a caretaker for Oz itself and only acts on a
grand scale (Barrier of Invisibility) when Ozma asks her for help.
Actually, I can't think, offhand, of any time that Glinda uses her magic
other than directly in Ozma's service.>>
 
Actually, Glinda established the Barrier of Invisibility when Ozma was
GOING to ask for her help. She also sends the Oogaboo army out of Oz and
sends the Scarecrow to right things in Jinxland without consulting with
Ozma, indeed without even informing her sovereign.

         I think Glinda's the type of ruler who takes unilateral steps "for
the greater good." And to my knowledge she's always been correct--she is
Glinda the Good, after all. But she seems to decide what constitutes the
greater good largely on her own.
 
On the question of witches, it seems clear to me that Baum didn't portray
them as a separate race of beings, the way he depicted the various kinds of
fairies. Instead, witches seem to be mortals (or, in the case of Ozians,
ordinary immortal people) who've attained a certain knowledge. One clue to
this is how Baum showed two different sorts of magic-workers losing their
powers.

         Toward the end of LAND, Glinda tells Mombi, "I shall merely ask you
to drink a powerful draught which will cause you to forget all the magic
you have ever learned." This implies that one becomes a witch by learning
certain magic, and forgetting that magic makes one cease being a witch. As
Mombi replies, "Then I would become a helpless old woman!" Thompson
reflects that in LOST KING when she states, "Mombi had forgotten every
witch word she had ever known" [20]. Her attempts to re-learn her magic by
herself end in failure. But with prompting from others she can recognize
incantations and once again produce magical effects, as when she causes
Ozma's palace to vanish [236-7, 121].

         In contrast, after Tititi-Hoochoo proposes to take "away
[Ruggedo's] magic powers" in TIK-TOK, he does more than cause the Nome King
to forget his spells. In chapter 18, Quok tells Ruggedo, "Tititi-Hoochoo,
the Jinjin, enchanted this ribbon in such a way that whenever Your Majesty
looked upon it all knowledge of magic would desert you instantly, nor will
any magical formula you can remember ever perform your bidding." As it
turns out, Ruggedo can still recall a magic formula, the one to protect
himself from eggs--he hasn't lost all knowledge of magic after all. But
knowledge is no longer enough for Ruggedo. His charm has no effect. The
grouchy rock fairy then realizes "that his magic power had been taken away
from him and in the future he could do no more than any common mortal."
Later books show him able to work newly learned charms and to use magical
tools, but his original Nome magic is gone.

         There's less stated about the case of Blinkie in SCARECROW, but she
appears to have her powers blocked without losing her memory. The Scarecrow
shakes Glinda's second powder over her. She tries to cast a spell on
Jinxland, unsuccessfully. The Scarecrow then says, "You are no longer a
witch, but an ordinary old woman." This seems to be a more powerful potion
than what Glinda gave Mombi, and seems to have had longer lasting results.
 
         It strikes me, then, that Baum's Nomes are a separate class of
beings, whose magic is innate until removed by a higher power. Ruggedo
remains a Nome even after losing his power; he never becomes "an ordinary
old man." Witches, on the other hand, seem to be biologically human and
return to being human after their knowledge of witchcraft is erased or
blocked.

         That in turn leads to the conclusion that something particular
about the Wicked Witch of the West made her vulnerable to water. Whatever
it was doesn't seem to affect the Wizard, Glinda, Coo-ee-oh, and other
people at one point called "witch" or its male equivalent. It may well have
affected Mombi, given the likelihood that they performed the same types of
experiments and were both very old. But I'm not convinced that was
necessarily the case.
 
Some irrelevant comments on the irrelevant episodes of LOST KING: As much
as in any other Thompson book, they seem inserted to take up space. (I'd
say "to take up time" except that we seem to have determined Dorothy's
adventures take up too much time to fit with other events.) Catty Corners
allows Mombi to demonstrate her baking powder, but the other encounters are
of literally no consequence.

         On the other hand, these episodes aren't all the same story over
and over. Unlike ROYAL BOOK, in which each strange new people (the mud
people, the Pokes, the Fixes) want to convert newcomers into one of them,
only the Blanks threaten to do that in LOST KING. In contrast, this book's
rulers basically want the royal treatment. King Rollo wants visitors to bow
down to him [71]. The Queen of Catty Corners insists, "I'm a Queen...and I
don't give a yowl for Ozma." [93] Even Vanetta/Vanette of Blankenburg  has
made laws that ensure she "always wins all the beauty prizes" [194]. That
fits with the book's theme of finding a lost king.

         Some even more random comments: Thompson says the Hoopers live in a
"park," presumably the same sort that children would roll hoops in [69].

         The Laughing Willows [76] are basically the same joke as the Town
Laugher. And just as the Town Laugher has a Town Cryer, these trees have
their opposites in the Quadling Country: the Fighting Trees.

         A sign at the gate of Catty Corners says, "No boys allowed!" [82]
This reflects an American cultural connection of cats with females (and
dogs with males) that goes back at least a century before LOST KING.

         Humpy asks if the Backwoodsmen speak Arabic, which is written right
to left just like the "back talk" Dorothy comes up with [146]. I'm not sure
why Thompson has the Backwoodsmen first let Dorothy and Humpy pass [149],
and then says they had no such intention [151], except to depict them as
mean. Humpy also says running backward is like being in "a funny picture"
[151], and indeed most people first saw action reversed in movie comedies.
[The man who discovered how to shoot action backwards by holding the camera
upside-down was actually shooting pornography.]

         The last episode of little consequence is Dorothy's encounter with
the Scooters. They assume Dorothy and Humpy are like them, but don't seem
annoyed when they learn otherwise [164]. All in all, the Scooters are among
of the nicest irregular humans that Dorothy comes across in Thompson's
books.
 
J. L. Bell                  JnoLBell at compuserve.com

Date: Wed, 26 Jan 00 09:09:29 CST
From: "Ruth Berman" <berma005 at maroon.tc.umn.edu>
Subject: neill in oz
 
 
J.L. Bell: Enjoyed your comments on the art in "Lost King."  The
triangle heading with "Go today tomorrow" -- although the words, as
you mention, don't exactly match text, the illo is nice, with the words
substituting for a side of the triangle, an interesting variation on lining
it off.  Yes, the weenix color plate is a striking one, with the weenix's
tears flying out against the solid black background.  (Irene Fisher," in
an early "Bugle" article on Neill's art, commented that for a few years
about this time Neill was making a lot of use of dramatic areas of solid
black as backgrounds, and that's certainly true of LK.)  If the "Bugle"
should want to reprint some of these color plates as covers sometime,
there are about four here that seem to me especially attractive.
Besides the weenix, there's one of Mombi cooking, with steam curling
up around her on one side, and the other side framed by the
stovepipe, with Mombi in a bright red top vivid against another of
those black bgs, and one of Kabumpo & co arriving at the palace
(ornately domed and spired, with statuary of Scarecrow, Tin Man, and
Soldier with the Green Whiskers), and one of Ozma lost in memory in
the cobwebby Morrow lodge (beautiful in spite of a left arm as weirdly
bent as the one Justin Richards pointed out in a "Grampa" colorplate).

    There wasn't much discussion of the art for the two preceding
books, so I think I'll mention also some striking color plates in
"Grampa" and "Cowardly Lion" it would be nice to see in the "Bugle"
(for their own merits, and because facsimile reprints of them are
otherwise unavailable to most).  In "Grampa," the one of Polychrome
leading the travelers over the rainbow (Neill was always striking with
rainbows), and maybe the one of Urtha asleep in the garden; in
"Cowardly Lion," the one of the old fairyman with the lanterns by the
sleeping Notta and Bob, and the one of the Scarecrow dishing out Oz
Cream.  It occurs to me now that the Oz Cream is in a big container
inside a bigger, ice-filled container -- evidently they make it themselves
on the spot out of fresh cream.  (Considering that home-freezers or
refrigerators with freezing compartments weren't, I think, generally
available at the time, the use of home ice-cream makers was probably
more familiar to readers then than it is now.)

    One more Neill-art point: a while back, we were talking about the
2-page spread in "Lucky Bucky" of a crowd of sorcerors done in a style
20 years earlier than the rest of the book.  It was reprinted as a
"Bugle" cover once with a caption pointing out the mystery as to its
origins.  Somehow, I never until now noticed the fine print in the
*following* issue, with a note explaining that the illo originally ran in a
1920s issue of "Boy's Life."  Unfortunately, the note doesn't give exact
date ("1920" could mean the year or even the whole decade), or the story.
 
Ruth Berman

From: CruentiDei at cs.com
Date: Wed, 26 Jan 2000 23:01:50 EST
Subject: Oz
 
Gehan wrote:
 > But anyway, my own MOPPET is that all wicked witches who
 > live in the same continent of imagination where Oz is
 > located, are all allergic to water by birth.

That implies that people are "assigned" a morality of good
or evil at birth, and I'm a little uncomfortable with that.
I like the idea that as some witches gravitate toward evil,
they become dried up and more allergic to water.
 
Piers Anthony, in his _Xanth_ novels, had an interesting discussion
of the differences in BEING magical and HAVING magic. A creature
such as a dragon (or a Woozy) is magical in nature, while other
animals can have magical abilities. Most animals in Oz, such as
the Cowardly Lion and Billina, do not seem to me to really BE
magical. Apart from their ability to talk, they seem to possess
no magical talents or innate abilities.
 
Tyler Jones

Date: Mon, 31 Jan 2000 16:13:06 +1100
From: Gehan <calamity at eureka.lk>
Subject: Ozzy Things
 
Magic-Workers:
In 'Magical Mimics of Oz', Jack Snow implies that some of the Ozites had
studied witchcraft and learned other arts of magic, and as a result, created
alot of trouble in Oz and nearly prevented Princess Ozma from ascending the
throne. This seems to imply that Mombi and the other three witches were just
ordinary women who studied/practised witchcraft, and eventually became
wicked witches. Another example is Ugu the Shoemaker Wizard. I know that NO
ONE is BORN evil, but in this case, I have to believe that witches ARE
wicked by birth, due to their ancestors. It must be in the genes or
something. LOL! I think the same goes for Nomes, Mimics, Growlywogs,
Whimises, Erbs e.t.c., e.t.c, e.t.c. However, villains like Coo-ee-oh,
Mrs.Yoop e.t.c seem to have been simply misguided. (In 'Ice King of Oz',
Glinda tells Dorothy : "We do not know whether the Ice King really IS evil,
or just misguided.)

As for the Witches, my guess is that their OLDEST ancestors were just plain
ordinary old women who studied witchcraft and BECAME witches, yet their
daughters, grand-daughters, great-granddaughters and so on were witches by
birth/were obliged to learn witchcraft in order to continue the generation
of 'witches'. Tip tells everyone in 'Land' that Mombi never went so chool,
and so she knows nothing about algebra. Perhaps witches are only meant to
study witchcraft. I also think that the VERY first witches became allergic
to water due to spending too much time with potions and chemicals, yet the
other generations of witches were allergic to water by birth. Another
'genes' case, I bet.....LOL!
 
~Gehan~

Date: Mon, 31 Jan 2000 10:16:16 -0500
From: "John W. Kennedy" <rri0189 at attglobal.net>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-30-2000
 
J. L. Bell wrote:
 >          Some even more random comments: Thompson says the Hoopers live in a
 > "park," presumably the same sort that children would roll hoops in [69].
 
A neat interpretation, but A) were children rolling hoops this late? and
B) just how far had "park" gone in its transition from "plot of land
neither wild nor farmed nor substantially built upon" to "public
recreation area"?  (Three guesses what movie Eleanor and I saw lately.)
 
Ruth Berman wrote:
 >     It occurs to me now that the Oz Cream is in a big container
 > inside a bigger, ice-filled container -- evidently they make it themselves
 > on the spot out of fresh cream.  (Considering that home-freezers or
 > refrigerators with freezing compartments weren't, I think, generally
 > available at the time, the use of home ice-cream makers was probably
 > more familiar to readers then than it is now.)
 
I grew up with many of my mother's and cousins' old Bobbsey's, etc.; I'd
say that's right.
 
Tyler Jones wrote:
 > Gehan wrote:
 >  > But anyway, my own MOPPET is that all wicked witches who
 >  > live in the same continent of imagination where Oz is
 >  > located, are all allergic to water by birth.
 > That implies that people are "assigned" a morality of good
 > or evil at birth, and I'm a little uncomfortable with that.
 
Well, it's kinda yer basic Calvinism.  Of course, Baum wasn't a
Christian, but seeing that 99% of today's society seems to be Calvinist
without being Christian, I'm not sure there's any contradiction there.
(I wish, I wish, I WISH I knew what he meant by saying that his main
reason for rejecting Christianity was "the Devil"; to someone with a
sound grounding in theology, that's like saying that ones main reason
for opposing the Automobile is that they come with cigarette lighters.)
--
-John W. Kennedy
-rri0189 at ibm.net
Compact is becoming contract
Man only earns and pays.  -- Charles Williams

Date: Mon, 31 Jan 2000 18:29:18 -0600
From: David Hulan <davidhulan at ntsource.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-06 thru 12-2000
 
1/6:
Tyler:
 >Age, experience and wisdom do not always go together, however. The president
 >of the company I work for is younger than several of the people there, but he
 >is the best programmer I have ever seen.
 
Programming, like most branches of math and science, is a talent where
people usually peak at a fairly young age. Statecraft, on the other hand,
is much more dependent on accumulated experience, and its practitioners
usually continue to become better at it up into their 60s at least. I can
readily believe that Glinda might have been a more powerful sorceress a few
centuries back, but I doubt if she was as wise about affairs of state.
 
Nathan again:
 >Are there any shops that would definitely be considered stores
 >within the Oz series?
 
When Dorothy enters the EC in _Wizard_ she sees "many shops" on her way to
the palace, but that was before Ozma's accession and therefore might not be
relevant.
 
Scott H.:
 >I thought there was an implication that they got meat that grows on trees,
 >like the lunch pail trees, only different.  Or perhaps that's unique to
 >Ooogaboo.
 
Humans may, but there's a clear implication that the Cowardly Lion, for
instance, hunts down other animals for food in _Wizard_ (though it's not
completely explicit), and certainly the Kalidahs seem to be intending to
eat Dorothy in that book and Trot and Cap'n Bill in _Magic_.
 
1/9:
Nathan:
 >Is there any reason why her [Ozma's] father couldn't be part-fairy?  That
 >would
 >certainly explain why the Blankenburg water didn't work on him, since,
 >according to the Wizard in _Lost Princess_, fairies can't be made invisible
 >against their will.
 
No, but Baum says that Ozma was descended from a long line of fairy queens;
this implies that her mother was at least part fairy, whatever her father's
status. (Although I suppose the implication isn't absolute; one might say
Prince Charles is descended from a long line of kings, even though his
father wasn't one of them.)
 
J.L.:
 >Dorothy has to take leave of her friends in
 >Perhaps City, make her way down "the steep mountain path" [127--also
 >remember Percy's difficult departure in GRAMPA], find the Wish Way, go to
 >Hollywood, bring Humpy to life, bring him back to Oz, escape the
 >Backwoodsmen, meet the Scooters, and find Kabumpo, all before 9:00 AM. I
 >think the only way Dorothy could do those impossible things before Ozma's
 >breakfast is if time itself ran backwards. But that may be what happens in
 >the Back Woods.
 
And of course, when she says "I wish I were back!" this may have returned
her to the time she left Oz, if not the place, and if time also rewound a
bit more in the Back Woods it might have been more like 8 AM when she
encountered the Scooters (regardless of what time they thought it was).
 
 >wouldn't she [Ozma]
 >remember Mombi more clearly as the nasty guardian who'd reared her?
 >Nevertheless, when Ozma sees Mombi, she shows no especial reaction [253],
 
Possibly Mombi's appearance had changed enough between the end of _Land_
and _Lost King_ that Ozma didn't recognize her immediately?
 
 >         And one chronometer mystery: Humpy has "a dollar watch" [249]. Why
 >would a studio equip a dummy with a watch, especially when he was supposed
 >to be falling for a medieval king? Shades of SPARTACUS!
 
Humpy apparently was used as a dummy in many different movies; maybe the
watch was left over from one where he was falling for a character in a
gangster movie or some such, and whoever re-dressed him didn't bother to
remove it.
 
Gehan:
 >And there WERE motion pictures as early as that [1908], though they
 >weren't AS developed....
 
I don't think they were centered in Hollywood that early, though. I could
be wrong; others on the Digest are much more knowledgeable about movies
than I. But I know the movie industry in the US was centered around New
York City in its early days; I don't think it moved to Hollywood until the
1910s, at least for the majority of pictures.
 
I think Dorothy very likely changed her attitude about killing evil
characters between _Wizard_ and _Ozma_; she certainly didn't hesitate to
use eggs against the Nomes in the latter book, although perhaps she didn't
know they were deadly. As for Ozma, Mombi is really the only character she
seems to have destroyed on her own initiative; Glegg is apparently
destroyed, but that was because the answer box said to make him drink
Triple Trick Tea. Nobody knew what that would do to him; for all Ozma knew
it might just make him a Nice Person. Other wicked characters are exiled or
turned into something harmless, but not destroyed.
 
1/12:
J.L.:
 >Why couldn't Pastoria have ruled Oz in his kind, absent, and increasingly
 >weak way for centuries?
 
No reason except that Ozma says that her grandfather was king of Oz when
the wicked witches took over, which to me seems to imply that Pastoria
couldn't have ever really ruled Oz, though he might have been the titular
monarch.
 
 >some things (babies, trees, nuts) have little or no
 >memory, so transforming someone into one of those might accomplish the
 >amnesia without requiring a separate spell.
 
Interesting speculation. The rule seems to be that when a transformation is
fully reversed, the memories of the original state return (but the memories
from the transformed state remain.)  However, a transformed being can be
brought to life without recovering memories (e.g., Peg Amy), and most
likely only reversing one stage of a multi-step transformation doesn't
restore the memories from before an earlier stage. Thus when Mombi
transforms Ozma into the baby Tip, he retains no memories of having been
Ozma. But when that transformation is broken and Tip becomes Ozma again,
she remembers her early life as a baby and perhaps toddler in Oz, but not
her origins in Lurline's band (though she eventually does learn about those
as well, whether she really remembers them or not).
 
 > I have a related question: Is Mombi really
 >a witch at this point? And would water have any effect on her?
 
She obviously thought it would; I think she says something specific to the
point before she turns the inland sea to gelatin.
 
Nathan:
I think I mentioned at the time that on a trip to Belgium a few years ago I
passed through a city called Blankeburg. Its inhabitants all seemed to be
quite visible, though. (But of course, if they weren't I wouldn't have
known - except that the day was quite chilly, so I'd have expected to see
some empty suits of clothes walking around...)
 
I don't recall Dorothy eating fish either before or after _Lost King_, but
I haven't done any kind of detailed analysis of what she eats. (That's a
pretty good Research Table project, though. Speaking of which, Andrea
Yussman is having to give up being coordinator of the Oz Research Group and
Story Circle, and I've volunteered to take it over unless someone else
really wants to. So any of you with research or stories should send them to
me now. Next mailing out in April sometime, assuming there's anything to
mail.)
 
Gehan:
Thompson does get a bit carried away with her superlatives, but then so did
Baum. Give a bit of poetic license to the folks.
 
David Hulan

From: Ozmama at aol.com
Date: Mon, 31 Jan 2000 21:47:38 EST
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-30-2000
 
In a message dated 1/30/00 7:33:13 PM Central Standard Time,
OzDigest at mindspring.com writes:
 
I said:<< Actually, I can't think, offhand, of any time that Glinda uses her magic
  other than directly in Ozma's service.>>
 
John responded: <<Actually, Glinda established the Barrier of Invisibility when
Ozma was GOING to ask for her help. She also sends the Oogaboo army out
of Oz and sends the Scarecrow to right things in Jinxland without consulting with
Ozma, indeed without even informing her sovereign. >>

     The first two examples cited were still done for Ozma's sake.  The
last,however, is a different kind of thing entirely, and I haven't before
considered it.  Glinda becomes involved because the Scarecrow asks
what's new, and she checks her Great Book.  There, they discover the
plight of Trot and Cap'n Bill and Button Bright.  They remember the
boy. Glinda says, rather thoughtfully, "I should like to help them."  The
Scarecrow supports that notion.  Once she determines to help the mortals, she
does so with decisiveness, giving the Scarecrow enough
magic to take away Blinkie's magic powers.  But it's Ozma who made the
law against unauthorized magic.  And we get the feeling that it's the
Scarecrow, not Glinda, who determines who should be the next ruler of
Jinxland.  Or am I misremembering that part?  I really think that if the
Scarecrow hadn't been with Glinda when she read about the Jinxland
situation, she might not have taken action...at least not more than that
of efficiently and magically rescuing the Americans.  As you say, John,
she *is* Glinda the *Good*!  I think I'll check _Glinda of Oz_ to see if
Glinda was tepid in her desire to help the poor Skeezers.  As I recall,
she didn't at all encourage Ozma to get involved.
 
Witches: Yes, Mombi fears being no more than an old woman when
she loses her magic, but Thompson repeatedly and consistently refers
to her as a witch in _Lost King_.  But I don't know any more than y'all
do whether you must be born to Oz witchiness or whether it's a learned
craft.  Maybe both?  As in not mutually exclusive?   I don't know what
to make of the Scarecrow's declaration to Blinkie in _Lost King_ about
her no longer being a witch.  Are we to believe that the Scarecrow is an
authority in such matters?
 
Hoopers in a park: In _Grampa_, the Playfellows are also enclosed in a
park.  Perhaps Thompson is continuing the Baum concept of enclosing
undesirables...kinda like Rigamarole....  Actually, I think there's a strong
Oz tradition of isolated and enclosed communities.  When one enters
these communities, there's usually a strong desire for a fast exit.  It'd be
rather convenient if all grabby or be-like-us-or-else communities in the
U.S. were walled off, too.
 
No boys allowed in Catty Corners: I'm not sure that this reinforces the
feminine mystique of felines as much as it refers to the fact that boys are
stereotypically too rough to play with cats.
 
Ruth: I believe the _Boy's Life_ Neill piece is from only one issue.  Ask
John VanCamp about it the next time you see him (hopefully this July?).
I think he may have the issue...and I believe it is from a single issue.
--Robin

Date: Fri, 4 Feb 2000 17:32:44 -0600
From: David Hulan <davidhulan at ntsource.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-15 thru 24-2000
 
1/15:
Robin:
It's apparent in _Wishing Horse_ (and _Cowardly Lion_) that Dorothy thinks
all witches are vulnerable to water. That doesn't necessarily make it so,
though; Dorothy isn't a student of magic and may be theorizing ahead of her
data. Certainly Mombi's revenant gets thoroughly soaked in _Lucky Bucky_
and comes to no permanent harm, though it might be argued that she's not
really a witch then (or that it's one more inconsistency in a Neill book).
Also, Coo-ee-oh hits the water in _Glinda_, though it's hard to say whether
she was a witch or a swan at that point. But if water would dissolve her,
why did the Su-dic use a magic potion rather than plain water? I think we
can safely assume that he knows a good deal more about magic than Dorothy
does.
 
J.L.:
 > It seems well within the
 >realm of possibility that Mombi blocked Glinda's magic from uncovering
 >Ozma's whereabouts.
 
But Glinda's magic seems to be far more powerful than Mombi's; it's hard to
imagine how Mombi could have blocked the Great Book of Records from finding
Ozma. Or Pastoria, for that matter.
 
 > Note that Lurline, Ozma's
 >"Fairy Godmother" [121], knew where her father was but never mentioned it.
 
But is there any evidence that Ozma and Lurline ever communicated after
Ozma took the throne? I don't recall any. (Well, until the much later
events of _Magical Mimics_.)
 
 >Such distance between Snip and his ruler makes it
 >easier to understand why he doesn't yell for help from Mombi, whom he knows
 >has no magical powers [35].
 
Anybody else want to join my campaign to abolish the use of the word "whom"
except when directly following a preposition? In other contexts my current
impression is that it's used incorrectly more often than correctly, even by
highly literate persons such as yourself, as in the above sentence. I find
sentences like "I don't know who you're talking about" much less grating
than "...whom he knows has no magical powers." Since only six words in
English (seven if you count "thou," but it's largely obsolete) preserve
distinct nominative and objective forms, most English speakers have lost
any intuitive feeling for which is "correct." The result is that, like the
use of the apostrophe, "proper" use of those cases for the six pronouns
that preserve it is more a means of showing off one's education than
anything to do with communication. For instance, on the rare occasions I
actually hear someone say, "It is I," I'm always expecting it to be
followed with, "Digby O'Dell, the Friendly Undertaker." (Of course, most of
you aren't old enough to remember that...)
 
Tyler:
 >The advent of RPT and the all-powerful magic belt overrides that, however. By
 >that time, the Ozzy powerful could do just about anything that they wanted.
 
I'm not sure that it's RPT that creates the all-powerful magic belt. It
seems to me that it's pretty much all-powerful in _Ozma_; the problem seems
to be that Ozma and Dorothy don't think of using it most of the time (as
when they're sunk in the lake in _Glinda_). And Dorothy seems to have
forgotten how to use it in _Lost Princess_ (and its powers seem to be
mysteriously diminished in that one book only).
 
1/19:
Gehan:
>And BTW, assuming that the GWN Dot met was Locasta, wouldn't she recall that
 >she came to Oz more than 25 years ago, since 'Giant Horse' and that the Good
 >Witch she met could NOT have been Tattypoo? And wouldn't Orin realise that
 >SHE wasn't the GWN who welcomed Dorothy?
 
Very possibly, but neither Dorothy nor the disenchanted Orin is ever a
point-of-view character in _Giant Horse_, so we don't know what they're
thinking.
 
David G.:
I think that in fact human beings are more than 70% water; I remember
something more like 90%. But wicked witches seem to be an exception to
this, or at least the WWW is. I think we can assume that the WWE is as
well, since she turns to dust shortly after the house falls on her and her
magic stops holding her together. For other witches this doesn't seem to be
the case necessarily, though; Zixi, for instance, doesn't seem to have any
fear of water, nor do Glinda or Coo-ee-oh in _Glinda_. We don't see any of
them getting wetted down, but they do things that could clearly put them in
danger of that fate without seeming to fear it.
 
It may have something to do with the kind of magic the witches use to
preserve their lives. Glinda seems to have found a spell that genuinely
keeps her young. Zixi's spell is not as powerful, but since she seems to be
totally fit as well as youthful-looking to everyone else, her body is
probably also kept in good condition. Coo-ee-oh's youth may well just be
the result of the general Oz spell of non-aging that took effect sometime
around the time of Ozma's accession; while it isn't explicit, my impression
in _Glinda_ is that Coo-ee-oh and the Su-dic have only been ruling their
respective countries for a decade or two.
 
Mombi, the WWW, and the WWE, on the other hand, had certainly been around
for more than half a century, possibly much longer, at the time of
Dorothy's first visit to Oz. If the spell they used to stay alive was much
less powerful than Glinda's or even Zixi's, it might be that water would
disrupt it and thus destroy them. I don't know of any legend that witches
were vulnerable to water before Baum, but there was a superstition that
witches couldn't cross running water (see "Tam O'Shanter's Ride" for an
example). And water is disruptive to certain kinds of magic spells in quite
a few fantasy books.
 
All this, of course, is pure speculation. There isn't much direct evidence,
but I think the above at least fits what evidence there is - without saying
that there aren't a dozen other explanations that fit equally well.
 
J.L.:
If my theory above is correct, then presumably when Mombi lost her magic it
didn't cancel the effect of whatever spell she'd used to keep herself
alive. The alternative is that once Ozma came to the throne Mombi, like
everyone else in Oz, became immortal and unaging. Since the breaking of
Ozma's enchantment necessarily took place before Mombi lost her powers,
she'd no longer need the special spell. But in that case, she probably
shouldn't have been vulnerable to water, either. Once again, we have to
wonder whether she was really liquidated or if she was just shooed off.
 
Ruth:
But Dorothy didn't go back to California at the end of _DotWiz_; Ozma sent
her directly back to Kansas, since Uncle Henry had already gone there.
 
The running gag in the Jack Benny show was about a bus, I think, rather
than a train; anyhow it was going to "Anaheim, Azusa, and Cucamonga." (Not
a very likely routing, since Anaheim is southeast of LA and Azusa is due
east, with Azusa about due north of Anaheim. Cucamonga is indeed farther
east of Azusa. "Altadena, Azusa, and Cucamonga" would have made more sense.)
 
1/24:
Gehan:
You're right that in a sense all the creatures in Oz are magical, including
the humans. Still, I think there's a difference between a creature who
shares in the magical character of the country, but is otherwise like its
normal counterparts in our world, and one that's fundamentally unlike any
creatures we know of here. The Woozy, the Sawhorse, the Glass Cat, the
dragons, etc. are in the latter category; Toto, Eureka, the Cowardly Lion
and Hungry Tiger, Hank, and so on are in the former.
 
Joyce:
Interesting point about Glinda's demo of the Great Book of Records setting
Ozma off on her misguided (if ultimately successful) expedition to rescue
the royal family of Ev. Works for me!
 
David Hulan

From: "Nathan Mulac DeHoff" <xornom at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 02-03-2000
Date: Sat, 05 Feb 2000 03:26:04 GMT
 
Gehan:
 >In 'Magical Mimics of Oz', Jack Snow implies that some of the Ozites had
 >studied witchcraft and learned other arts of magic, and as a result,
 >created
 >alot of trouble in Oz and nearly prevented Princess Ozma from ascending the
 >throne. This seems to imply that Mombi and the other three witches were
 >just
 >ordinary women who studied/practised witchcraft, and eventually became
 >wicked witches. Another example is Ugu the Shoemaker Wizard.
 
Ugu was not born as a magician, but the text makes explicit that one of his
ancestors had been a great sorceror, so he might have inherited some of this
ancestor's knack for magic.
 
 >Tip tells everyone in 'Land' that Mombi never went so chool,
 >and so she knows nothing about algebra. Perhaps witches are only meant to
 >study witchcraft.
 
Well, Tip hasn't been with Mombi for her entire life, so she might have been
to some kind of school before her "adoption" of the boy.  I think it's more
likely that she learned her witchcraft through a sort of private tutoring
(possibly by her mother, if you believe that witchcraft is genetic).
 
David Hulan:
>Humans may, but there's a clear implication that the Cowardly Lion, for
 >instance, hunts down other animals for food in _Wizard_ (though it's not
 >completely explicit), and certainly the Kalidahs seem to be intending to
 >eat Dorothy in that book and Trot and Cap'n Bill in _Magic_.
 
And the Cowardly Lion and the Hungry Tiger eat bees, and Dorothy and the
Wizard are only concerned that they might have been Trot and Cap'n Bill, not
that their friends ate other sentient beings.  Maybe the rules are different
for insects, though.  No one seems to have trouble with Billina eating bugs.
 
 > >wouldn't she [Ozma]
 > >remember Mombi more clearly as the nasty guardian who'd reared her?
 > >Nevertheless, when Ozma sees Mombi, she shows no especial reaction [253],
 >
 >Possibly Mombi's appearance had changed enough between the end of _Land_
 >and _Lost King_ that Ozma didn't recognize her immediately?
 
Along those same lines, it's interesting that Dorothy seems to immediately
recognize Mombi, even though they had never met in previous FF books.
 
Nathan

Date: Sat, 5 Feb 2000 11:34:41 -0600
From: David Hulan <davidhulan at ntsource.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-30 & 02-03-2000
 
1/30:
Robin:
 >This makes me more secure in my MOPPET that Glinda is more an Ozma protector
 >than an Oz protector.  As long as Glinda didn't perceive a direct connection
 >to Ozma's wellbeing, she didn't take action.  (But I'll never figure out why
 >she seems to have given up so readily on finding Ozma.)
 
Glinda certainly seems to be more interested in Ozma than in Oz as a whole,
but she's known to have taken action unrelated to either Ozma or the
Quadling Country - most notably, installing the Forbidden Fountain on the
palace grounds. That was well before Ozma's day, since the wicked king of
Oz was surely not Pastoria and probably not even his father.
 
Ruth:
 >(Considering that home-freezers or
 >refrigerators with freezing compartments weren't, I think, generally
 >available at the time, the use of home ice-cream makers was probably
 >more familiar to readers then than it is now.)
 
I ran across a reference a few days ago that said when freezing
compartments were first added to home refrigerators, but I can't remember
when it was. Sometime in the Twenties, I think. Home ice-cream makers were
still being made quite recently, though - I know we got one as a wedding
present (1974). (It didn't work very well, though.) They may be made even
now. I mean the old kind that you put a salt-and-ice mix in the outer part
and cranked an inner part; I know they make home ice-cream makers that you
chill in a freezer and then crank a while, because we have one and make ice
cream in it a few times a year.
 
Tyler:
 >Piers Anthony, in his _Xanth_ novels, had an interesting discussion
 >of the differences in BEING magical and HAVING magic. A creature
 >such as a dragon (or a Woozy) is magical in nature, while other
 >animals can have magical abilities.
 
This is pretty much the distinction that Baum makes between "immortals"
(fairies, nomes, wood nymphs, ryls, knooks, erbs, and so on) and humans,
even though some of the latter may also be immortal (like Ozites). The
former have innate magic; the latter have to learn it, though they can do
that.
 
2/3:
Gehan:
What evidence do you have that the ancestors of any of the witches we know
of were even witches, much less wicked ones? I recall no mention of any
such ancestors in any context. We do know that Ugu's ancestors were
magicians, but there's no evidence that they were wicked, and in fact
there's some that they weren't.
 
And I don't think Nomes are inherently wicked, though Erbs seem to be, and
Whimsies and Growleywogs probably are as well. Kaliko seems quite nice in
_Tik-Tok_, for instance.
 
John K.:
 >A neat interpretation, but A) were children rolling hoops this late?
 
Since I can remember rolling hoops when I was a kid in the Forties, the
short answer is "yes."
 
Robin:
Glinda in fact did her best to discourage Ozma from going to the
Skeezer-Flathead war, but was unsuccessful.
 
Another ambiguous character is Faleero. In _Kabumpo_ she's referred to as a
"fairy princess," but in _Purple Prince_ Randy, at least, refers to her as
a witch, and her actions are much more consistent with a witch than a fairy.
 
 >No boys allowed in Catty Corners: I'm not sure that this reinforces the
 >feminine mystique of felines as much as it refers to the fact that boys are
 >stereotypically too rough to play with cats.
 
Boys tormenting cats is a cliche in a lot of books, probably because it
happened a lot. I'm sure that's more the reason for "no boys allowed" than
that cats are associated with females.
 
David Hulan

From: CruentiDei at cs.com
Date: Sat, 5 Feb 2000 20:10:04 EST
Subject: Oz
 
Gehan:
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on that point. I believe that a
person's genetic heritage can define many physical characteristics, but I
believe that qualities of character and morality are learned as you journey
through life.
 
> Possibly Mombi's appearance had changed enough between the end of _Land_
> and _Lost King_ that Ozma didn't recognize her immediately?
This made me remember something all of a sudden. In chapter 16, Dorothy and
Mombi both seem to recognize each other, although they have never met (at
least, in any book written so far). It's likely that they've seen pictures of
each other. In Mombi's case, she may have made several clandestine visits to
EC and seen Dot.
 
********** SPOILER FOR OJO IN OZ **********
David Hulan:
As I recall, Ozma effectively destroyed Mooj.
********** END OF SPOILER **********
 
Robin:
When Glinda says "I wish I might help them", she clearly means helping the
Americans, and not necessarily righting the wrongs in Jinxland. However, when
the Scarecrow offers to assist, Glinda "Carefully instructed the Scarecrow
what to do". Baum gave no details, but Glinda might have mentioned removing
King Krewl. However, later on, the Scarecrow says that his mission is to
specifically help the visitors, since Glinda knows that they are in danger
from Krewl and Blinkie. Glinda still does not seem motivated to remove the
ultimate source of the problem, or to help the suffering Jinxlanders, even
though they are citizens of Oz and Quadlings, thus under the direct rule of
Glinda.
 
In the very next chapter, though, the Scarecrow no longer mentions helping
the visitors, but begings by analyzing the political situation and stating
that they must now remove Krewl from the throne. After Pon's abortive coup,
the Scarecrow marches in and says that he himself has decided that Krewl
should no longer rule. He claims that his status as friend and servant of
Ozma gives him the authority to do this.
 
As for _Glinda_:...
Yes, Glinda is very reluctant at first to do anything at all about the
confrontation 'twixt the Skeezers and the Flatheads. After finding that Ozma
is determined to resolve the situation, Dorothy says that Ozma should not put
herself in danger, and Glinda recomends sending the Wizard to warn them not
to fight. This mirrors the rule of thumb of captains and away team mission in
_STNG_.
 
TYler Jones

Date: Tue, 08 Feb 2000 19:00:22 +1100
From: Gehan <calamity at eureka.lk>
Subject: Ozzy Things
 
David Hulan:
 >I think that in fact human beings are more than 70% water; I remember
 >something more like 90%.
 
I've read in several books that human beings are 67%-70% water. However,
blood is 9/10 water......
 
>I don't know of any legend that witches
 >were vulnerable to water before Baum
 
Which is why I believe that only NONESTICAN/OZIAN witches are vulnerable to
water.
 
 >What evidence do you have that the ancestors of any of the witches we know
 >of were even witches, much less wicked ones? I recall no mention of any
 >such ancestors in any context.
 
I don't have any evidence, and I know there's no evidence in the FF. T'was
just my own 'MOPPET'......As for Kaliko, I believe that he has ego
problem......
 
~Gehan~

Date: Tue, 08 Feb 2000 09:39:03 -0600
From: Stephen Teller <steller at pittstate.edu>
Subject: Ozzy Matters
 
>  >No boys allowed in Catty Corners: I'm not sure that this reinforces the
 >  >feminine mystique of felines as much as it refers to the fact that boys are
 >  >stereotypically too rough to play with cats.
 >
 > Boys tormenting cats is a cliche in a lot of books, probably because it
 > happened a lot. I'm sure that's more the reason for "no boys allowed" than
 > that cats are associated with females.
 >

One of the QUEEN VISITOR stories concerned a boy who tormented a stray cat
until he was forced to be that stray for a night; then he gained sympathy for
the boor creature.

From: "Arlem" <arlem at hitter.net>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 02-08-2000
Date: Tue, 8 Feb 2000 17:23:23 -0500
 
David:
 >> It seems well within the
 >>realm of possibility that Mombi blocked Glinda's magic from uncovering
 >>Ozma's whereabouts.
 
 >But Glinda's magic seems to be far more powerful than Mombi's; it's hard to
 >imagine how Mombi could have blocked the Great Book of Records from finding
 >Ozma. Or Pastoria, for that matter.
 
Perhaps I'm wrong but I don't think the Great Book of Records existed at
that point, why else would Glinda rely on a network of spies, as stated in
Land. Perhaps Glinda was less powerful in Land than she is now.
Just a thought..... back to lurking I go.....
 
arlem

From: "Nathan Mulac DeHoff" <xornom at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 02-08-2000
Date: Wed, 09 Feb 2000 01:01:00 GMT
 
David Hulan:
 >I'm not sure that it's RPT that creates the all-powerful magic belt. It
 >seems to me that it's pretty much all-powerful in _Ozma_; the problem seems
 >to be that Ozma and Dorothy don't think of using it most of the time (as
 >when they're sunk in the lake in _Glinda_). And Dorothy seems to have
 >forgotten how to use it in _Lost Princess_ (and its powers seem to be
 >mysteriously diminished in that one book only).
 
Oddly enough, both _Lost Princess_ and _Glinda_ indicate that nothing can
hurt Dorothy while she's wearing the Belt, yet that doesn't seem to hold
true in other books (or maybe just for other wearers).  If it did, would
Dorothy have been able to steal the Belt in the first place, and would
Roquat have had any reason to fear the eggs that the Scarecrow threw at him?

   Similarly, in _Gnome King_, Ruggedo is physically injured numerous times
while wearing the Belt.  (In fact, if the Belt had protected him from
physical harm, he would probably have succeeded in sending the important
Ozites to the bottom of the ocean.)  I suppose one possibility is that it's
really the GWN's kiss, and not the Belt, that protects Dorothy from harm,
but wouldn't Glinda have realized this, even if Dorothy and Ozma hadn't?
 
 >You're right that in a sense all the creatures in Oz are magical, including
 >the humans. Still, I think there's a difference between a creature who
 >shares in the magical character of the country, but is otherwise like its
 >normal counterparts in our world, and one that's fundamentally unlike any
 >creatures we know of here. The Woozy, the Sawhorse, the Glass Cat, the
 >dragons, etc. are in the latter category; Toto, Eureka, the Cowardly Lion
 >and Hungry Tiger, Hank, and so on are in the former.
 
Well, unless Eureka really DID become pink in between _Dorothy and the
Wizard_ and _Patchwork Girl_, in which case she might have something magical
about her.
 
 >Another ambiguous character is Faleero. In _Kabumpo_ she's referred to as a
 >"fairy princess," but in _Purple Prince_ Randy, at least, refers to her as
 >a witch, and her actions are much more consistent with a witch than a
 >fairy.
 
My own conjecture, as expressed in my short story, "The Banishment of
Faleero," is that Faleero is a fairy who learned witchcraft.
 
Tyler:
********** SPOILER FOR OJO, PIRATES, AND HANDY MANDY **********
 >David Hulan:
 >As I recall, Ozma effectively destroyed Mooj.
 
In _Handy Mandy_, Ozma states that she transformed Ruggedo in a manner that
he could only be disenchanted when dropped by the seventh hand of a
travelling Mernite, and, as she makes it quite clear that she did not even
know what a Mernite was at that point, this might have been close to a
"destruction."
********** END OF SPOILER **********
 
Nathan

Date: Wed, 09 Feb 2000 21:23:40 -0600
Subject: Oz
From: "David Godwin" <d.godwin at minn.net>
 
Nathan wrote:
 
 >And the Cowardly Lion and the Hungry Tiger eat bees, and Dorothy and the
 >Wizard are only concerned that they might have been Trot and Cap'n Bill, not
 >that their friends ate other sentient beings.  Maybe the rules are different
 >for insects, though.
 
It would seem so, but what of woggle bugs? One of them was capable of
becoming thoroughly educated while crawling around a school room. As for
eating bees, people seem concerned that the Woozy not do so. It would be
complicating things unnecessarily, I think, to postulate that honeybees and
woggle bugs have a different level of sentience from other insects -
although, with only four limbs, the Woggle Bug is not, strictly speaking, an
insect at all.
 
- David G.

Date: Wed, 9 Feb 2000 22:37:13 -0500
From: "J. L. Bell" <JnoLBell at compuserve.com>
Subject: Great Book of CDs
 
Nathan DeHoff wrote:
<<Regarding the question as to whether or not witches are ordinary mortals,
the WWW makes a bar of iron "invisible to mortal eyes."  Although not
explicitly stated, this seems to imply that she can see it, and is not a
mortal.>>
 
Unless it merely means that an immortal (i.e., some kind of fairy) could
see through the spell, even though Dorothy couldn't. In other words, the
phrase might say more about the limit of the witch's power than about the
witch herself.
 
David Hulan wrote:
<<Glinda's magic seems to be far more powerful than Mombi's; it's hard to
imagine how Mombi could have blocked the Great Book of Records from finding
Ozma. Or Pastoria, for that matter.>>
 
LOST KING tells us that Mombi transformed Pajuka in such a way that he
couldn't tell Glinda about his plight. That shows Mombi was anticipating
opposition from the sorceress and taking preemptive steps against her. And
such steps seem to prevent Glinda, despite her greater power, from
overcoming Mombi's concealing spells. Indeed, Glinda is quite forthright in
LAND that she can't identify the lost princess Ozma or restore her; only
Mombi can. Similarly, in LOST KING only the original green magic spell can
restore Pastoria. Obviously, Mombi casts a very powerful transformation
even if Glinda can defeat her in a one-on-one battle.

         Could such witchcraft overpower the Great Book of Records? Many
times that Book is said to be one of the most magical items in Oz,
recording every event in the world. However, in practice the Book's
limitations become quite evident. Its reports are terse and far from
complete. The nature of those accounts is probably to blame for Glinda not
noticing:

* Pajuka's quest for his master, even though she'd presumably recognize the
former Prime Minister's name. [Accepting Ruggedo's claim that the Book
doesn't record animals' doings would, however, explain that oversight.]
* how Mrs. Yoop transformed and imprisoned the Scarecrow and Tin Woodman.
* the Scarecrow's many days on the Silver Islands.
* Ruggedo's underground trickery, and his invasion from Menankypoo.
* Mogodore's attack on the Emerald City from Glinda's own Quadling Country.  
* the Wizard of Wutz's elaborate plot.
* problems in the Ozure Isles, Seebania, and other large and important
kingdoms within Oz, involving some of Ozma's friends and allies.

         These aren't distant disputes and injustices of the sort that
Glinda urges Ozma to ignore in GLINDA, and that she herself ignored prior
to SCARECROW. Rather, these events are crucial to Ozma's security and/or
happiness. If the Great Book of Records were truly to have informed Glinda
about them, her lack of action would be inexplicable.

         Therefore, I have to believe the power of the Great Book of Records
is somewhat overstated, like the power of the Barrier of Invisibility and
perhaps even the power of the Deadly Desert. In all three cases, Glinda has
every reason to let Oz's neighbors and historians believe that their power
is absolute. The Book recording *every* action? The Barrier *completely*
impenetrable? The Desert *immediately* fatal? Those beliefs keep Oz safe,
even though [don't tell!] we have evidence contradicting all three. The
Great Book of Records probably doesn't record every action, therefore, and
may be vulnerable to outside magic.

         Finding Pastoria would seem to be a mission near the top of
Glinda's to-do list--at the very least, she wouldn't let an opportunity to
do it pass by [unless she were even more devious than I'd credit]. Glinda
would therefore be alert to the names of Pajuka and Mombi and any other
clues to the lost king's whereabouts. Yet she never finds anything (or at
least anything she tells Ozma about). I can see the Book's reports to be
vague and unhelpful most of the time, but *all* of the time between its
first page and the end of LOST KING? Glinda's lack of clues seems to imply
some magical interference built into Mombi's original spells.

         Such magical interference allows the Great Book of Records exist
before LAND. I could even argue that for Mombi to have included such
protection from the Book in her transformation, the Book had to exist back
then. Putting that argument aside, the fact remains that Mombi's admittedly
lesser powers completely stymied Glinda in her attempts to restore Ozma
and/or her father.
 
David Hulan wrote:
<< > Note that Lurline, Ozma's
  >"Fairy Godmother" [121], knew where her father was but never mentioned
it.
 
But is there any evidence that Ozma and Lurline ever communicated after
Ozma took the throne? I don't recall any.>>
 
There's no such evidence I can think of. (I theorize Lurline delivered the
Magic Picture to Ozma after her ascension to the throne, but that's
extra-canonical.)

         My point was that a "Fairy Godmother" traditionally protects a
person and watches out for her interest [as Robin Olderman sees Glinda
doing for Ozma]. That implies Lurline would be looking after the princess.
Yet in this case Lurline seems to have been aware of Pastoria's change and
imprisonment but did nothing to release him or inform his daughter of his
whereabouts.

         The best solution for that paradox, it seems to me, is that
Thompson's "Fairy Godmother" statement was simply wrong, or hinted too much
about Lurline's bond with her.
 
David Hulan wrote:
<<Boys tormenting cats is a cliche in a lot of books, probably because it
happened a lot. I'm sure that's more the reason for "no boys allowed" than
that cats are associated with females.>>

         And Robin Olderman wrote:

<<No boys allowed in Catty Corners: I'm not sure that this reinforces the
feminine mystique of felines as much as it refers to the fact that boys are
stereotypically too rough to play with cats.>>
 
That "cliche" and "stereotype" are just the other side of the 19th
century's association of cats with females: dogs were linked with males. To
quote from Nancy C. Carlisle, "The Chewed Chair Leg and the Empty Collar:
Mementos of Pet Ownership in New England" (Dublin Seminar for New England
Folklife, Annual Proceedings 1993):

         "Throughout the nineteenth century dogs tended to be associated
with men. In both paintings and photographs, dogs are most often seen with
men or boys. Portrait conventions during this period illustrate boys with
dogs (or sticks or pony whips) while girls are shown with flowers, dolls,
and fruit. . . . When owners are named on dog collars, particularly on
early collars, the names are usually men's. . . . Cats, on the other hand,
are almost always shown in the company of women and girls, [...usually]
young girls and elderly women."

         This is another door into examining how the first two Oz authors
portrayed gender roles. Baum introduced his little girl Dorothy in
unorthodox fashion with a dog. Her kitten didn't arrive until two
adventures later, and, unlike Toto and Billina, had only one adventure with
Dorothy. In contrast, Thompson drew upon and perpetuated a traditional
stereotype of gender: cats and boys don't mix in LOST KING, and in YANKEE a
boy and a dog do.
 
Tyler Jones wrote:
<<In chapter 16, Dorothy and Mombi both seem to recognize each other,
although they have never met (at least, in any book written so far). It's
likely that they've seen pictures of each other.>>
 
LOST KING says Prof. Wogglebug's history of Oz mentions Mombi, though not
by name. In GRAMPA such a history includes Dorothy. Thompson also describes
a wide distribution of such books, as far as Kimbaloo and Ragbad.
Therefore, I think it's indeed likely Mombi and Dorothy knew *of* each
other even though they hadn't met.
 
John W. Kennedy wrote of the Hoopers' park:
<<A) were children rolling hoops this late? and B) just how far had "park"
gone in its transition from "plot of land neither wild nor farmed nor
substantially built upon" to "public recreation area"?>>
 
Thompson shows Snip vanquishing the Hoopers by rolling them just as
children did, and provides so little description of his act that I think
she expected her readers to recognize it.

         Robin Olderman's reminder that <<In _Grampa_, the Playfellows are
also enclosed in a park>> implies that Thompson was deliberately locating
the peoples she associated with play in parks. Whether or not the old
meaning of park still survived, there were lots of city parks for kids to
play in by 1924-25.
 
Typographically, that odd habit of spreading out the first line of text on
a page when it's the last line of a paragraph reappears in LOST KING. (I
remarked on it earlier in GLINDA.) Some examples: 83, 88, 94, 138, 150,
177, and 191. It seems to be there to defining the "text box." On the other
hand, that spread seems optional since pages 105, 146, and 196 don't show
it.

         Another typesetting anomaly appears on page 171, where the
ever-careful Reilly & Lee used brackets appear instead of parentheses.
 
Finally, some words to live by from LOST KING:

         "Immediately Rosa Merry, Kinda Jolly and all the rest rushed into
the kitchen to see for themselves how gone everything was." [39]

         Kabumpo after meeting Humpy: "Excuse me until I mash that idiot."
[168]

         Humpy, bouncing on Kabumpo's back: "So this is fun? Ah, how fast I
am learning." [171]

         Finally, I noted the "King, King, double King" chant [268], which
first appeared in a poem Thompson wrote for her Philadelphia newspaper,
re-published in an issue of OZ-STORY.
 
J. L. Bell                  JnoLBell at compuserve.com

Date: Fri, 11 Feb 2000 09:13:26 -0500
From: "J. L. Bell" <JnoLBell at compuserve.com>
Subject: the professor
 
David Godwin wrote:
<< >Maybe the rules are different
>for insects, though.
 
It would seem so, but what of woggle bugs? One of them was capable of
becoming thoroughly educated while crawling around a school room. . . .
although, with only four limbs, the Woggle Bug is not, strictly speaking,
an insect at all.>>
 
I imagine the Wogglebug to be immensely embarrassed by his relatives, none
of whom share his ambition or hunger for learning. There's no sign he ever
goes back to visit them, or even writes. How can you keep a boy down in the
farm after he's seen the Emerald City?

         To complicate the question of whether he's an insect, the Wogglebug
shows up in QUEER VISITORS and his own book with six limbs--not simply in
the illustrations but in Baum's texts!
 
Arlem wrote:
<<I don't think the Great Book of Records existed at that point, why else
would Glinda rely on a network of spies, as stated in Land.>>
 
Glinda does indeed state that, but can we be sure it's true? It's still a
very unsettled time in Oz, with the Emerald City conquered, Mombi returning
to full-fledged witchcraft, and the rightful ruler of the entire kingdom
lost. Glinda's speaking to a potential rival to that ruler, the Scarecrow
(he keeps hinting that he should retake his throne). Why wouldn't she
conceal the exact source of her extensive knowledge in order to protect it?
 
         Lest we think that such an incomplete truth would be out of
character, let's remember that Glinda doesn't even tell Dorothy about the
Book of Records until the end of EMERALD CITY. She must know about little
conflicts all over Oz, but she doesn't seem to tell Ozma, who'd be troubled
by them. When Glinda thinks a certain action is the right thing to do, such
as cutting Oz off from the Outside World or banishing the Oogaboo army, she
does it without consulting others who'd be affected. I think it would be
quite in her character to keep her own counsel on unveiling the Great Book
of Records until she's certain it's safe.
 
J. L. Bell                  JnoLBell at compuserve.com

From: "Nathan Mulac DeHoff" <xornom at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 02-10-2000
Date: Fri, 11 Feb 2000 17:37:23 GMT
 
J. L. Bell (I think):
>Many
 >times that Book is said to be one of the most magical items in Oz,
 >recording every event in the world. However, in practice the Book's
 >limitations become quite evident. Its reports are terse and far from
 >complete. The nature of those accounts is probably to blame for Glinda not
 >noticing:
 >* Pajuka's quest for his master, even though she'd presumably recognize the
 >former Prime Minister's name. [Accepting Ruggedo's claim that the Book
 >doesn't record animals' doings would, however, explain that oversight.]
 
Although that claim seems to be contradicted by the fact that it mentions
the Cowardly Lion that cat's own book.  Besides, Ruggedo is probably relying
on second-hand information in _Magic_, since I don't think he actually sees
the Record Book until _Handy Mandy_ (when it's in Wutz's cavern).
 
 >         Such magical interference allows the Great Book of Records exist
 >before LAND. I could even argue that for Mombi to have included such
 >protection from the Book in her transformation, the Book had to exist back
 >then.
 
Unless Mombi just cast the spell to block information magic in general.
 
 >Yet in this case Lurline seems to have been aware of Pastoria's change and
 >imprisonment but did nothing to release him or inform his daughter of his
 >whereabouts.
 
Didn't Lurline give Pastoria his butterfly ears when she found she couldn't
break Mombi's enchantment?  This is also interesting because it means that
Mombi was capable of casting spells that even the powerful Fairy Queen
couldn't break.

Date: Mon, 14 Feb 2000 23:20:52 -0500
From: "J. L. Bell" <JnoLBell at compuserve.com>
Subject: wearing a bulletproof Belt
 
Nathan DeHoff wrote:
<<Didn't Lurline give Pastoria his butterfly ears when she found she
couldn't break Mombi's enchantment?  This is also interesting because it
means that Mombi was capable of casting spells that even the powerful Fairy
Queen couldn't break.>>
 
A very good point! In this time of Pokemon and other card-fighting games,
it's important for us to remember that battles aren't always won by the
side that looks stronger on paper. Otherwise, all magical duels would be
reduced to a form of rock/paper/scissors with no rock.
 
J. L. Bell                  JnoLBell at compuserve.com

Date: Tue, 15 Feb 2000 15:55:12 -0600
From: David Hulan <davidhulan at ntsource.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 02-08 thru 14-2000
 
2/8:
Nathan:
>Along those same lines, it's interesting that Dorothy seems to immediately
 >recognize Mombi, even though they had never met in previous FF books.
 
Interesting indeed. I suppose there might have been pictures of Mombi
around in some of Ozma's scrapbooks or the like, but it does cast doubt on
my suggestion that Mombi looked different enough that Ozma didn't
immediately recognize her.
 
Tyler:
 >********** SPOILER FOR OJO IN OZ **********
 >David Hulan:
 >As I recall, Ozma effectively destroyed Mooj.
 >********** END OF SPOILER **********
 
********** SPOILER FOR OJO IN OZ **********
That's a question that was brought up a few years ago on the Digest with
inconclusive results. Is transforming a person into a drop of water
destroying him, any more than transforming him into a dove or a jug or a
cactus? Could that drop of water be transformed back into Mooj? Will it
stay as a unified drop of water, or will its molecules disperse throughout
the Nonestic?
********** END OF SPOILER **********
 
>This mirrors the rule of thumb of captains and away team mission in
 >_STNG_.
 
Which was probably introduced because one of the biggest criticisms of the
original Star Trek was that the captain of a starship shouldn't be going
personally into possibly hostile situations.
 
2/10:
Nathan:
 >Well, unless Eureka really DID become pink in between _Dorothy and the
 >Wizard_ and _Patchwork Girl_, in which case she might have something magical
 >about her.
 
I think it much more likely that something magical happened to Eureka than
that she had some magical power of her own. If _Eureka in Oz_ ever gets
published I have a possible explanation of it...
 
J.L.:
Point well taken about the GBR's inability to penetrate Mombi's spells in
_Lost King_, which negates the inference that she didn't have it as of
_Land_. I still think she'd have mentioned it then, if she had no
reservations about mentioning it in _Emerald City_, but maybe, as you say
in a later post, she wasn't all that confident of the Scarecrow's loyalty
in _Land_ and thus didn't reveal all her resources to him.
 
 >My point was that a "Fairy Godmother" traditionally protects a
 >person and watches out for her interest [as Robin Olderman sees Glinda
 >doing for Ozma]. That implies Lurline would be looking after the princess.
 >Yet in this case Lurline seems to have been aware of Pastoria's change and
 >imprisonment but did nothing to release him or inform his daughter of his
 >whereabouts.
 
It's at least arguable that Lurline let Pastoria languish in Blankenburg
for some years in order to let Ozma establish herself on the throne and in
the hearts of her people before arranging his release (which would explain
much better than Snip's generous heart why Tora was suddenly able to
leave). It doesn't seem that Tora was abused or otherwise mistreated in
Blankenburg, except for being kept there; Lurline did arrange his mobile
ears to alleviate his probable boredom, which would have been the main
problem. Lurline did, after all, want Ozma on the throne of Oz, and
producing someone with a better claim to the throne early in her reign
might well have led to the kind of controversy Oz didn't need.
 
"King, King, double King" is an expression I can remember hearing playing
checkers when I was a kid, and I suspect it came from that rather than
being original with Thompson. I believe Neill uses it in _Lucky Bucky_ as
well, when Bucky and Jack Pott are playing checkers, though I haven't
checked.
 
David Hulan

Date: Sun, 20 Feb 2000 15:00:16 -0500
From: "J. L. Bell" <JnoLBell at compuserve.com>
Subject: Library of Congress and Copyright Office
 
David Hulan wrote:
<<It's at least arguable that Lurline let Pastoria languish in Blankenburg
for some years in order to let Ozma establish herself on the throne and in
the hearts of her people before arranging his release (which would explain
much better than Snip's generous heart why Tora was suddenly able to
leave).>>
 
Interesting possibility. It presents Lurline as even more Machiavellian
than my image of Glinda!
 
David Hulan wrote:
<<"King, King, double King" is an expression I can remember hearing playing
checkers when I was a kid, and I suspect it came from that rather than
being original with Thompson.>>
 
That makes sense. Thompson would therefore have been playing off the
expression in two separate directions in LOST KING and her newspaper
writing.
 
J. L. Bell                  JnoLBell at compuserve.com

From: JOdel at aol.com
Date: Wed, 23 Feb 2000 18:51:26 EST
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 02-23-2000
 
Actually, it was Digger O'Dell. Not Digby. Understandably, it was on of my
Dad's nicknames at work...

From: "Jeremy Steadman" <jsteadman at loki.berry.edu>
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2000 21:27:06 EST
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 01-19-2000
 
Digest of 1/24:
Re Mombi and melting:
Dave Hardenbrook says, <<This was the Adepts' assesment, and they
tell me that it takes a long time *and* really vast evil to reached
that sufficiently "shrivelled" state. Mombi probably didn't hack it
on either count.  So they believe that she couldn't be "washed out"
and that she's still out there somewhere.>>
 
So she was just pretending to melt?  Yikes . . .
 
Until a later Ozzy time,
Jeremy Steadman, Royal Historian of Oz
kivel99 at planetall.com

ICQ# 19222665, AOL Inst Mssgr name kiex or kiex2
 
"A good example of a parasite?  Hmmm, let me think...
How about the Eiffel tower?"

Date: Mon, 28 Feb 2000 21:22:43 -0600
From: David Hulan <davidhulan at ntsource.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 02-23-2000
 
2/28:
Joyce:
Digby O'Dell was always called "Digger" in the show ("Fibber McGee and
Molly," I think, though I wouldn't swear it wasn't "The Great
Gildersleeve"), but he always introduced himself as, "It is I - Digby
O'Dell, The Friendly Undertaker." In sepulchural tones befitting his
profession. I can easily see how your father would have acquired the
sobriquet, though (by name only; I never met him, so I have no reason to
have an opinion on its appropriateness otherwise).
 
David Hulan

From: "Miscellaneous McFate" <xornom at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Ozzy Digest, 02-28-2000
Date: Tue, 29 Feb 2000 15:58:53 GMT
 
>Re Mombi and melting:
 >Dave Hardenbrook says, <<This was the Adepts' assesment, and they
 >tell me that it takes a long time *and* really vast evil to reached
 >that sufficiently "shrivelled" state. Mombi probably didn't hack it
 >on either count.  So they believe that she couldn't be "washed out"
 >and that she's still out there somewhere.>>
 >
 >So she was just pretending to melt?  Yikes . . .
 
Maybe she was a VERY good actress.
 
Nathan

Date: Wed, 8 Mar 2000 11:29:01 -0500
From: "J. L. Bell" <JnoLBell at compuserve.com>
Subject: PARADOX and paradigms
 
Nathan DeHoff wrote of Mombi:
<< >So she was just pretending to melt?  Yikes . . .
 
Maybe she was a VERY good actress.>>
 
"Oh! I'm melting! I'm melting! You horrible men, how can you watch this?"

"'Struth, my straw-filled friend, 'tis hardly a noble deed."

"But she is a witch, you know."

"Oh, yes I am! And now I'm melting! To think that someone as, um,
floppy as you could destroy all my beautiful wickedness!"

"Hmmm. She's not melting much."

"But I am! I can feel myself draining away!"

"Methinks she's crouching."

"No, no, you foolish knight, my knees have dissolved! Haven't you
seen anyone dissolve into molasses before?"

"By my sword, no."

"It's a sad sight. Turn your heads away, for your own sakes!"

"Actually, I'm rather curious to see this. Dorothy told me about
melting that other witch, but she couldn't really describe--"

"Oh, for wickedness' sake! As my last act of spite, I shall light a match!"

"What?! Come, Hokus, let's watch at a distance."

"But, noble sir, recall you not that the witch be soaking wet?"

"But you know what I always say: better to be safe than on fire."

"Curses, my final wicked wish foiled! I can't even stop myself from
seeping behind this thick bush. Soon I shall breathe my last! It shall take
only five minutes for me to pass through the highly volatile, inflammable
stage into total nothingness. Ah, me! Maybe ten minutes, to be safe. What a
world, what a world!"
 
J. L. Bell                  JnoLBell at compuserve.com