Chapter 24 – Home Again

It all ends in Kansas again with Dorothy returning home to Aunt Em and Uncle Henry.

To finish this Guide to Oz, here’s some short and sweet information about the book and its creators.

Meet the author, L.Frank Baum. The L stands for Lyman but he never liked it, so he always used his middle name.

Frank wanted to write a fairy tale to appeal to modern children (in 1900). He included things they would recognise, like hot air balloons, and he didn’t want it to be too scary.

Do you think he was successful?

 

The original illustrator was a man called William Wallace Denslow. William worked with Frank to design all the characters, and illustrate the first edition of the book in 1902.

He also included his own little touches. Each chapter’s illustrations are coloured according to which country of Oz it’s happening in e.g. Chapter 2 is in Munchkinland, so the illustrations are blue.

Denslow also included his own little seahorse signature in most of his illustrations. Try and spot them in the book.

Frank wrote 14 Oz books, and other authors wrote more. There are now 40 official Oz books in total.

Films

There have been several film versions of the Wizard of Oz, from the very first silent film version from 1910

to the most famous version in 1939, and lots more since. The most recent was released in 2018.

More Oz stuff

The Wizard of Oz is still incredibly popular, with new merchandise, conventions, books and exhibits appearing all the time,

even Lego!

We hope you’ve enjoyed our Guide to Oz.

Look out for more Read to Succeed projects.