‘Wizard of Oz' still defies gravity for Kansans, but enduring political themes pull us down to Earth
The Oz Museum in Wamego offers displays about both the novel by L. Frank Baum and subsequent stage and screen adaptations. (Clay Wirestone/Kansas Reflector)
Roving with Clay Wirestone
Opinion editor travels Kansas and beyond for stories off the beaten path. Read them all here.
The Wizard of Oz means so many different things to so many different people.
At one level it's a classic children's book, 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz,' published by L. Frank Baum in 1900. At another, it's the classic movie from 1939, showcasing the teenage Judy Garland. At another it's a Kansas brand, selling protagonist Dorothy Gale's prairie roots. At yet another, it was adopted by the LGBTQ+ community as a metaphor for the voyage from sepia-toned heteronormativity to technicolor pride.
And of course, it's also political.
The latest version of the Oz story hit movie theaters late last year. The musical 'Wicked,' with music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz and directed by Jon Chu, has been nominated for 10 Academy Awards. The wizard in this version, played by Jeff Goldblum, has authoritarian aspirations of the kind that should be familiar to anyone who has followed national politics.
I headed to the Oz Museum in Wamego this December hoping to glean some deep thoughts about this escapist parable and its enduring effect on all of our lives. Instead, I enjoyed a pleasant afternoon and headed home. I might have hummed 'Defying Gravity,' but little else came to mind.
Then, a couple of weeks ago, I remembered the green glasses.
The glasses are a throwaway joke inserted by Baum in his children's book, meant for a chuckle and little more. Anyone who enters the Emerald City has to wear a pair. They're supposed to protect the wearer's eyes from all the gem-packed brilliance.
But the glasses lie. Here's the passage where the wizard admits it all.
'Just to amuse myself, and keep the good people busy, I ordered them to build this City, and my Palace; and they did it all willingly and well. Then I thought, as the country was so green and beautiful, I would call it the Emerald City; and to make the name fit better I put green spectacles on all the people, so that everything they saw was green.'
'But isn't everything here green?' asked Dorothy.
'No more than in any other city,' replied Oz; 'but when you wear green spectacles, why of course everything you see looks green to you. The Emerald City was built a great many years ago, for I was a young man when the balloon brought me here, and I am a very old man now. But my people have worn green glasses on their eyes so long that most of them think it really is an Emerald City, and it certainly is a beautiful place, abounding in jewels and precious metals, and every good thing that is needed to make one happy.'
Those glasses explain so much about this current moment.
They explain why Kansas legislators decided to bully trans kids before passing a budget or any other legislation. It explains why they've continued their assault of public education, abandoning a commitment to fully fund special education. It explains why their big idea to reduce government waste costs $11 million and requires hiring 110 new employees.
Those green lenses they shove against their eyes tint everything. Those green glasses show them a world that's recognizable but unavoidably tinted.
They were buffeted by the same COVID-19 pandemic that the rest of us were. They lived through inflation, watching the cost of living rise just about everywhere. And they experienced the same 2024 election season as the rest of us, during which one party claimed to have easy solutions to every problem and other tried to surf on feel-good vibes.
The tint of those glasses — perhaps they should come in MAGA red rather than Ozian green — made an awful lot of difference.
It meant surviving the pandemic made these folks less likely to trust doctors and science, given the way that public health guidance shifted. It meant they saw inflation as the result of incompetence, even though public spending that rescued our economy also fueled record prices. They leaped on the promise of simple fixes during the election, despite the corruption of the man making them.
In other words, like the citizens of Oz, they found themselves besotted by an all-too-human man declaring himself to be great and powerful.
In the 1900 book and 1939 film, the wizard willingly admits his deceptions and yields power when confronted by Dorothy and her friends. In the books, he becomes an adviser to the land's true leader, Princess Ozma (it's a long story and involves a gender change). In the film, he sails away in his hot air balloon.
I wonder if our current leader will step aside so genially. I wonder if our nation's citizens will ever take off their tinted spectacles to see a world far more complex and nuanced than they believe. I wonder if we will ever, as Kansans or Americans, learn lessons that Baum taught 125 years ago.
How wonderful that would be.
Clay Wirestone is Kansas Reflector opinion editor. Through its opinion section, Kansas Reflector works to amplify the voices of people who are affected by public policies or excluded from public debate. Find information, including how to submit your own commentary, here.
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