Durand, Kevin K., and Mary K. Leigh, Eds. the Universe of Oz: Essays on Baum's Series and Its Progeny
2011; Volume: 22; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
0897-0521
Autores Tópico(s)Folklore, Mythology, and Literature Studies
ResumoDurand, Kevin K., and Mary K. Leigh, eds. The Universe of Oz: Essays on Baum's Series and Its Progeny. Jefferson: McFarland, 2010. 252 pp. Paperback. ISBN 978-0-7864-4628-5. $35.00. Kevin K. Durand and Mary K. Leigh have assembled an interesting collection of essays built around L. Frank Baum's world of Oz. Bringing together essays that address the universe of in terms of its literary impact, its philosophical roots, and its connections to social change, the volume is generally strong and would be a good addition to the scholar's shelf. The book offers a preface by editor Kevin K. Durand and seventeen numbered essays that are divided into three major sections: Oz and Literary Criticism, Oz and Philosophy, and Oz and Social Critique. The volume concludes with information about the contributors and an index. The essays vary in quality, but there are enough strong entries to make this a worthy collection. Several essays truly stand out. Agnes B. Curry and Josef Velazquez's Dorothy and Cinderella: The Case of the Missing Prince and the Despair of the Fairy Tale is a wide-ranging exegesis that incorporates everything from Grimm to Spiderman. This essay compares mother figures, love objects, maturity, and, of course, shoes. The essay ends with several sections that place The Wizard of in the context of modern fairy tales, taking a look at Dorothy's otherworldliness as compared to heroines in Disney offerings Mulan and The Little Mermaid. One major consideration the authors bring forward is the gradual disappearance of the king/prince in the world of the fairy tale. The essay concludes with a comparison of The Wizard of to modern superhero tales, such as Superman, Spiderman, and Batman. The authors propose a historical evolution to the fairy tale that puts The Wizard of on a continuum from stories that end with a prince and happily-ever-after to tales like Oz, where there is prince and no happiness (48). Equally engaging is Kristin Noone's essay, Place Like the O.Z.: Heroes and Hybridity in Sci-Fi's Tin that examines the Sci-Fi (now Syfy) channel's reboot of The Wizard of Oz. Noone notes that the O.Z. (the Outer Zone) is a much darker place than Baum's and that the familiar characters are greatly changed, known better by what they have lost than by what they gain. For example, the Scarecrow figure, known as Glitch, has had much of his brain removed by the Witch, and so in a half-human liminal space, a man with no memories, no brain, no purpose (99). Glitch does manage to access some of his memories at the end of the series, but not without empathic and technological help. His past as advisor and inventor is lost; his future is unsure. The Tin Man, a former lawman named Wyatt Cain, has been locked inside a metal suit and forced to watch a video loop of his wife and son being tortured. Even after being freed from the suit after years of imprisonment and then reuniting with his son, Cain finds no happy reconciliation and ends as a man without family or official allegiances (102). The characters stop the destruction of the O.Z., but as pointed out by Noone, they do not necessarily end with what they seek. No boon-granting wizard exists to give them what they desire. This essay references ably Istvan Csicsery-Ronay, Jr.'s recent The Seven Beauties of Science Fiction, which provides a nice critical framework for the argument that Tin Man takes viewers more heavily into the realm of sf and the grotesque than does the original movie. Also referencing a recent text, Randall Auxier's Ask the Clock of the Time Dragon: in the Past and Future argues that of all the variations of Oz, Gregory Maguire's books best reveal what it is about that makes it a book, a movie, a place, and an idea to which we want to return. Auxier uses Maguire's A Lion Among Men, his Cowardly Lion novel, to discuss temporality and responsibility. According to Auxier, whether the future is active in the present (or past) is the major question (125). …
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