Listening to the audiobook version of Gregory McGuire's Wicked apparently did some serious harm to my psyche. I get an inward cringe when exposed to any references to it, though I'm told the play and the movie were much more enjoyable.
My childhood was an Oz-infused world. There was the annual network broadcast of the movie and thus pilgrimage to my cousin's house to watch it on her color TV. But most important were the books: the classics by L.Frank Baum with illustrations by John R. Neil, and then the later ones by Ruth Plumly Thompson--and then a few also written by John R. Neil. (I loved John R. Neil, as only a little girl can love the man who draws her ideal fairy princesses.)
To be able to read the Oz books was my main motivation for learning to read.
Our eldest sister Melinda (rhymes with Glinda) was the keeper of these sacred tomes. We would approach her with a request to borrow one of them only when we were certain she was in a good mood. What if she was in a bad mood, and said no? Then we'd have to wait even longer before we could ask again. (For the record, this feared scenario never happened. She never did refuse to lend us a sacred Oz book, once we'd worked up the courage to ask her.)
Most of the Oz books were inherited from our cousins. There were a few books missing from the collection. Prior to a Hanukkah trip to the discount bookstore where books were sorted by publisher, we'd check and carefully memorize the publisher: Reilly and Lee. Reilly and Lee. "Reilly and Lee," we'd say, entering the car, then again while entering the bookstore.
I appreciated that McGuire had read all the books. That showed in his details, like Smith & Tinker being the manufacturer of mechanical men in both the original books and in McGuire Oz. These details added to the creepiness--as if the true evil had always lurked in Oz--as if any adult could have seen it, the way we all learn horrible truths about the real world as we grow up. To grow up in the real world is to replace one-by-one the simple ideal explanations that the grownups start us off with. Likewise, McGuire Oz is an unmasked evil that we hadn't noticed before only because we were children.
But my Oz, our Oz, was a child's paradise.There was no evil truth to learn about the world, no need to grow up. No one ever died there. You stayed the age you liked best.
When Dorothy ate a ham sandwich from a lunchbox she'd picked from a lunchbox tree, we asked our Orthodox Jewish father if we could eat a ham sandwich if it grew on a tree and he said yes. We could even eat ham sandwiches in Oz. Freedom and fantasy. Oz was the Best Place, a Refuge. Escape.
Oz never left me, no matter how old I grew. After all, you're the age you liked best in Oz--and why would anybody choose to grow up?
I listened to the Wicked audiobook during my pre-Covid, pre-remote-work, hours-long stressful car commuting to and from my out-of-state job. So ok, maybe I was already vulnerable? And ram, stomp, onto my childhood paradise went the well-written riveting narrative--I couldn't escape McGuire Oz, not until its sad sad ending.
No.
Some time I'm sure I will see the movie. The bits of stills from it I've seen are pretty. But I haven't the courage yet.
