Oz Imitations (original) (raw)

Oz Imitations began to appear soon after the publication of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz in 1900.

As with the previous year's Father Goose, the initial critical and commercial success of the first Oz book inspired other writers, artists, and publishers to attempt to replicate it. Among the most prominent and noteworthy examples of this trend are:

• Zauberlinda, by Eva Katharine Gibson (1901)
• The Pearl and the Pumpkin, by Paul Clarendon West and W. W. Denslow (1904)
• The Golden Goblin, by Curtis Dunham (1906)
• Yama Yama Land, by Grace Duffie Boylan (1909)
• The Magical Land of Noom by Johnny Gruelle (1922)
• Magic Land by Alexander Volkov and various others (1939-)
• The 13 Clocks and The Wonderful O by James Thurber (1950, 1957)
• The Amazing Land of Wew, by John G. Kaufer (1954)

There are also many other books that have been classified as Oz imitations or pastiches in the years and decades that followed 1900.

The 1940 film The Blue Bird was considered to be 20th Century Fox's fairy tale film response to MGM's The Wizard of Oz (1939). It starred Shirley Temple who notably was passed on to Judy Garland, and started with a similar black and white opening before switching to color. It was based off a Belgian play from 1908 which interestingly also had fairies and a dog named Tylo which is similar to Toto. The movie costarred Gale Sondergaard, who had screen tested for MGM as the Wicked Witch of the West.

The two 'Oz writings' by Frank Joslyn Baum which are The Laughing Dragon of Oz and Jimmy Bulber in Oz which were both written in 1934 are sometimes considered imitations.