Did you know that L. Frank Baums book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is allegory, a parable on late 19th century US populism? Dorothys silver slippers (MGM changed the silver slippers to the vivid ruby slippers to exploit the fabulous technology of Technicolor): Originally the slippers were the property of the Wicked Witch of the East, until Dorothy drops the house on the witch. Walking on the yellow brick road with the silver slippers represented the bimetallic standard, which Populists advocated. Dorothy can go back to Kansas by kicking the heels of her silver shoes together three times. The power to solve her problems (by adding silver to the money stock) was there all the time. The yellow brick road = Paved with gold bricks (the gold standard). The Wicked Witch of the East = Eastern banking and industrial interests. She keeps the munchkins in [debt] bondage for many years, making them slave for her night and day. She is killed by Dorothys falling house because the Populists expected that the eastern industrial workers would vote Populist, but that never happened. The Munchkins = subjects of the eastern banking and industrial interests. Dorothy = the American people: plucky, good natured, naive. The Scarecrow = He is the western farmer, who thinks he has no brain. A major theme of the populist movement was that the people, farmers in particular, were able to understand the complex theories that underlay the choice of a monetary standard. The Tin Woodsman = He is the workingman. In the book we learn that he was once flesh and blood but was cursed. As he worked, his ax would take flight and cut off part of his body. A tinsmith would replace the missing part, and the Tin Woodman could work as well as before. Eventually there was nothing left but tin. But for all his increased power to work, the Tin Woodman is unhappy for he had lost his heart. He represents the Populist idea of the alienation of the industrial worker. Hes so dehumanized he doesnt have a heart. He once was an independent artisan but is now just a cog in a giant machine. He joined the unemployed of the 1890s, victim of the eastern goldbugs who didnt want to increase the money supply by adding silver. After the Wicked Witch of the West is killed, the tin woodman is given a new axe-handle of solid gold with a blade polished so that it glistened like burnished silver. The bimetallic standard will ensure the industrial worker that he wont be unemployed again. The Cowardly Lion = William Jennings Bryan, the wonderful orator but unsuccessful politician. He backed the silver cause. The Wicked Witch of the West = Western railroad interests, including the western land barons and mortgage holders.the Wicked Witch of the West had but one eye, yet that was as powerful as a telescope, and could see everywhere. And [S]he blew upon a silver whistle that hung around her neck to summon the predators. The yellow Winkies [Chinese labor], ... were the slaves of the Wicked Witch. The Witch was killed with a bucket of water, the Wicked Witch had been melted by a bucket of water, that is, she was liquidated. [Definition: Late Latin liquidÄtus, past participle of liquidÄre to melt, make liquid or clear.] Toto = the Prohibition (Temperance) party. Favored the bimetallic standard but like any fringe group often pulled in the wrong direction. So they got to be a dog. (Toto is a play on teetotalers.) The Good Witch of the North = the upper Midwest, a populist stronghold. The Good Witch of the South = the South, another populist stronghold. The Emerald City = Washington D.C. The color is suggestive of paper greenbacks. It is exposed as fraud. The Emerald City is only an illusion, and green paper money is likewise a delusion. The Wizard = a little bumbling old man, hiding behind a facade of paper mache and noise, ... able to be everything to everybody. This could be President McKinley who is really just a little man pulling levers to sustain an illusion of power, or, it could be that the real power of the President rests with the little men behind the facade who pull the levers and create the illusion, men like McKinleys adviser, Marcus Alonzo Hanna. >
Posted on: Sat, 01 Feb 2014 18:52:39 +0000
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