Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West
Page 49
—Boston Phoenix
“A fantasy novel that reads like Graham Greene at his best.”
—San Jose Mercury News
“Gregory Maguire has taken this figure of childhood fantasy and given her a sensual and powerful nature that will stir adult hearts with fear and longing all over again.”
—New Orleans Times-Picayune
“Maguire combines puckish humor and bracing pessimism in this fantastical meditation on good and evil, God and free will, which should . . . captivate devotees of fantasy.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Maguire’s adult fable examines some of literature’s major themes: moral ambiguity, the nature of evil, the bittersweet dividends of power, the high costs of love. Elphaba—the Wicked Witch of the West—is as scary as ever, but this time in a different way: She’s undeniably human. She’s us.”
—Wally Lamb, author of She’s Come Undone and I Know This Much Is True
“Starting with the Wizard of Oz material, Gregory Maguire has added greater depths and different facets, creating something altogether different and unique. It’s a magnificent work, a genuine tour de force.”
—Lloyd Alexander, author of The Chronicles of Prydain
“Gregory Maguire’s donnés in Wicked are from Baum’s land of Oz; but everything here has been recut to sparkle fresh and new, with illuminations shining in unexpected directions. Funny and serious, pulsing with imaginative energy, encompassing political thriller and moral reflection, this is truly a fabulous novel.”
—Jill Paton Walsh, author of Knowledge of Angels
“Here is a story that is at once a page-turner and a powerful stimulus to thought.”
—John Rowe Townsend, author of The Islanders
“This book is a glorious frolic, a feast of language, a study of good and evil, and a massive history of the fabulous land of Oz.”
—Jane Langton, author of The Diamond in the Window
Praise for Gregory Maguire’s
Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister
“An arresting hybrid of mystery, fairy tale, and historical novel . . . Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister isn’t easy to classify or forget.”
—Detroit Free Press
“A tale so movingly told that you will say at the end of the first reading, ‘It’s been a long time since I read a book this good.’ . . . Few writers match Gregory Maguire.”
—Nashville Tennessean
“[A] brilliantly plotted fantasy. . . . Maguire is rapidly becoming one of contemporary fiction’s most assured myth-makers.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred)
“Captivating and beautifully written . . . Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister is a rich canvas of colorful characters and fantastic events rendered by an artist attentive to every surface and texture.”
—Book magazine
“Bewitching.”
—Chicago Tribune
Credits
Cover design by John Lewis
Illustrations by Douglas Smith
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.
WICKED. Copyright © 1995 by Gregory Maguire. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of PerfectBound™.
PerfectBound™ and the PerfectBound™ logo are trademarks of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.
THE WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ copyright © 1899 by L. Frank Baum
MS Reader edition v 1. October 2002 ISBN 0-06-053889-9
A hardcover edition of this book was published in 1995 by ReganBooks, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
First paperback edition published 1996, reissued 2000.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
About the Publisher
Australia
HarperCollins Publishers (Australia) Pty. Ltd.
25 Ryde Road (PO Box 321)
Pymble, NSW 2073, Australia
http://www.perfectbound.com.au
Canada
HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
55 Avenue Road, Suite 2900
Toronto, ON, M5R, 3L2, Canada
http://www.perfectbound.ca
New Zealand
HarperCollinsPublishers (New Zealand) Limited
P.O. Box 1
Auckland, New Zealand
http://www.harpercollins.co.nz
United Kingdom
HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
77-85 Fulham Palace Road
London, W6 8JB, UK
http://www.uk.perfectbound.com
United States
HarperCollins Publishers Inc.
10 East 53rd Street
New York, NY 10022
http://www.perfectbound.com
INTRODUCTION.
Folk lore, legends, myths and fairy tales have followed childhood through the ages, for every healthy youngster has a wholesome and instinctive love for stories fantastic, marvelous and manifestly unreal. The winged fairies of Grimm and Andersen have brought more happiness to childish hearts than all other human creations.
Yet the old-time fairy tale, having served for generations, may now be classed as “historical” in the children’s library; for the time has come for a series of newer “wonder tales” in which the stereotyped genie, dwarf and fairy are eliminated, together with all the horrible and blood-curdling incidents devised by their authors to point a fearsome moral to each tale. Modern education includes morality; therefore the modern child seeks only entertainment in its wonder tales and gladly dispenses with all disagreeable incident.
Having this thought in mind, the story of “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” was written solely to pleasure children of today. It aspires to being a modernized fairy tale, in which the wonderment and joy are retained and the heart-aches and nightmares are left out.
L. FRANK BAUM.
CHICAGO, APRIL, 1900.
LIST OF CHAPTERS.
* * *
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER I.—The Cyclone.
CHAPTER II.—The Council with The Munchkins.
CHAPTER III.—How Dorothy Saved the Scarecrow.
CHAPTER IV.—The Road Through the Forest.
CHAPTER V.—The Rescue of the Tin Woodman.
CHAPTER VI.—The Cowardly Lion.
CHAPTER VII.—The Journey to The Great Oz.
CHAPTER VIII.—The Deadly Poppy Field.
CHAPTER IX.—The Queen of the Field Mice.
CHAPTER X.—The Guardian of the Gates.
CHAPTER XI.—The Wonderful Emerald City of Oz.
CHAPTER XII.—The Search for the Wicked Witch.
CHAPTER XIII.—How the Four were Reunited.
CHAPTER XIV.—The Winged Monkeys.
CHAPTER XV.—The Discovery of Oz the Terrible.
CHAPTER XVI.—The Magic Art of the Great Humbug.
CHAPTER XVII.—How the Balloon was Launched.
CHAPTER XVIII.—Away to the South.
CHAPTER XIX.—Attacked by the Fighting Trees.
CHAPTER XX.—The Dainty China Country.
CHAPTER XXI.—The Lion Becomes the King of Beasts.
CHAPTER XXII.—The Country of the Quadlings.
CHAPTER XXIII.—The Good Witch Grants Dorothy’s Wish.
CHAPTER XXIV.—Home Again.
This book is dedicated to my good friend and comrade.
My Wife
~ L. F. B.
Chapter I.
The Cyclone.
DOROTHY LIVED IN the midst of the great Kansas prairies, with Uncle Henry, who was a farmer, and Aunt Em, who was the farmer’s wife. Their house was small, for the lumber to build it had to be carried by wagon many miles. There were four walls, a floor and a roof, which made one room; and this room contained a rusty-looking cooking stove, a cupboard for the dishes, a table, three or four chairs, and the beds. Uncle Henry and Aunt Em had a big bed in one corner and Dorothy a little bed in another corner. There was no garret at all, and no cellar—except a small hole, dug in the ground, called a cyclone cellar, where the family could go in case one of those great whirlwinds arose, mighty enough to crush any building in its path. It was reached by a trap-door in the middle of the floor, from which a ladder led down into the small, dark hole.
When Dorothy stood in the doorway and looked around, she could see nothing but the great gray prairie on every side. Not a tree nor a house broke the broad sweep of flat country that reached the edge of the sky in all directions. The sun had baked the plowed land into a gray mass, with little cracks running through it. Even the grass was not green, for the sun had burned the tops of the long blades until they were the same gray color to be seen everywhere. Once the house had been painted, but the sun blistered the paint and the rains washed it away, and now the house was as dull and gray as everything else.
When Aunt Em came there to live she was a young, pretty wife. The sun and wind had changed her, too. They had taken the sparkle from her eyes and left them a sober gray; they had taken the red from her cheeks and lips, and they were gray also. She was thin and gaunt, and never smiled, now. When Dorothy, who was an orphan, first came to her, Aunt Em had been so startled by the child’s laughter that she would scream and press her hand upon her heart whenever Dorothy’s merry voice reached her ears; and she still looked at the little girl with wonder that she could find anything to laugh at.
Uncle Henry never laughed. He worked hard from morning till night and did not know what joy was. He was gray also, from his long beard to his rough boots, and he looked stern and solemn, and rarely spoke.
It was Toto that made Dorothy laugh, and saved her from growing as gray as her other surroundings. Toto was not gray; he was a little black dog, with long, silky hair and small black eyes that twinkled merrily on either side of his funny, wee nose. Toto played all day long, and Dorothy played with him, and loved him dearly.
To-day, however, they were not playing. Uncle Henry sat upon the door-step and looked anxiously at the sky, which was even grayer than usual. Dorothy stood in the door with Toto in her arms, and looked at the sky too. Aunt Em was washing the dishes.
From the far north they heard a low wail of the wind, and Uncle Henry and Dorothy could see where the long grass bowed in waves before the coming storm. There now came a sharp whistling in the air from the south, and as they turned their eyes that way they saw ripples in the grass coming from that direction also.
Suddenly Uncle Henry stood up.
“There’s a cyclone coming, Em,” he called to his wife; “I’ll go look after the stock.” Then he ran toward the sheds where the cows and horses were kept.
Aunt Em dropped her work and came to the door. One glance told her of the danger close at hand.
“Quick, Dorothy!” she screamed; “run for the cellar!”
Toto jumped out of Dorothy’s arms and hid under the bed, and the girl started to get him. Aunt Em, badly frightened, threw open the trap-door in the floor and climbed down the ladder into the small, dark hole. Dorothy caught Toto at last and started to follow her aunt. When she was half way across the room there came a great shriek from the wind, and the house shook so hard that she lost her footing and sat down suddenly upon the floor.
A strange thing then happened.
The house whirled around two or three times and rose slowly through the air. Dorothy felt as if she were going up in a balloon.
The north and south winds met where the house stood, and made it the exact center of the cyclone. In the middle of a cyclone the air is generally still, but the great pressure of the wind on every side of the house raised it up higher and higher, until it was at the very top of the cyclone; and there it remained and was carried miles and miles away as easily as you could carry a feather.
It was very dark, and the wind howled horribly around her, but Dorothy found she was riding quite easily. After the first few whirls around, and one other time when the house tipped badly, she felt as if she were being rocked gently, like a baby in a cradle.
Toto did not like it. He ran about the room, now here, now there, barking loudly; but Dorothy sat quite still on the floor and waited to see what would happen.
Once Toto got too near the open trap-door, and fell in; and at first the little girl thought she had lost him. But soon she saw one of his ears sticking up through the hole, for the strong pressure of the air was keeping him up so that he could not fall. She crept to the hole, caught Toto by the ear, and dragged him into the room again; afterward closing the trap-door so that no more accidents could happen.
Hour after hour passed away, and slowly Dorothy got over her fright; but she felt quite lonely, and the wind shrieked so loudly all about her that she nearly became deaf. At first she had wondered if she would be dashed to pieces when the house fell again; but as the hours passed and nothing terrible happened, she stopped worrying and resolved to wait calmly and see what the future would bring. At last she crawled over the swaying floor to her bed, and lay down upon it; and Toto followed and lay down beside her.
In spite of the swaying of the house and the wailing of the wind, Dorothy soon closed her eyes and fell fast asleep.
Chapter II.
The Council with
The Munchkins.
SHE WAS AWAKENED by a shock, so sudden and severe that if Dorothy had not been lying on the soft bed she might have been hurt. As it was, the jar made her catch her breath and wonder what had happened; and Toto put his cold little nose into her face and whined dismally. Dorothy sat up and noticed that the house was not moving; nor was it dark, for the bright sunshine came in at the window, flooding the little room. She sprang from her bed and with Toto at her heels ran and opened the door.
The little girl gave a cry of amazement and looked about her, her eyes growing bigger and bigger at the wonderful sights she saw.
The cyclone had set the house down, very gently—for a cyclone—in the midst of a country of marvelous beauty. There were lovely patches of green sward all about, with stately trees bearing rich and luscious fruits. Banks of gorgeous flowers were on every hand, and birds with rare and brilliant plumage sang and fluttered in the trees and bushes. A little way off was a small brook, rushing and sparkling along between green banks, and murmuring in a voice very grateful to a little girl who had lived so long on the dry, gray prairies.
While she stood looking eagerly at the strange and beautiful sights, she noticed coming toward her a group of the queerest people she had ever seen. They were not as big as the grown folk she had always been used to; but neither were they very small. In fact, they seemed about as tall as Dorothy, who was a well-grown child for her age, although they were, so far as looks go, many years older.
Three were men and one a woman, and all were oddly dressed. They wore round hats that rose to a small point a foot above their heads, with little bells around the brims that tinkled sweetly as they moved. The hats of the men were blue; the little woman’s hat was white, and she wore a white gown that hung in plaits from her shoulders; over it were sprinkled little stars that glistened in the sun like diamonds. The men were dressed in blue, of the same shade as their hats, and wore well-polished boots with a deep roll of blue at the tops. The men, Dorothy thought, were about as old as Uncle Henry, for two of them had beards. But the little woman was doubtless much older: her face was covered with wrinkles, her hair was nearly white, and she walked rather stiffly.
When these people dre
w near the house where Dorothy was standing in the doorway, they paused and whispered among themselves, as if afraid to come farther. But the little old woman walked up to Dorothy, made a low bow and said, in a sweet voice,
“You are welcome, most noble Sorceress, to the land of the Munchkins. We are so grateful to you for having killed the Wicked Witch of the East, and for setting our people free from bondage.”
Dorothy listened to this speech with wonder. What could the little woman possibly mean by calling her a sorceress, and saying she had killed the Wicked Witch of the East? Dorothy was an innocent, harmless little girl, who had been carried by a cyclone many miles from home; and she had never killed anything in all her life.
But the little woman evidently expected her to answer; so Dorothy said, with hesitation,
“You are very kind; but there must be some mistake. I have not killed anything.”
“Your house did, anyway,” replied the little old woman, with a laugh; “and that is the same thing. See!” she continued, pointing to the corner of the house; “there are her two toes, still sticking out from under a block of wood.”
Dorothy looked, and gave a little cry of fright. There, indeed, just under the corner of the great beam the house rested on, two feet were sticking out, shod in silver shoes with pointed toes.
“Oh dear! oh dear!” cried Dorothy, clasping her hands together in dismay; “the house must have fallen on her. What ever shall we do?”
“There is nothing to be done,” said the little woman, calmly.
“But who was she?” asked Dorothy.
“She was the Wicked Witch of the East, as I said,” answered the little woman. “She has held all the Munchkins in bondage for many years, making them slave for her night and day. Now they are all set free, and are grateful to you for the favour.”