L. Frank Baum created a magical place in his book The Wizard of Oz and in the many subsequent books he wrote about this fantastic land to which the Kansas farm girl, Dorothy, was transported by a tornado, and the film version of the book, made in 1939, offered a visualization of the creations of Baum in a colorful and appealing form. The film is different from the book in a number of ways, not only in terms of changes in the plot, but in terms of the accent placed on various ideas and in the way elements are dramatized. For one thing, of course, the movie is part musical, something never considered by Baum. Baum would likely have been favorably disposed to the movie given that he himself had written, produced, and directed several Oz films during the silent era. Baum wrote 13 Oz books, and the books were carried on after his death by others so that another 19 books were added in the 19 years after Baum's death (Harmetz 292).
Lyman Frank Baum was 43 years old when he wrote the first Oz book. In 1899 he wrote a book then titled The Emerald City, and he took it to the George M. Hill Publishing Co. in Chicago, Illinois. He had spent a year inventing the Emerald City before he started writing, first creating it as a bedtime story for his four sons. Baum had by this time been a failure in several professions, as an actor, playwright, and a salesman of axle-lubricant. In truth, he was a poor businessman, and while the publication of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (as the title became) in 1900 made him financially secure, by 1911 he had to file for bankruptcy. The book was indeed an instant success and sold out its first edition of 10,000 copies in two weeks. Some 90,000 copies were sold during 1900 and 1901. In 1902, Baum teamed with composer Paul Tietjens and turned The Wizard of Oz into a five-act children's operetta. Stage director Julian Mitchell insisted that Baum rewrite it as a musical comedy, and in this form it was extre...