4 of 5 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Another good Oz reference, Jan 20 2000
By A Customer - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: The Oz Scrapbook (Hardcover)
Whereas "The Annotated Wizard of Oz" is a good reference for the first Oz book specifically, this is a good reference for the whole Oz phenomenon, from Baum to later authors, from books to stage plays and films.
The book opens with a description of L. Frank Baum himself; biographical details, his history of books, the writing of the 14 Oz books, his relations with illustators, and his involvement with stage plays and films based on Oz. This section, like the whole book, is illustrated with many black & white illustrations, b&w photographs, and a few color plates.
The second chapter describes the ongoing Oz phenomenon taken over by Ruth Plumly Thompson and some later Oz authors, and includes pictures of the dustjackets of some of these books as well as many other illustrations.
The third chapter deals specifically of course John R. Neill. There are also samples of illustrations from foreign language translations and adaptions of the Oz series.
Chapter 4 documents Oz on stage and on screen, starting with Baum's earliest stage plays, his later attempts with the Oz on stage and in film, later cartoon adaptions, the 1939 MGM movie, up to The Wiz of 1975. And the last short chapter spends some space to Oz pages + 16 unnumbered pages of color plates. By David L. Greene 0-394-410548, LCCN 77-3675.
4.0 out of 5 stars
there's no place like Oz, April 3 2010
By JGC - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: The Oz Scrapbook (Hardcover)
"The Oz Scrapbook" is a hard cover, coffee table sized book published in 1977 by Random House. The book is very informative and discusses overall Oz history, stories, and phenomenon. Cultural impact, meanings of the plots and undertones are not touched upon (I get the feeling that these types of things were not overly addressed until the 50th anniversary of the '39 film). Included is a background on L. Frank Baum as well as most of his writings. The book did not delve too much into his work, instead giving a brief description. Also addressed is the full Oz cannon and how these books came to fruition. Included are lots of rarely seen black and white pictures as well as several full-page, all-color pictures of books in the series, as well as countless other Oz item. My favorite pictures are the ones of the Oz books from overseas. In addition to going over the books, the original Oz stage plays and the silent films (incidentally there is a very odd looking picture of the Scarecrow intimately embracing the Tin Woodman from the 1902 musical comedy which I found confusing) "The Oz Scrapbooks" also details the later movies, films and revivals. The book also goes over, albeit briefly, some of the Oz collectibles. I enjoyed the book, however it's terribly dated. For example it wrote about how the 15K spent on the ruby slippers was like all the money in the world and it wrote about the upcoming "Wiz" musical film as if it were going to be an Academy Award best picture. The writers also seem to be rather critical of Mr. Baum as well as the 1939 Judy Garland movie, never shying away from giving their blunt and blatant opinions which sort of left a not so good impression because both the movie and Mr. Baum's works are each synonymous with Oz. Overall, it's a pretty good book for anyone interested in getting an overall introduction on Oz. It's also a lovely picture book (there are pictures on just about every page) and is truly worth the price of admission alone just for the pictures. There's no place like Oz.