With two “tough” Australian brigades going into battle singing “Have you heard of the wonderful wizard, The wonderful Wizard of Oz..” it was a song that was spread from Australia to England. The song reflected a classic 1939 Hollywood production of the story, which not only introduced millions to the land of Oz, but also to a talented young lady named Judy Garland. Published in 1900, Lyman Frank Baum’s The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was immensely popular- providing a base for a profitable musical comedy, three movies,and plays. The tale that Baum has created has been seen by interested scholars, such as Russel B. Nye. being neither critically acclaimed nor critically examined. In the Oz book, Professor Nye finds a “strain of moralism” as well as “ a well-developed sense of satire”, however in Baum’s stories, he often includes parodies of the contradictions in human nature.
In 1900, Baum was surrounded by an astonishing degree of political reality. While Baum was living in South Dakota, not only was the frontier and actual thing of the past, and with the stark reality of the dry, open plains served to crush Romantic Idealism. In Chicago, Baum saw the results of the depression which had closed down upon the nation in 1893. Baum took part in the pivotal election of 1896, marching in “torch-light parades got William Jennings Bryan” With Baum’s allegiance to the cause of Democratic Populism, it must balance against the fact that he was not a political activist.

I always like the story of Wizard of Oz, though I never understood the symbols or “hidden” message everyone would talk about. In the novel and the movie “The Wizard of Oz,” there has been many opinions brought about that are controversial on whether or not Frank Baum meant to use the novel as a parable on the Populist movement. Though there were skeptics of any play on populism, many would say that Frank Baum