The Trouble In Oz Eleanor Thorp The book, Wizard of Oz, demonstrates the struggles and parallels with populism in the late 19th century. However, the 1941 movie, “The Wizard of Oz,” creates a fantasy that many audiences enjoy, but does not connect the movie to the story’s intended allegories, such as the color of Dorothy’s shoes, portrayal of representing characters, and the yellow brick road. In Baum’s book, Dorothy’s shoes were silver (representing the push for silver from Jennings in the late 19th century), whereas in the movie version her shoes were “ruby” colored. In Baum’s story Dorothy is given silver shoes, to represent how America could use something other than gold (yellow brick road). The silver shoes are used …show more content…
The speech was repeated by Bryan on many occasions. But in November, he lost the election to William Mckinley. Baum’s novel is an effective political satire about America in the Gilded Age of unrestrained capitalism and the perceived greed of the Robber Barons. The “wicked witch of the East” represents these greedy forces working for what we now would call Wall Street, but at the same time ignoring small town American Main Street, as well as the interests of debt- ridden American farmers. Moreover, the Populist Party (formed in 1892) stood for reforms that would have restructured American society. Unlimited minting of silver was only one of their proposed measures, along with nationalisation of the railways, and tariff reform that would work in favor of small time and rural America. While the mainstream of the Democratic Party supported the issue of silver currency, many Democrats believed populism went too far. Bryan himself tended to favor a bigger role of the Federal government, and this was probably why Baum cast Bryan as the Cowardly Lion in the story. Bryan ran unsuccessfully for president three times (1696, 1900 and 1908); the victors were the Republican “bumblers,” such as Mckinley, those characterized as the “wizard of Oz,” who tried to be all things to all people, but accomplished next to