Changes

The most famous adaptation is the 1939 film "The Wizard of Oz" featuring [[Judy Garland]] as Dorothy.  Strong new political elements were added.  The Wicked Witch of the West is played by the same actress who was the evil landowner in the opening scene who is trying to destroy Toto, while the Wizard is portrayed less as a humbug than as psychologically perceptive and helpful.   

The most famous adaptation is the 1939 film "The Wizard of Oz" featuring [[Judy Garland]] as Dorothy.  Strong new political elements were added.  The Wicked Witch of the West is played by the same actress who was the evil landowner in the opening scene who is trying to destroy Toto, while the Wizard is portrayed less as a humbug than as psychologically perceptive and helpful.   

''The Wiz'' was a Broadway hit musical with an all-black cast emphasizing the liberation from slavery. It was later made into a 1978 movie directed by Sidney Lumet, and starring Diana Ross as Dorothy and Michael Jackson as the Scarecrow.  Gregory Maguire wrote ''Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West'' (1995). The 2003 Broadway musical "Wicked" (based on Maguire's novel) was a popular hit, with the Wizard's corruption emphasized.  ==Impact on readers==

''The Wiz'' was a Broadway hit musical with an all-black cast emphasizing the liberation from slavery. It was later made into a 1978 movie directed by Sidney Lumet, and starring Diana Ross as Dorothy and Michael Jackson as the Scarecrow.  Gregory Maguire wrote ''Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West'' (1995). The 2003 Broadway musical "Wicked" (based on Maguire's novel) was a popular hit, with the Wizard's corruption emphasized.   

==Impact on readers==

The 40 Oz books had a significant impact on their young middle class readers who read them in English, Spanish, Russian, French, German, Romanian, Latin, Hebrew, or Arabic editions. Novelist Gore Vidal recalls:

The 40 Oz books had a significant impact on their young middle class readers who read them in English, Spanish, Russian, French, German, Romanian, Latin, Hebrew, or Arabic editions. Novelist Gore Vidal recalls:

:""Like most Americans my age (with access to books) I spent a good deal of my youth in Baum's Land of Oz," he wrote. "I have a precise, tactile memory of the first Oz book that came into my hands. It was the original 1910 edition of ''The Emerald City of Oz.'' I still remember the look and the feel of those dark blue covers, the evocative smell of dust and old ink. I also remember that I could not stop reading and rereading the book. But 'reading' is not the right word. In some mysterious way, I was translating myself to Oz, a place which I was to inhabit for many years .... With The Emerald City, I became addicted to reading."<ref>Quoted in , Nicholas Von Hoffman, "Flimflam Land. ''Civilization,'' Feb/Mar2000, Vol. 7, Issue 1 </ref>

:""Like most Americans my age (with access to books) I spent a good deal of my youth in Baum's Land of Oz," he wrote. "I have a precise, tactile memory of the first Oz book that came into my hands. It was the original 1910 edition of ''The Emerald City of Oz.'' I still remember the look and the feel of those dark blue covers, the evocative smell of dust and old ink. I also remember that I could not stop reading and rereading the book. But 'reading' is not the right word. In some mysterious way, I was translating myself to Oz, a place which I was to inhabit for many years .... With The Emerald City, I became addicted to reading."<ref>Quoted in , Nicholas Von Hoffman, "Flimflam Land. ''Civilization,'' Feb/Mar2000, Vol. 7, Issue 1 </ref>