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Love this version on Wizard of Oz. ( ![]() I got this in 4th grade (looking back it was highly inappropriate for a 9 year old) and couldn't really get into it for obvious reasons. Finally tackled it during a giant snowstorm in 7th grade. I have severely mixed feelings about this book. I liked this book overall. There were parts that I thought dragged. It was a slow pace for me as my interest would weave in and out. It is wickedly funny throughout the book. I am a big fan of the wicked witch now. When I was little I wanted to be Glinda. Now I think I would chose to be Elphaba even if it meant being green. She has heart, is interesting, smart and tenacious. She is out spoken and doesn't show fear. She does and says what she wants to. Who would not want to be her? The book has a little bit of everything in it as it deals with the issue of nature and the roots of evil. You will find sex, romance, intrigue, good and evil, suspense, thrills and all the characters from the Wizard of Oz. I'm not sure what I expected and perhaps that is why I am ambivalent about the book. It is one that, I think, maybe came off better as a stage play. The first 20% of this book about Elphaba's parents should have been cut out. It had no point, no trajectory, and was bizarrely, jarringly sexual in tone. For a book supposedly giving us the Wicked Witch's story, we don't even get her perspective until over 25% of the way in, nor do we get an explanation for her green skin or inability to touch water. I skipped to the end to see if it got better, but no, the surface-level incoherent narrative didn't resolve itself in any way.
Although Mr. Maguire demonstrates a knack for conjuring up bizarre adventures for Elphie and introducing her to an eccentric cast of creatures (though nowhere near as enchanting as the many creatures Baum invented in his multiple sequels to "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz"), his insistence on politicizing Oz and injecting it with a heavy dose of moral relativism turns a wonderfully spontaneous world of fantasy into a lugubrious allegorical realm, in which everything and everyone is labeled with a topical name tag. With a husky voice and a gentle, dramatic manner that will call to mind the image of a patient grandfather reading to an excited gaggle of children, McDonough leisurely narrates this fantastical tale of good and evil, of choice and responsibility. In Maguire's Oz, Elphaba, better known as the Wicked Witch of the West, is not wicked; nor is she a formally schooled witch. Instead, she's an insecure, unfortunately green Munchkinlander who's willing to take radical steps to unseat the tyrannical Wizard of Oz. Using an appropriately brusque voice for the always blunt Elphaba, McDonough relates her tumultuous childhood (spent with an alcoholic mother and a minister father) and eye-opening school years (when she befriends her roommate, Glinda). McDonough's pacing remains frustratingly slow even after the plot picks up, and Elphaba's protracted ruminations on the nature of evil will have some listeners longing for an abridgement. Still, McDonough's excellent portrayals of Elphaba's outspoken, gravel-voiced nanny and Glinda's snobbish friends make this excursion to Oz worthwhile Belongs to SeriesThe Wicked Years (1) Is contained inIs a retelling ofHas the adaptationHas as a student's study guide
This re-creation of the land of Oz, tells the story of Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West, who wasn't so wicked after all. Past the yellow brick road and into a phantasmagoric world rich with imagination and allegory, Wicked just might change the reputation of one of the most sinister characters in literature. No library descriptions found. |
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