Ozma/Sleeping Beauty

Sometime in 1907-1908, John R. Neill drew a set of illustrations for Sleeping Beauty for the Children's Stories That Never Grow Old series. These were originally published in the Philadelphia North American newspaper, and later as individual story books.

I find it interesting that the images of the Princess are clearly influenced by Neill's illustrations of Princess Ozma from the Oz series. The poppies in the hair, practically a trademark characteristic of Ozma, are present and make sense in this case. Poppies have long been associated with sleep and death, and the soporific power of the poppies tie in well with the 100 years sleep. In Greek mythology, Hypnos and Thanatos are twin brothers representing sleep and death - they are often pictured in conjunction with poppies. And L. Frank Baum made memorable use of this symbolism with the deadly poppy field in the first Oz book.

Neill placed poppies in Ozma's hair in his first illustrations of her, in The Marvelous Land of Oz, and continued to use them throughout the series. I wonder if his idea was to represent a reminder of her years under enchantment - either as years asleep, or dead to the world?

Curtains

In 1929, John R. Neill created a new cover for Ozma of Oz . Reilly & Lee had been using the original Reilly & Britton dust jacket drawing as the book cover, and obviously felt it could use an update - the old cover was more of a publishers advertisement than an eye-catching image.

For the new cover, Ozma is shown pushing aside a set of curtains. Neill found curtains to be a useful device in a number of his Oz illustrations. These were effective means of revealing a character, or obscuring a scene. They obviously worked well, because I've always remembered these particular pictures.


In Ozma, Ozma pushes aside the drapes as she moves forward to make her final guess in the Nome King's room of ornaments.

In Tik-Tok, Betsy Bobbin and Hank the Mule are seen after their arrival in the Emerald City palace.

In Lost Princess, Dorothy is shown discovering the loss of Ozma and her magic tools.

In Magic, Ozma is pulling aside a curtain to enter on her birthday feast and presents.

In Jack Pumpkinhead, the Baron and his Princess are revealed.

And of course, the MGM film does have the famous line "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!"

Jack Snow

After John R. Neill's death in 1943, the Oz series came to a stop. It was revived by Jack Snow, a fervent admirer and collector of L. Frank Baum's work, and author of The Magical Mimics in Oz (1946), and The Shaggy Man of Oz (1949). In these two Oz titles, Snow ignored any incidents occurring after Glinda of Oz, and worked only with characters created by Baum or himself. I enjoy these stories, but these are the first to be illustrated by someone other than Neill, and the combination of new author as well as new illustrator make them feel a little odd to me. Frank Kramer was a friend of Snow's, and he was in the unenviable position of replacing Neill, who had illustrated the last 35 books!

Who's Who in Oz is a bit of an Oz oddity - This book from 1954 is an alphabetical listing of over 600 Oz characters, from the 39 books then in print. Plot summaries of each title are also given, as well as biogaphical sketches of authors and illustrators from the series. The dust jacket for this books takes its image from the endpapers of The Royal Book of Oz, and I think is an inspired choice.

Two Neill Books

Here are another pair of later books with illustrations by John R. Neill.

I've always thought this edition of Andersen's Fairy Tales was an odd book. It was published in 1922 by Cupples and Leon, and is illustrated in black and white by an unknown artist. Neill provided a cover and two color plates for the book, which strikes me as a strange number of color plates. One is used as a frontispiece, and the other is lost within the book. These were finished watercolors, and it would have been nice to see a more complete suite of illustrations for this title.

Another book to use Neill's illustrations was King Arthur and His Knights, published in 1924 by Rand McNally. This book takes the opposite approach from Andersen's Fairy Tales - the cover and color illustrations are by Mead Schaeffer, and Neill provided a handful of pen drawings - generally at the beginning of each "book" of the story. The drawings are vignettes rather than full scenes, but it's fun to see some Arthurian illustrations by Neill.

Peter and the Princess

John R. Neill didn't illustrate many books after the 19-teens, other than the Oz series. A notable exception to this is Peter and The Princess, which was published by Reilly & Lee in 1920. This title was was an elaborate gift book, and a showcase for John R. Neill's artwork, containing 8 beautiful color plates, plus color title page, endpapers, and cover - eleven images in all.


These illustrations were taken from finished watercolors, rather than ink drawings with color added by the printers, and the book was sold in a decorative box. I do find it a bit odd that Neill didn't create any ink drawings for the book, since he was such a master of that medium. But the watercolors are lovely, and I believe most of them remain in the Neill family today.

Two years ago I had an opportunity to visit with Jory Mason, one of Neill's granddaughters. This was a memorable occasion, as I was able to view a great deal of original artwork at the time. As a bonus, she had a large quantity of pieces belonging to her Aunt which were being returned shortly after my visit. Among these were several of the watercolors for this book, and it was a thrill to see them in person.

A Denslow Cover

The cover for Reminiscences of William Wetmore Story is a little different from some of the other covers W. W. Denslow designed for Rand McNally. The design is very sedate and much more linear, lacking any bold blocks of color. As this title is not a novel, but a biography of the American sculptor/author, this restrained approach seems most appropriate. The images of a quill, mallet, laurel wreath and lamp all reflect the subject of the book. Story lived much of his life in Rome, and his home there became a gathering place for many famous people of his day.

My copy of this book is a somewhat worn ex-library copy, with a card flap and library stamps on various pages. Originally it was given by the author to a childhood friend - there is an inscription on the front endpaper. However, I have to laugh to see that this book has clearly never been read, either by the friend or later by any library patrons; about two thirds of the pages have never been opened!

Illustrated Walls

I've spent a good deal of my life surrounded by Oz in some form or another, but a couple years ago, I took that to a new level. My partner and I had repainted our dining room in a rather uncompromising shade of mustard yellow - something I was a little unsure of then, and am still uncertain about. To give it some additional interest, I decided to try illustrating the walls.

This was accomplished by projecting images of book illustrations on the wall, tracing, and painting them in place. I had a lot of fun, choosing drawings by various artists we collect, and generally sticking to less recognizable characters.

There are quite a few Neill drawings since he's a favorite and they were really well suited to the application. As images were added over time, I couldn't help adding a few classics like Piglet and Pinocchio. There are also images by Edward Gorey, Mary GrandPre, H. J. Ford, H. R. Millar, and Palmer Cox - a bit of a grab-bag of illustrators. There are still a few holes that could be filled; we'll see.

Lucky Bucky

Lucky Bucky in Oz had a British edition published in 1945, by Hutchinson Books. I think an attempt was being made to profit from the MGM film, which was re-released in England in 1944, by issuing the most recent Oz title. No matter how you look at it, it was an odd title to choose when most of the series had never been published in Britain.

This volume is larger than the American Oz books, but considerably thinner due to a new layout for the story and the omission of a few illustrations. A new cover was painted for the dust jacket, based on John R. Neill's original design. I prefer Neill's original, with the stylized stripes of waves, rather than the more realistic ocean.

Jenny Jump

I have one drawing of Jenny Jump, the female protagonist created by John R. Neill for his Oz stories.

In this picture from The Wonder City of Oz, Jenny is aboard an Ozoplane with Scraps, the Patchwork Girl. Jenny is an interesting character. She arrives in Oz and proceeds to grow younger through the story. Here we can see that her dress is clearly too large for her, as she has been dropping a few years. I believe Neill's original intention was for Jenny to be an old woman when she landed in Oz, and end up a young girl but I'm not completely sure about that.

Scraps is shown wearing a boys bathing suit, a costume she is stuck in for most of the book. I would certainly have preferred her to be in her patchwork dress - I'd love to have a good drawing of the classic Patchwork Girl!

Latest Bugle

The latest Baum Bugle arrived a few days ago, featuring the centennial of Ozma of Oz, the Oz book for 1907. Ozma has always been one of my favorites, as it has been for many readers. I particularly enjoyed an article in this issue by Michael O. Riley examining the story arc of Ozma and the three following books, with the idea that these four books truly constitute the Oz series - after all, the series was intended to end with the last title of that group, The Emerald City of Oz. The other major articles are an appreciation of Ozma by Atticus Gannaway, a review of the series Tin Man by Eric Gjovaag, and an article on Arthur Freed by Mark Griffin. As always, a fun read - and a very nice mention of my blog as well!

Wonder City Art

I have a couple pieces of artwork by John R. Neill from The Wonder City of Oz. Two pieces feature one of Neill's new characters, Number Nine, a Munchkin boy who ends up as assistant to the Wizard of Oz. In both pictures, he's wearing his whistlebreeches - pants that play music if the wearer slows down while working. As Number Nine was a somewhat lazy boy, he was given these pants to make sure he kept moving!

This drawing was used as the heading for Chapter 21, on page 216. According to Neill's notation on the artwork, it was originally intended for Chapter 5, much earlier in the book. The editing and rewriting of Neill's manuscript required moving illustrations about throughout the book, and many were changed to fit the final story.

The second drawing I'm showing is Number Nine with the Town Crier - a typically Ozzy pun/character . I've always found this drawing odd because Number Nine is clearly missing one leg. On the drawing, there are pencil remnants of various positions tried by Neill for the right leg, but he must not have been pleased with any - so, no leg!

Neill Oz Titles

After Ruth Plumly Thompson left the Oz series, John R. Neill stepped up to continue writing, as well as illustrating, the stories. As much as I admire his artwork, I have to confess that his stories don't do a whole lot for me.

His first, The Wonder City of Oz, was heavily rewritten and edited by the publishers. Much of the artwork for this title does survive. The following two, The Scalawagons of Oz and Lucky Bucky in Oz, were kept much closer to his intentions. I know the cover drawing and color sketch survive from Lucky Bucky - I don't know of any other pieces.

Neill planned a fourth title, The Runaway in Oz, but did not live to see it published. This missing Oz title was finally published by Books of Wonder in 1995, with editing and illustrations by Eric Shanower - my favorite among contemporary Oz illustrators.

Removable Heads

L. Frank Baum's early Oz stories contain an amazing quantity of removable heads. Here are a few examples, off the top of my head...

In Wonderful Wizard, the Scarecrow's head is removed in order to put his new brains in the right place - and of course, the Wizard appears to Dorothy as a giant head!


In Marvelous Land, Jack Pumpkinhead loses his head a few times, and is constantly worried whether it might spoil.



In Ozma, Princess Langwidere has a head for every day of the month and threatens Dorothy with a head exchange.



Road to Oz introduces the Scoodlers, who throw their heads at their enemies. Also, Button Bright and The Shaggy Man are given replacement fox and donkey heads for a while.



In Emerald City, one of the groups of villains are the Whimsies, who wear large cardboard heads over their own tiny heads.




The theme pops up in non-Oz stories as well - in A New Wonderland, the King of Phunniland loses his head and is forced to try new heads of various materials before regaining his original.



In John Dough, the General who goes to pieces lost his head at Santiago and had it replaced with wax - but the female executioner is stymied when she is unable to cut the head from a wooden cigar store Indian.



One of the most memorable moments in the series is the discovery by the Tin Woodman of his former head, in a cupboard, in The Tin Woodman of Oz. The Tin Woodman was originally made of flesh and bone, but slowly cut himself to pieces with an enchanted ax, visiting a local tinsmith after every accident to replace each missing part. The tinsmith kept all the pieces, and when a similar fate befell another character, a soldier, the tinsmith used the various body pieces of both men to create a new man. Since he only needed one head, the spare was kept in a cupboard in his shop. This whole concept is very intriguing.

Ozoplaning with the Wizard

Ozoplaning with the Wizard of Oz was published in 1939, and ended Ruth Plumly Thompson's run of Oz books for Reilly & Lee. As this was the year of the MGM movie, an attempt was made to benefit from the publicity surrounding the film.

The cover is interestingly generic, and was designed with the Wizard, Scarecrow, and Tin Woodman prominently featured. The title The Wizard of Oz appears in large letters - Ozoplaning With is almost an afterthought.

The Oz characters of the story are all pulled from those present in the first book - but rather than using the more familiar characters, primary roles were given to Jellia Jamb and the Soldier with the Green Whiskers. It's nice to see these secondary figures on an adventure of their own. Hungry Tiger Press has recently published a new edition of this title.

Thompson would write two more Oz titles. In the 1970's The International Wizard of Oz Club printed Yankee in Oz, and The Enchanted Island of Oz, both with illustrations by Dick Martin. New editions of both of these books are currently available from the club.

A Neill Watercolor

Here's a watercolor by John R. Neill, which I think bears a striking resemblance to a published drawing of Planetty, the Silver Princess in The Silver Princess in Oz. The pose is very similar, as is the outfit, if a bit more risque. I don't know if this drawing was ever published - I'm guessing it wasn't.

Apparently Neill did do his share of bawdy drawings - in these days of adult/dark Oz tales, it's interesting to consider how Neill might have worked as an illustrator.

Silver Princess in Oz

The Silver Princess in Oz, from 1938, was the second to last Oz book written by Ruth Plumly Thompson for Reilly & Lee. She also published King Kojo this year, possibly looking for an alternative to the Oz series as she was getting tired of working with Reilly & Lee - after all, this was her 18th Oz book, four more than L. Frank Baum had written.

The story veers towards science fiction, as the Silver Princess herself is from another planet - or to be more precise, Anuther Planet. Of course, magic in Oz has always had a technological bent, so this blends in very nicely.

Since color plates were no longer in use, John R. Neill had found another way to create memorable images; in the final Oz books he illustrated, he used a few double page spreads for effect.

The first editions of this book used metallic silver ink in the title on the cover and dust jacket - a nice touch, and something that hadn't been done since The Sea Fairies in 1911. The spine of the dust jacket on this book, as well as the previous title Handy Mandy, dispenses with the small image of the main character's head that had been present on all previous Thompson titles.

I always thought it was a little odd that Handy Mandy's head was used on the spine of the book itself - when the International Wizard of Oz Club published their reprint edition of this title in 1990, they corrected that error with an image of the princess on the spine of both the book and the dust jacket.

Bindings

I collect a few different series of children's books, and it's interesting to compare the bindings of the Oz books with two British series from the same time period. The British titles are smaller in scale, and very elegant but lack some of the colorful exuberance of the Oz series.

Many British children's books seem to favor red or blue cloth, with gilt stamping. In the case of the Andrew Lang Fairy Book series, the cloth color matches the title of the book - blue, red, green, on up to olive and lilac. The Story Books which go with the series are bound in blue or red, again with the wonderful pictorial gilt stamping. These are beautiful little books, and very rich with the extensive gilt on the covers and spine. Of course this series was ostensibly for children, but as it is a fine collection of folklore and fairy tales, it was collected by many adults as well.

The books of E. Nesbit tend to be bound in red, though there are exceptions. Here again, the look is very uniform, without the variety seen in the Oz bindings. In comparison, the Oz books are large and bold, and in my mind exactly what a child would want! Perhaps Lewis Carroll was right, when he rejected the first printing of The Nursery Alice, claiming that the printing of the color illustrations was too gaudy but would be fine for Americans.

L. Frank Baum and Ruth Plumly Thompson were both very aware of Lang and Nesbit - Thompson mentioned reading both authors.