The Wizard of Oz

Designed to appeal to book lovers everywhere, the Macmillan Collector's Library is a series of beautiful gift editions of much-loved classic titles. Macmillan Collector's Library are books to love and treasure.Regarded as a modern fairy tale, L. Frank Baum's The Wizard of Oz is one of America's most cherished and enchanting children's stories. This edition features original illustrations by W. W. Denslow, coloured by Barbara Frith, and an afterword by Professor Sarah Churchwell.Follow Dorothy, and her loyal dog Toto, as they are carried away from Kansas by a cyclone to the wonderful world of Oz. Wandering down the yellow brick road Dorothy meets her three famous companions - a Scarecrow longing for a brain, a Tin Woodman wishing for a heart, a cowardly Lion yearning for some courage - and together they travel to the illustrious Emerald City where they hope all their dreams will come true.

“Like Robin Hood, Alice or Winnie the Pooh, Baum's inventions . . . have become the mythological furniture of our children's minds, and of our own and our parents' . . . Funny and inventive”

-- Marina Warner Guardian
The tales of Aesop and other fabulists . . . will never pass entirely away, but a welcome place remains and will easily be found for such stories as The Wonderful Wizard of Oz New York Times
Baum created a truly extraordinary world, a real world . . . and filled it with amazing things -- Dinitia Smith
[It] has worked its way into the national psyche as a fable of eternal hope in which things are not always as fearsome as they seem New York Times
Baum dared to offer delight without instruction -- Michael Patrick Hearn

Lyman Frank Baum was born in 1856 in Chittenango, New York. Educated mostly at home due to ill health, he was encouraged by his wealthy father to pursue his early interests in journalism and playwriting. At a young age he started his first magazine, established his own theatre and worked for many newspapers and periodicals before turning to children's fiction. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, published in 1900, was a bestselling book and launched the hugely successful series of 'Oz' titles. Baum continued writing for the rest of his life and died in 1919 with over one hundred books to his name.

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