Folklore, legends, myths and fairy tales have followed childhood through the
ages, for every healthy youngster has a wholesome and instinctive love for
stories fantastic, marvelous and manifestly unreal. The winged fairies of Grimm
and Andersen have brought more happiness to childish hearts than all other
human creations.
Yet the old time fairy tale, having served for generations, may now be classed
as “historical” in the children’s library; for the time has
come for a series of newer “wonder tales” in which the stereotyped
genie, dwarf and fairy are eliminated, together with all the horrible and
blood-curdling incidents devised by their authors to point a fearsome moral to
each tale. Modern education includes morality; therefore the modern child seeks
only entertainment in its wonder tales and gladly dispenses with all
disagreeable incident.
Having this thought in mind, the story of “The Wonderful Wizard of
Oz” was written solely to please children of today. It aspires to being a
modernized fairy tale, in which the wonderment and joy are retained and the
heartaches and nightmares are left out.
L. Frank BaumChicago, April, 1900.
