Introduction

Folk lore, 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 incident 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 pleasure children of today. It aspires to being a modernized fairy tale, in which the wonderment and joy are retained and the heart-aches and nightmares are left out.

L. Frank Baum.
Chicago, April, 1900.

List of Chapters

1. The Cyclone
2. The Council with The Munchkins
3. How Dorothy Saved the Scarecrow
4. The Road Through the Forest
5. The Rescue of the Tin Woodman
6. The Cowardly Lion
7. The Journey to The Great Oz
8. The Deadly Poppy Field
9. The Queen of the Field Mice
10. The Guardian of the Gates
11. The Wonderful Emerald City of Oz
12. The Search for the Wicked Witch
13. How the Four were Reunited
14. The Winged Monkeys
15. The Discovery of Oz the Terrible
16. The Magic Art of the Great Humbug
17. How the Balloon was Launched
18. Away to the South
19. Attacked by the Fighting Trees
20. The Dainty China Country
21. The Lion Becomes the King of Beasts
22. The Country of the Quadlings
23. The Good Witch grants Dorothy's Wish
24. Home Again