Visitors from Oz: The Wild Adventures of Dorothy, the Scarecrow, and the Tin Woodman [Hardcover]

Martin Gardner (Author), L. Frank Baum (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1998

Dorothy and friends return in this Oz sequel, this time to New York City, on the eve of the 100th anniversary of "The Wizard of Oz". Combining mathematical riddles with technological pyrotechnics and vivid suspense, Martin Gardner has created a new fable celebrating the power of imagination and the lure of an ageless heroine named Dorothy from the turn of the century.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In time for the 100th anniversary of the publication of The Wizard of Oz, popular mathematician, pseudo-science debunker, professional literary eccentric and first chairman of the International Wizard of Oz Club Gardner (Classic Brainteasers; The Annotated Casey at the Bat) has cooked up this rather disenchanted bagatelle, mixing fin de (this) siecle satire with references to several childhood classics. As one would expect from the world's premier math puzzle expert, the book contains a little math puzzle. Dorothy, the Scarecrow and the Tin Man want to return to earth for a visit, but how can they get through the fourth dimension that separates Oz from earth? They do find an answer that is topologically sound, although not exactly easy to understand, and arrive back on the planet in time for 1998, where a good movie producer has summoned Dorothy to earth as part of a publicity stunt for a production of one of the Oz books. Another, evil movie magnate has other plans. Unfortunately, the magic of the Oz books doesn't survive arch references to Mayor Giuliani and TV newscasts. Although Gardner's introductory remarks about Oz are inspiring, this sequel (like the Scarecrow after his encounter with the Wicked Witch of the West) is just too disjointed to work. Color illustrations and spot art by Ted Enik.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Gathering diverse information about the netherworld from myth, religion, literature, theater, art, music, film, television, and pop culture in a single, comprehensive volume, Van Scott offers a broad range of interpretations from hundreds of different sources, highlighting origins and disparities between descriptions (e.g., when describing the underworld depicted in Virgil's Aeneid, she makes reference to features of the underworlds found in Homer's Odyssey and Plato's Gorgias). Listings, organized alphabetically with cross referencing, vary in length from a quarter of a page for "Abbadon," the Hebrew word for destruction found in the Old and New Testaments, to several pages, as when the author highlights the visual appeal and psychological attraction of hell for music video performers. Hundreds of facts relating to hell make this fascinating reading, and Van Scott's fine research and treatment of the material enables the reader to grasp specific points with great depth. All libraries will do well to add such a contemporary title.?Leroy Hommerding, Citrus Cty. Lib. System, Inverness, FL
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 189 pages
• Publisher: St Martins Pr (October 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 031219353X
• ISBN-13: 978-0312193539
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,872,260 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

For 25 of his 95 years, Martin Gardner wrote 'Mathematical Games and Recreations', a monthly column for Scientific American magazine. These columns have inspired hundreds of thousands of readers to delve more deeply into the large world of mathematics. He has also made significant contributions to magic, philosophy, debunking pseudoscience, and children's literature. He has produced more than 60 books, including many best sellers, most of which are still in print. His Annotated Alice has sold more than a million copies. He continues to write a regular column for the Skeptical Inquirer magazine.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Vastly Disappointing, as much as I didn't want it to be., March 29, 2001

By 

Richard Segal (Somerville, MA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Visitors from Oz: The Wild Adventures of Dorothy, the Scarecrow, and the Tin Woodman (Paperback)

I've loved Martin Gardner's work for years. I've loved Oz for years. I /wanted/ to like his 1st Oz book, but I just couldn't. While he has interesting things to say and a few interesting characters, the levels of real-world negativity in the book were nothing short of crushing. The plot was merely adequate and the mechanics clunky. While Gardner was an Oz fan for much of his life (and a founding member of the Int'l Wizard Of Oz Club in '57, I recently discovered), it seems that he came to write his Oz book too late, after his cynicism levels had gotten too high to suppress in his writing and his sense of wonder had had just a few too many Wicked Witches attack it.

I really wanted to like this and I really didn't. (I'll also mention that the Posthumous John R. Neal Oz book, Illustrated by Eric Shanower, isn't really worth the time either, though it's not as bad.)

Sorry, Martin. :(

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not for purists, but fun for the rest of us, May 3, 2000

By 

Sheila L. Beaumont (South Pasadena, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Visitors from Oz: The Wild Adventures of Dorothy, the Scarecrow, and the Tin Woodman (Paperback)

Martin Gardner has given us a delightful addition to Oziana. In this book, denizens of Oz (Dorothy, the Tin Woodman and the Scarecrow) come to our world via a Klein Bottle. It's unlike any previous Oz book. In it we find the Internet, the gods of Mount Olympus (Apollo "used to take the sun around the earth, but he had to stop doing this when astronomers proved that the earth went around the sun"), characters from Alice's Wonderland and Looking-Glass Land, and the bear detective Sheerluck Brown. Oz purists may disapprove of all this, but I think it's great fun. "Visitors From Oz," with its humor and originality, is one of the very best of the post-Baum/Thompson Oz books.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Not what I would call an Oz book, November 2, 1998

By 

Debbie (Maryland) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Visitors from Oz: The Wild Adventures of Dorothy, the Scarecrow, and the Tin Woodman (Hardcover)

I have read all of the original Oz books by L. Frank Baum and some of the more recent ones. I can tell you right now that this book spoiled Oz for me. I can't imagine Oz having computers and telephones. The author may have tried to recreate the land of Oz, but he did not succeed. He kept going back to different books that Baum wrote about Oz, telling about this or that, and that was basically what the first two or three chapters were about! And also, I never really got into this book as I did with the others, for me, this book wasn't Oz. Gardner may have thought he was doing a good job, but I didn't. Oz is supposed to be a magic place, if there are computers and telephones and the like, it takes the magic away. And Glinda never had Oz transported to another dimension, she made it invisible or something, not to another dimension. For people who love Oz the way Baum and the other authors depicted it, don't read this book. It really does take away from the world that Baum created and others just improved upon. Gardner shouldn't have written this book, in my opinion, it shouldn't have ever been written. Just leave Oz the way it is.