The Gnome King of Oz

1927, 1985 Del Rey edition
Ruth Plumly Thompson
Illustrated by John R. Neill
The Gnome King of Oz
Bought newish for $5.95
Slightly worn paperback
B-

The title is interesting for a few reasons.  To begin with, Thompson is using the correct spelling of "gnome," with the G, as she usually does, unlike Baum trying to simplify things for the kiddies.  The king is "of" rather than "in" Oz, unlike Kabumpo and Grampa, even though they're Oz natives and Ruggedo is not.  He again hopes to conquer Oz, so he might become the king of Oz, but he of course fails.  The same number of years have passed in Oz as in the real world, so he's been on his island for the five years since Kabumpo.  He escapes thanks to an earthquake and a boy named Peter.

Peter is an all-American lad who plays baseball and would rather live in Philadelphia than Oz, unlike Button-Bright, who also hails from that city.  Neill draws Peter as more modern-looking than Button, or even than orphan Bob in Cowardly Lion.  He's nine years old, so we'll see how much he ages when he returns a couple books later.

The story doesn't get to Peter and Ruggedo till Chapter Four.  The first three chapters deal with the succession in Patch, which is the 705th small country within Oz.  The current population of the Emerald City is 57,318 "gay Ozites" and "nearly a hundred celebrities."  The 57,318 figure is identical to that in the sixth book, but Baum didn't count the celebrities separately.  Still, a pretty stable population. 

The new queen of Patch, which, like Ragbad and Kimbaloo, is another country with a very specific economy, appears to be Scraps.  Thompson does better with and by her this time, although Peter is the real hero of the book.  The two parties going to the Emerald City team up, as usual, although Ruggedo uses a magic cloak of invisibility and transport to go off on his own and try to conquer E.C.  Peter uses his baseball pitching skills to vanquish the gnome, who's again dunked in the Fountain of Oblivion and granted his freedom.  You'd think Ozma or somebody would know better by now, but this is one villain that the Royal Historians like to keep around.  As for Peter, he becomes a prince, like Dorothy becoming a princess long ago.

Unlike my other 1927 books, there are no lesbians in this story, unless you count bob-haired, short-skirted Queen Jazzma of Tune Town admiring Scraps's doggerel and serenading her, "Maiden stay, you are so gay, I'd like to look at you all day."  Actually, other than the recurring use of "gay," the main Plumly innuendo this time is "As for Peter, he was so excited over the adventure with Kuma's hand, he could think of nothing else."