The Tin Woodman of Oz

1918, undated probably 1970s Reilly & Lee edition
L. Frank Baum
Illustrated by John R. Neill
The Tin Woodman of Oz
Bought new for $7.95
Slightly stained hardcover but one of my Oz books in better condition
B

In the 1939 movie of The Wizard of Oz, the Tin Woodman is always referred to as "the Tin Man," but I think Baum used the term "the Tin Woodman" (along with Nick Chopper and the Emperor of the Winkies of course) until this book, where he starts to sometimes say "the Tin Man."  This is ironic since, as the cover shows, there are now two Tin Men.  Perhaps he got tired of the longer name.

This other tin man is the Tin Soldier, and they were made in similar ways for similar reasons.  There are differences, however, in Nick's origin story in the first book and the twelfth, particularly in the Wicked Witch of the West's role in the life of the Munchkin girl Nick loved, here revealed to be named Nimmie Amee.  The Tin Soldier came along after Nick was rusted in the woods but before Dorothy rescued Nick.  The not-yet-tin soldier, named Captain Fyter, got Nimmie on the rebound, and then the vengeful witch enchanted his sword as she'd enchanted Nick's axe, so he, too, chopped pieces of himself off, one at a time.

Their mutual friend the tinsmith replaced each part with tin, and in this book we find out he's been saving the "meat" pieces.  Why?  So as not to be wasteful, although it's still a bit horror-storyish.  And in fact, he's made a sort of Frankenstein's monster out of them, named Chopfyt, even the name a mishmash of the two tin men.  Chopfyt doesn't have a blend of their personalities though.  He's moody and a bit lazy.  He's also married Nimmie, since he reminds her of the two men she loved.

That's at the end of the quest to resolve Chopper's (and Fyter's) abandonment of the girl years ago.  Even though no one ages in Oz (any more at least), people do get over heartbreak and move on with their lives.  The tin twins (as Baum calls them a few times) think Nimmie is pining for one or both of them, so they'll give her the choice between them, but she's already chosen a husband.

Along the way, they meet Mrs. Yoop, who's not only a giant but a yookoohoo, which is not exactly a witch and not exactly a sorceress.  (I believe that there's another yookoohoo in the last Baum book.)  She doesn't miss her brutish husband, but she is lonely for company.  She imprison the travelers, which at this point includes a boy wanderer named Woot (not to be confused with netspeak w00t), the Tin Woodman of course, and his faithful companion the Scarecrow.  They meet another prisoner, Polychrome, who in this book comes across as very clever and kind.  Mrs. Yoop transforms her and Nick into birds, which is ironic in light of the conversation that Nick and the Scarecrow have about the happiness of a bird's life near the end of Lost Princess.

After their escape but before meeting Capt. Fyter, Woot meets some dragons, and as always with Baum, there are jokes about how dragons age so slowly.  We also spend a few chapters with Jinjur, and I have to ask, what happened to her husband?  On the journey from the Nome Kingdom to the Emerald City in Ozma, they stop by Jinjur's place and she's gotten married to a man that she nags and hits.  (As Nimmie treats Chopfyt.)  She's mentioned in passing as the Scarecrow's friend and touch-up artist in Patchwork Girl.  And here we visit her ranch and there's no sight or mention of her husband.  Did he run off?  Is there divorce in Oz?  Altogether, the view of love and marriage in this book is not a happy one.

Well, the Swynes are happy.  The proposal party meets the parents of the Nine Tiny Piglets, who give a completely different view of how the Wizard acquired their children than the story he told in DatW.  You know what I think of the Wizard's honesty, so I'm inclined to believe the parent pigs and assume that he took the piglets sometime before he flew off in his balloon and made up the more colorful story about them as part of his showman's spiel.

The place that the questers go to that feels most original is Loonville, which is populated by balloon people whose last names are all Loon, including their king, Bal.  There's also Panta Loon, who gets too big for his britches and explodes.  He's repaired by Til Loon.  As a child, I would rack my brains trying to figure out what a "tilloon" was.  It wasn't till much later that I realized that Baum was referencing a 1914 Chaplin movie, Tillie's Punctured Romance.  This certainly fits the theme of puncturing romance.

The other theme in the book is identity, since the tin men go into existential crises, starting with Nick talking to his "meat head," and climaxing in the encounter with Chopfyt.  Even their mostly amicable twinship (made more amicable in the illustrations) has its limits, and Ozma ends up sending the captain to patrol the dangerous parts of the Gillikin Country, in order to keep him mostly out of sight and not reduce Nick's uniqueness.

Another story that is retold in this book is the origin of Oz and Ozma.  Although in other books Ozma and Dorothy look about the same age, here we're told that Ozma looks a bit older than Dorothy, "perhaps fourteen or fifteen years of age."  She may or may not be the fairy that Queen Lurline (a version of Queen Lulea in Zixi?) left behind to rule Oz after transforming it into a fairyland.  That's the moment when Oz became a utopia, where no one ever ages, including those who emigrate from the outside world.  I think that when the throne is usurped, as happened with the Wizard, people (including the Wizard and Tip-Ozma) do age, and then the utopian laws gradually reassert themselves when the rightful ruler is on the throne.

Again, I think Baum needed stronger editors, not just for each book (and there are always a few typos), but for the entire series, to improve continuity and consistency.  The different versions of stories are interesting but impossible to reconcile.  Still, this is one case where I disagree with The Oz Scrapbook (1977).  I generally concur with their ranking of the Baum books, but I would not put this as a lesser entry in the series.

Speaking of errors, there are a few of Neill's illustrations that don't match the text, like Polychrome being herself rather than a canary when she feeds the Jaguar eggs.  His work is generally good but not remarkable in this book.  He does begin to use two-page pictures to good effect, as when Woot, Nick, and the Scarecrow talk to Mrs. Yoop.  These double illustrations will become more common as the series goes on.