The three heroic questers set off searching for the plot coupons, and discover a problem which the Crooked Magician really should have thought of: none of them has the faintest idea where they're going. Ojo has lived his entire life in a remote cabin in the woods with a man who says about two words per day, the Patchwork Girl is a day old, and the Glass Cat only knows what she's seen and heard around Dr. Pipt's place.
Still, they trot along merrily enough. The Patchwork Girl, in particular, is still just glad to be alive and finds the world a delightful place. As we get to know her, Scraps is a pretty entertaining character. She's relentlessly cheerful, combining a sort of "wise fool" naivete reminiscent of Jack Pumpkinhead with an intellect comparable to the Scarecrow. Her only irritating trait is a habit of bursting out into verse, which mostly serves to indicate that L. Frank Baum wasn't as good a poet as he thought he was.
Scraps is almost an archetype: the artificial person (magical or technological) who is a better person than most people. This kind of character mostly shows up in science fiction: Adam Link, Robby the Robot, and Data the Android are examples. Isaac Asimov used to claim that he invented his "Three Laws of Robotics" as a reaction to the old Frankenstein's Monster trope of the created being which turns on its creator. But L. Frank Baum had already dismantled that trope in children's fantasies half a century earlier! I can't actually think of any "artificial" characters in the Oz books who are villains.
During a meal stop on their trip, the Glass Cat does manage to get in a little transhumanist gloating when she observes that Ojo must have food to stay alive. "Can't you understand that you and I are superior people and not made like these poor humans?" she asks the Patchwork Girl. But Scraps is too busy making puns and rhymes to bother.
Their first encounter with the greater Ozian civilization comes in the shape of Munchkin woodchopper who lives at the edge of the forest. He warns them that magic is a closely-guarded monopoly in Oz, and that Dr. Pipt's unlicensed experiments could mean the Patchwork Girl and the Glass Cat might get arrested if they go to the Emerald City.
The woodcutter also tells them about his old colleague Nick Chopper, whose body was eventually replaced with tin, making him the famous Tin Woodman. Ojo, who is currently traveling with a girl made of cloth and a cat made of glass, finds the idea strange. Despite the woodcutter's kind invitation to spend the night, the three decide to press on.
This leads to an exceedingly weird encounter when night falls: they take refuge in an apparently empty house, which turns out to be inhabited by an invisible presence. The invisible entity gives them beds to sleep in -- but also throws Scraps out of the house when she's impertinent. Unlike most sane people, Ojo doesn't run like hell from this temperamental unseen host. He sleeps through the night in the bed.
In the morning a breakfast appears for him, which he eats. Then he and the Glass Cat set out once more. They find the Patchwork Girl waiting outside. She spent the night looking at the stars and the Moon (which she has never seen before) -- oh, and at the big gray wolf which came to the door three times during the night.
And that is the end of the whole incident! We never find out who or what the invisible presence in the house is, or its connection (if any) to the wolf in the night. Ojo doesn't have to pay any price for eating the magical food, there's no payoff later in the story -- the travelers spend the night in what looks like the premise for a horror story, or at least one of the nastier fairy tales, and then check out in the morning without a hitch. It's as if someone were to stop off in Innsmouth or Hill House and then leave bright and early the next morning.
Just then Dr. Pipt's animated phonograph catches up with them. The Crooked Magician apparently got sick of hearing it and threatened to smash it up, so the phonograph fled and wants to join the expedition. We get a little music criticism from Mr. Baum here. The phonograph describes its first record as follows: "It is classical music, and is considered the best and most puzzling ever manufactured. You're supposed to like it, whether you do or not, and if you don't, the proper thing is to look as if you did. Understand?"
When that proves unsatisfactory, they try the flip side, a ragtime tune, and that's no better. The three adventurers chase away the phonograph and proceed. I've already mentioned in my account of The Road to Oz that Baum was writing at the dawn of the age of musical reproduction, when music was no longer a rare treat but something one might sometimes wish to avoid. From his treatment of the phonograph I think it's safe to assume that L. Frank Baum was not the kind of man who could put up with other people's taste in music.
Next time: feeling Woozy!
I always assumed it was the wolf who was their gracious host for the night, but yeah, I always wondered what was going on in that scene. I wish we had an explanation for it.
Posted by: Michael A. Burstein | 03/08/2013 at 03:53 PM