Gilded Age And The Wizard Of Oz

The Wizard of Oz, written by L. Frank Baum and produced by Mervyn LeRoy is an example of how art reflects life because of the characters, scenery and props chosen. In the 1890’s and early 1900’s a new political party emerged, the populist party. Most populists (farmers and laborers) mistrusted the president and most of the presidential candidates, they thought of them as “wind bags”. Mark Twain would refer to this as the “Gilded Age” because those in power considered it a time of prosperity, but it really was only for people that were rich. They thought everything was great and green, but they weren't seeing all of it. People such as farmers and factory workers could not afford loans and wished to take the United States off their strict gold standard policy. The populist party encouraged the people to rise up and help take the rich down a peg, they would shine from 1889 to 1896.
The characters in the story represent a certain type of person or thing in the real world. For example Dorothy is from Kansas, where the political storm started. She was made a female to speak for the women suffragettes. The wicked witch of the east represents the national banks on the east coast, both are crushed by the house. Glinda, the good witch shows how the north supported the populist movement, just like Glinda supported the munchkins. The scarecrow resembles the farmers who were politically scattered. The tin man coincides with factory workers, who were “emotional sheets of iron”. The cowardly lion represents congress because they talk big, but they were unable to make big decisions. In other words they were cowards. The wizard is similar to the president because both of them didn’t follow through with their promises. The wicked witch of the west assumes the role of mother nature, who caused a drought, in order to end a drought you need water, and water kills the wicked