The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West

This autumn I can't walk in New York without bumping into some reference to the Wizard of Oz. On Halloween the whole staff of our local bakery dressed as Dorothy and company (the blue grease painted Munchkin was especially impressive). Bus stops in Manhattan are plastered with notices of the Sci Fi Channel's premiere of Tin Man this Sunday. Approachig Times Square, I was overwhelmed by the amount of advertising for the musical Wicked, based on Gregory Maguire's book of the same name (although last week's New York performances weren't held due to the stagehand strike).

There was no question why I suddenly had the urge to read Wicked, the Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West. The reminders of my childhood days in Oz were too in my face to be subliminal.

What I admire most about Maguire's book is its dramatic structure. If a creative writing teacher asked Maguire what his protagonist wanted, I know he could answer in a heartbeat: the Wicked Witch of the West wants forgiveness.

Forgiveness for what? Plaguing Dorothy? No, no. All that Dorothy business comes late in the book- perfectly timed to synchronize events from Baum's well-known tale to the thrilling end of the Witch's personal story. Wicked begins before the Witch's birth, and describes an Oz quite different, I think, from the one Baum envisioned. Yet Maguire selects a few haunting aspects of Baum's mythology, the tiktok mechanical creatures, the ruby slippers, talking animals- and uses them as conduits between his created universe and Baum's.

The question still stands: the Witch wants forgiveness for what? Well, that's kind of the point of the story, getting inside the Witch's oiled green skin and finding and losing sympathy with her as she finds and loses sympathy for herself.