But what if you are worried you don't know enough to write a story within such a vast and long-lived continuity. Does that mean you have to painstakingly read all of the books and take extensive notes that could possibility fill it's own novel's worth of pages? Short answer is "nah."
The most you should do is maybe read over the first 14 books, if even that. The rest is up to you. Although there are some fairly consistent things about the franchise that fans will be looking for, continuity within the actual canon is often just ignored by the main authors anyways. Even the creator L. Frank Baum ignored his own continuity regularly. The fact that he did that encouraged other authors to do it too.
Heck, if you wanted to just write your own sequel to the 1939 film, you could just do that, and that movie didn't really have much of anything to do with the book it was based on. (Yes, I know the movie did have a sequel called "Journey Back to Oz," but like nobody even remembers that film. You're probably just learning about it right now!) Just make your own, and you aren't doing anything wrong.
The wonderful thing about Oz being in the public domain is that you can just relax and have fun with it. And I really do like that Baum ignored his own continuity to a small extent. It gives new writers a chance to breath and craft something that will make themselves happy. It's a perfect setup that is well-suited to make things easier on everyone.
It also helps that Oz is a fairyland, so the magic of Oz can be used to construct most any sort of narrative. Magic is sort of a universal catalyst for any situation in this series. It's almost a way of cheating through your story, but if you write it well enough, it will still lead to the enjoyment of your reader. Just come up with something clever and you'll be fine. It's really not that hard.
Anyways, I just thought you might find this interesting. Oz has been around since 1900 and entered into the public domain in 1956. It no longer belongs to anyone and, by extension, belongs to everyone. Oz is our story, and we have every right to keep adding to it, be it good or bad. But the point of writing an Oz story will always be to make us, as writers, happy. So just go for it!
This blog was written on November 1, 2023.
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The author himself designed the universe to be whimsical. The magic and weirdness of it all make it consistent even when inconsistent. GENIUS! No wonder Oz keeps flourishing.
ReplyDeleteIt has near infinite potential and can go on until the end of time.
DeleteBeing a magical land could help to explain the lack of continuity. Magic tends to be chaotic, and a place like that would be apt to change. Even the characters might act differently, as a result.
ReplyDeleteI mean... that's kind of a stretch, but if it works for you then good.
DeleteI think its fantastic that people can write a story in the Oz universe without fear of legal battles. That's how it should be! And what better reason than to make people happy.
ReplyDeleteIt has become the world's best source for writing in an established franchise.
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