What do the characters in The Wizard of Oz symbolize?
The characters in “The Wizard of Oz” operate on two levels, the literal and the symbolic. Author L. Frank Baum wrote the book as a children’s story, published in 1900. An essay published in American Quarterly in 1964 by Henry M. Littlefield linked the Oz characters to the Populist movement of the 1890s, according to USA Gold. Either way you take it, “The Wizard of Oz” is a fascinating story.The Populist MovementDorothy represents Middle America. Her life in Kansas was dull and gray, a reflection of Kansas in the late 1880s to early 1890s when the area had droughts and bad weather conditions making it into a sort of wasteland, according to USA Gold. Many farmers blamed the hard times on bankers and railroads, and the Populist movement began. Toto’s name is short for teetotaler, a pun linking the dog to the Prohibitionists who followed the Populists.The Wicked Witch of the East and the MunchkinsIndustry was to blame for much of the country’s ills, according to the farmers in the Populist
