The usually preternaturally sunny and pleasant Dorothy is uncharacteristically a bit irritable and insulting in these first two chapters. First she calls the Shaggy Man both clumsy and stupid and follows that up by calling Button Bright stupid. To be fair, it is hard to imagine anyone would not have become frustrated with that conversation with the young boy, I do think the dialog in between the characters in these two opening chapters is great fun.
We also see her be quite afraid when they get lost at first, which is a big change from the last few books where she is lost at sea in one and is perfectly cheerful and falls through the earth in the next one and is completely happy. Its pretty interesting!
I can never remember if Button Bright premiered here and then Baum used him in the non-Oz novel Sky Island, or the other way 'round. Anyways, despite what Dorothy says, he's not actually stupid. He's five, I think? Granted, Dorothy is smarter than your average eight year old...I think?
"Where do you live?" "Don't know." "How did you come here?" "Don't know".
Dorothy and Button Bright's verbal exchange almost seem to anticipate the tricky wordplay routines Abbott and Costello popularized.
The usually preternaturally sunny and pleasant Dorothy is uncharacteristically a bit irritable and insulting in these first two chapters. First she calls the Shaggy Man both clumsy and stupid and follows that up by calling Button Bright stupid. To be fair, it is hard to imagine anyone would not have become frustrated with that conversation with the young boy, I do think the dialog in between the characters in these two opening chapters is great fun.
We also see her be quite afraid when they get lost at first, which is a big change from the last few books where she is lost at sea in one and is perfectly cheerful and falls through the earth in the next one and is completely happy. Its pretty interesting!
I can never remember if Button Bright premiered here and then Baum used him in the non-Oz novel Sky Island, or the other way 'round. Anyways, despite what Dorothy says, he's not actually stupid. He's five, I think? Granted, Dorothy is smarter than your average eight year old...I think?