The Deadly Poppy Field--Oz pages 19 and 20

Hello lovelies! Today begins one of the parts that is both book and film related—the deadly poppy field. In the film it is set up to be a trap by the Wicked Witch of the West to ensnare them and in the film, they are saved by Glinda the good witch who makes it snow. Which incidentally (bit of film trivia for you) was made of asbestos. ASBESTOS. The snow they used was asbestos—and this was AFTER knowing for several years that asbestos caused cancer. The magic of Hollywood.

Here, the poppy field is just another part of Oz which is full of strange things, both wonderful and wild. I have decided as the field of poppies is so vast that it should be a two page spread.. The book states:

They walked along listening to the singing of the brightly coloured birds and looking at the lovely flowers which now became so thick that the ground was carpeted with them. There were big yellow and white and blue and purple blossoms, besides great clusters of scarlet poppies, which were so brilliant in colour they almost dazzled Dorothy's eyes.

"Aren't they beautiful?" the girl asked, as she breathed in the spicy scent of the bright flowers.

"I suppose so," answered the Scarecrow. "When I have brains, I shall probably like them better."

"If I only had a heart, I should love them," added the Tin Woodman.

"I always did like flowers," said the Lion. "They seem so helpless and frail. But there are none in the forest so bright as these."

I decided to paint the background with just a green watercolour wash. I wanted to use tissue paper to make the poppies and my test pieces all showed that green paint muddied the colour of the red poppies. I thought about and tested poppies that I cut from tissue, but ultimately decided to go with torn red tissue. I loved that this gave them a wild and ragged look. That way every poppy would be different. I also freehandedly cut (whilst watching an exciting episode of Doctor Who) all the black centres. I glued them down with just barely a blob of glue in the middle so that the petals would be able to have movement and then then glued a smaller torn piece in a roughly circular shape in the centre. I let them completely dry and then glued the centres on.

Interesting bit of trivia:  In 1902 (2 years after the book was published) Baum turned The Wonderful Wizard of Oz into a musical extravaganza. It had a series of shapely chorus girls with big red flower headdresses as the poppy field and a cow named Imogene instead of Toto (just because it is easier to have two actors playing a pantomime cow than to have a real unpredictable dog). Also this is where MGM got the idea for snow waking them up from the deadly poppies. They probably used asbestos in 1902 as well, but they didn’t know any better. They did by 1939 though, so there is no excuse.

So how did they escape:

They now came upon more and more of the big scarlet poppies, and fewer and fewer of the other flowers; and soon they found themselves in the midst of a great meadow of poppies. Now it is well known that when there are many of these flowers together their odour is so powerful that anyone who breathes it falls asleep, and if the sleeper is not carried away from the scent of the flowers, he sleeps on and on forever. But Dorothy did not know this, nor could she get away from the bright red flowers that were everywhere about; so presently her eyes grew heavy and she felt she must sit down to rest and to sleep.

But the Tin Woodman would not let her do this.

"We must hurry and get back to the road of yellow brick before dark," he said; and the Scarecrow agreed with him. So they kept walking until Dorothy could stand no longer. Her eyes closed in spite of herself and she forgot where she was and fell among the poppies, fast asleep.

"What shall we do?" asked the Tin Woodman.

"If we leave her here she will die," said the Lion. "The smell of the flowers is killing us all. I myself can scarcely keep my eyes open, and the dog is asleep already."

It was true; Toto had fallen down beside his little mistress. But the Scarecrow and the Tin Woodman, not being made of flesh, were not troubled by the scent of the flowers.

"Run fast," said the Scarecrow to the Lion, "and get out of this deadly flower bed as soon as you can. We will bring the little girl with us, but if you should fall asleep you are too big to be carried."

So the Lion aroused himself and bounded forward as fast as he could go. In a moment he was out of sight.

"Let us make a chair with our hands and carry her," said the Scarecrow. So they picked up Toto and put the dog in Dorothy's lap, and then they made a chair with their hands for the seat and their arms for the arms and carried the sleeping girl between them through the flowers.

On and on they walked, and it seemed that the great carpet of deadly flowers that surrounded them would never end. They followed the bend of the river, and at last came upon their friend the Lion, lying fast asleep among the poppies. The flowers had been too strong for the huge beast and he had given up at last and fallen only a short distance from the end of the poppy bed, where the sweet grass spread in beautiful green fields before them.

"We can do nothing for him," said the Tin Woodman, sadly; "for he is much too heavy to lift. We must leave him here to sleep on forever, and perhaps he will dream that he has found courage at last."

"I'm sorry," said the Scarecrow. "The Lion was a very good comrade for one so cowardly. But let us go on."

They carried the sleeping girl to a pretty spot beside the river, far enough from the poppy field to prevent her breathing any more of the poison of the flowers, and here they laid her gently on the soft grass and waited for the fresh breeze to waken her.

So how did they help the Lion escape if there was no asbestos snow, I hear you cry? Why, with the help of the Queen of the Field Mice of course! Stay tuned!!!!