The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
The Kansas Centennial Edition
L. Frank Baum
Illustrated by Michael McCurdy
Foreword by Ray Bradbury
xviii, 194 pages, 25 illustrations, 7 x 8-1/2
Paper ISBN 978-0-7006-1151-5, $12.95 (t)
Also available: Deluxe Collector's Edition
Limited to 500 numbered copies, slipcased, and signed by the
artist
Cloth ISBN 978-0-7006-0986-4, $100.00
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
remains one of the world's most beloved and widely read books.
Throughout a century of remarkable change, the popularity of
L. Frank Baum's classic tale has endured and grown, embraced
by generation after generation of children and the young at heart.
To honor the centennial of its publication in 1900, the University
Press of Kansas is pleased to present this special anniversary
edition that combines Baum's original text with the contributions
of two renowned artists: book illustrator Michael McCurdy and
writer Ray Bradbury. Distinguished by McCurdy's beguiling illustrations
and Bradbury's provocative meditation on the Land of Oz, our
book also embraces and even celebrates the oft-kidded connection
between Baum's wondrous story and the state of Kansas. With good
humor and appreciation, then, we are very proud to welcome both
Dorothy and Toto back home.
"A delightful volume illustrated with haunting but witty
illustrations that provide a fresh, anti-Hollywood interpretation
of the story."--Christian Science Monitor
"Combines substance with style. Ray Bradbury offers a
poetic, reverential introduction, and Michael McCurdy contributes
appropriately eerie drawings."--Chicago Tribune
<>Praise for Michael McCurdy's illustrations:
"Michael McCurdy is a marvelous artist whose wondrous
images offer new shadings for this re-paving of a road well-taken
and a harvest of characters well-met."--Ray Bradbury
"Irresistible"--Washington Post Book World
"A revelation. As rich in emotion as they are in detail."--New
York Times Book Review
L. FRANK BAUM (18561919) is one of America's great
literary treasures. From his first published book for children,
Mother Goose in Prose (1897), until his last, Glinda
of Oz (1920), he produced a rich array of fairy tales, fantasy,
and whimsy for the reading pleasure of millions of Americans,
young and old alike. In all, he produced fourteen full-length
Oz books. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, however, remains
the most popular and enduring of all. One of the best-known and
most-read books in the world, it is still considered "the
quintessential American fairy tale."
RAY BRADBURY, one of America's most popular and widely
respected authors, has played a major role in putting fantasy
and science fiction on the map of genres worthy of our close
attention. His own books--classics like The Martian Chronicles,
Fahrenheit 451, The Illustrated Man, Dandelion
Wine, and Something Wicked This Way Comes--have sold
millions of copies in English and in translation around the world.
He lives in Los Angeles.
MICHAEL McCURDY's richly evocative scratchboard drawings
and wood engravings grace more than 160 books for children and
adults alike. These books have been acclaimed by the New York
Times Book Review, Washington Post Book World, Publishers Weekly,
Library Journal, and Parenting, among others. They
include American Fairy Tales, American Tall Tales, Tarzan,
The Bone Man: A Native American Modoc Tale, The Sailor's Alphabet,
Escape from Slavery: The Boyhood of Frederick Douglass in His
Own Words, Iron Horses, and Trapped by the Ice: Shackleton's
Amazing Antarctic Adventure. Two of the volumes that he illustrated--Howard
Norman's The Owl Scatterer and Ann Whitford Paul's The
Seasons Sewn--were chosen by the New York Times for
the list of Ten Best Illustrated Children's Books of the Year.
A native of New York City, McCurdy lives in Great Barrington,
Massachusetts.
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