Ozoplaning With The Wizard of Oz - "Airland"

"Airland"

The stereotypical idea of landscapes in the clouds, "castles in the air," cities and countries in the sky, can be found repeatedly in imaginative literature. Baum used it, most prominently in his Sky Island. Thompson included several sky countries in her Oz books, and later Oz authors employed comparable materials (see Hightown in Jack Snow's The Shaggy Man of Oz for a pertinent example). Thompson's "splendid cloud mountains and cities" in this book shares in this established trope.

In Ozoplaning, Thompson exploits current interest in developments in aeronautics and atmospheric science. She plays with the new terms "stratosphere" and "troposphere." (Similarly, the Wizard refers to "the outer stratosphere" in the 1939 MGM film.) Instead of lemonade, people in Stratovania drink "air-ade" (a pun on "air raid"), as well as "liquid air."

As the Tin Man struggles to control the Oztober on its wild first flight, he spies, in the light of dawn, what looks like a land in the clouds —

"far ahead, between a bank of fog and an arch of platinum sun rays, loomed a long, lavender crescent. Nick even fancied he could see people moving about its glittering surface."

Yet when he tries to land there, the plane crashes through a "frozen cloud."

Stratovania proves more substantial when they reach it; Thompson refers to the place as an "airland" or "skyland," while the Tin Man calls it an "airosphere." Its altitude is 101,867 feet; the controlled climate is so benign that the people live under canopies rather than in houses. The locale is described in brilliant terms —

"Jellia saw a country of such dazzling beauty, she was almost afraid to breathe lest it vanish before her eyes. The trees were tall and numerous, with gleaming, prism-shaped trunks and a mass of cloudlike foliage. Some bore fruit that actually seemed to be illuminated — oranges, pears, and peaches glowing like decorated electric light bulbs! Moon and star flowers grew in great profusion, and in the distance caves and grottoes of purest crystal scintillated in the high noon sun."

The Stratovanians themselves are comparably impressive —

"The Airlanders were a head taller than even the Tin Woodman. Their hair grew straight up on end, sparkling and crackling with electricity in a really terrifying manner. Their eyes were star-shaped and shaded by long, silver lashes; the noses and mouths were straight and firm, the foreheads transparent. Some shone as from a hidden sun, while across the brows of others tiny black clouds chased one another in rapid succession. Watching their foreheads would be a good way, decided Jellia Jam, to find out whether they were pleased or angry. Strut and his subjects wore belted tunics of some iridescent, rainbow-hued material, and silver sandals laced to the knee."

Their silver footwear recalls the silver slippers of the Wicked Witch of the East in Baum's first Oz book. Thompson's puns maintain the skyey theme: the newspaper Strut reads is a "morning star." His people live the "high life."