Classic Literature

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz passages and copywork.

By L. Frank Baum

"The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" by L. Frank Baum is a children's novel written in 1900. When a cyclone sweeps young Dorothy and her dog Toto from Kansas to the magical Land of Oz, she discovers only one way home: she must destroy the Wicked Witch of the West. Joined by a Scarecrow seeking brains, a Tin Woodman wanting a heart, and a Cowardly Lion desiring courage, Dorothy follows the yellow brick road to seek help from the mysterious Wizard of Oz.

Chapters
27
Passages
413
Comments
20
Copywork
0

Slow Reading

Read for the sentences that stay with you.

The Passage is built around passages rather than finished-book lists. Open The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, notice the line that asks for another look, and keep it close as part of your reading journal.

Sample Passages

A few places to begin.

Chapter I The Cyclone Dorothy lived in the midst of the great Kansas prairies, with Uncle Henry, who was a farmer, and Aunt Em, who was the farmer’s wife. Their house was small, for the lumber to build it had to be carried by wagon many miles. There were four walls, a floor and a roof, which made one room; and this room contained a rusty looking cookstove, a cupboard for the dishes, a table, three or four chairs, and the beds. Uncle Henry and Aunt Em had a big bed in one corner, and Dorothy a little bed in another corner.

There was no garret at all, and no cellar—except a small hole dug in the ground, called a cyclone cellar, where the family could go in case one of those great whirlwinds arose, mighty enough to crush any building in its path. It was reached by a trap door in the middle of the floor, from which a ladder led down into the small, dark hole. When Dorothy stood in the doorway and looked around, she could see nothing but the great gray prairie on every side. Not a tree nor a house broke the broad sweep of flat country that reached to the edge of the sky in all directions.

The sun had baked the plowed land into a gray mass, with little cracks running through it. Even the grass was not green, for the sun had burned the tops of the long blades until they were the same gray color to be seen everywhere. Once the house had been painted, but the sun blistered the paint and the rains washed it away, and now the house was as dull and gray as everything else. When Aunt Em came there to live she was a young, pretty wife. The sun and wind had changed her, too.

Copywork

Turn memorable sentences into practice.

Copywork gives a sentence more time. Type a passage exactly as it appears, then return to the words you chose with more attention than a quick highlight allows.

Reflect

Leave a public or private note on the sentence that mattered.

Copy

Practice one memorable line at a time through focused typing.