What editions of the Oz books have the original illustrations?

July 2, 2024 5:16 PM

I am mystified how to determine which reprinting -- if any! -- of the original 14 Wizard of Oz books contain all or most of the original illustrations (W. W. Denslow for the first, John R. Neill for the rest).

I have a few cheap paperbacks around that I've been reading to the little ones. I believe the illustrations are poor copies of the originals, and I am ALSO pretty sure that only about 1/10 of them are included. How can I be sure without buying first editions on ebay and calling it done (an expensive prospect), or randomly trying various editions?

I was loaned early editions as a young'un which had all of the illustrations, and would love to revisit them with the kids. The Library of Congress didn't seem to help, but maybe I was using it wrong.

Bonus points if you can point me to book covers, in order to help in purchasing them.

Thanks!

posted by AbelMelveny to Writing & Language (9 answers total)

Not physical copies Project Gutenberg but has at least a few of them with the original illustrations (as far as I can tell).

Here is The Wizard of Oz.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 5:30 PM on July 2

The link goes to Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz.
posted by Ideefixe at 5:40 PM on July 2

Thank you, Tell Me No Lies. That will be extremely helpful in comparing an edition in-hand with the original. And I've determined quickly that my cheapo paperback of Ozma of Oz with a 1990s Wal-Mart sticker is missing even more of the illustrations than I had guessed.

So, my original question stands, I guess. Were there other editions that had all of the illustrations?
posted by AbelMelveny at 6:11 PM on July 2

These were the two suggestions via the Oz subreddit:

Books of Wonder: https://booksofwonder.com/collections/world-of-oz

Search “100th anniversary oz collection” editions on Amazon
posted by girlmightlive at 6:20 PM on July 2

They might be hard to find right now, but a while back Barnes and Noble released a hardcover set of compendium books that included the original illustrations. All 14 books were collected into 3 compendium books. It looks like the version I know for sure has the illustrations has these details:

Pub. Date: 12/18/2013
Publisher: Fall River Press
Illustrations by W. W. Denslow and John R. Neill

I bought them because I love the art so much. If you'd like pictures of the insides, feel free to memail me.
posted by past unusual at 6:32 PM on July 2

From the description for the 100th Anniversary Oz Collection:

"All 66 original illustrations by John R. Neill. Don't be fooled by other versions with missing or made-up pictures."

Chef's kiss. Thank you!

And I'll look into those compendiums, too, past unusual. Great suggestion there as well!
posted by AbelMelveny at 6:35 PM on July 2

One other option, though maybe too pricey, is the 1950s Reilly & Lee sets of the Oz books. They're what I grew up with and they're exceptionally beautiful. The original were hardcover, but they were also re-released by Rand McNally as softcover books in the 1970s.
posted by anastasiav at 7:17 PM on July 2

The Internet Archive may also be useful - both for unreformatted scans of the original books (e.g. the first edition of TWWOO and a 1903 edition with fewer illustrations), and to look at different modern editions in their Books to Borrow section.
posted by offog at 8:27 PM on July 2

Thank you, anastasiav! I've not been able to find any resource that says explicitly that those editions have all of the original illustrations, but it seems very likely they did.
posted by AbelMelveny at 6:32 AM on July 7