The Wizard of Oz is a quintessentially American story, and over the 120+ years since the novel's release, the tale and its subsequent iterations have reflected the political climate of particular moments in our culture.

From its inception as an alleged allegory for the late 19th century Populist movement, to the imagery of early women's suffrage in the witches of Oz, to the echoes of FDR's New Deal and the Great Depression in "Over the Rainbow," to The Wiz's positioning within the Black American experience in the 1970s, and even to how the musical Wicked reflects the flawed third-wave feminism of the 1990s.

Further reading:

Populist symbolism in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

The Matriarch Behind the Curtain

The American dream of "Over the Rainbow"

The Wiz as a Black American journey

Wicked as a feminist work

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