"Just the same Tip": Gender Fluidity in Baum's Oz

L. Frank Baum's mother-in-law was a radical feminist, and she influenced his work greatly (if you're interested more on this particular aspect, Sally Roesch Wagner has a book on this called The Wonderful Mother of Oz). This contributed to the gender fluidity of his work.

Baum rarely wrote a book with a non-female protagonist. When they did, they almost always were written with a twist, as in the case of Tip and Chick. Tip was transformed from a boy to a girl by the evil witch, Momba; Chick was a cherub, neither boy nor girl. Baum's publishers made him run a competition to decide whether Chick was a boy or a girl: Baum chose two entries-one for a boy, one for a girl.

The gender fluidity in Oz has led to many of the books, especially The Marvellous Land of Oz, being co-opted as icons by the transgender community.

This aspect-both the fluidity of gender and the importance of the anima over the animus in Oz-was lost on future Royal Historians. Later Royal Historians would revert to a traditional fairy tale model, and-as always-emphasised the male over the female.