“There’s no place like home,” said Judy Garland as Dorothy in the 1939 classic film, “The Wizard of Oz,” as she clicked her heels and hoped for the return to the comforts of her own bed and her beloved Auntie Em and Uncle Henry. Today we call it “homesickness,” and it’s an emotion shared by children and adults alike, particularly this time of year, when kids are away at summer camp or preparing to head off to college for the first time this fall. What is it about home and family that make it difficult to leave? Why is the emotion often accompanied by shame? What does it feel like to be homesick and what can parents do to help their children cope with those feelings? And finally, what is it about the American spirit that encourages us to explore the world but at the same time cherish being home? In this hour of Radio Times, we talk about homesickness with SUSAN MATT, professor of history at Weber State University and author of “Homesickness: An American History;” and clinical psychologist CHRIS THURBER, author of “The Summer Camp Handbook.”
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In Kansas Dorothy and her family live on a farm in the middle of nowhere and even though her family and friends are caring and loving Dorothy is clearly bored there. Dorothy and Toto, her dog and seemingly her best friend, are constantly getting into trouble with their neighbour Mrs Gulch and this just seems to be one of Dorothy’s multiple problems in Kansas. The song Dorothy sings ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow,’ truly shows her desire of escape, this also reflects the immigrant experience of the time, the desire to go somewhere else better, the dream of a better life somewhere far away from where are, your home.
The technical aspects of the film keep the divide between Kansas and Oz very clear. Colour is a key aspect in the film; Kansas which is shot in a sepia tone to emphasise the dull lifeless landscape and to let the audience truly see why it is that Dorothy wants to get out so badly. Then when we see Oz, this bright vibrant world that is shot in technicolour which was still uncommon at the time, the audience gain the same impact that Dorothy does as she opens the door into this new world. Primary colours are used to create the world of Oz to give this hyper real effect and to truly convey that Oz is a world of fantasy, and is a world completely different from that of Kansas. Also the music is an extremely important characteristic of the film because not only does it link characters to moments in the narrative and act as a warning for dramatic events it also acts as an emotional release for the audience and allows us to pause and enjoy the aesthetics of Oz and appreciate how wonderful it is.
Even though this is a brand new world for Dorothy she still encounters constant reminders of home. This comes about with the familiarity of the characters she meets along the way, especially the scarecrow, the tin man and the lion and how she makes the connection from them to her friends in Kansas. However the bond she makes with her new friends after only a short time seems remarkably stronger than the bond she has created over many years with her friends at home, which only reinforces the fact that maybe Oz is the better place to be. Also on a social level Oz maybe a better place for Dorothy to be because in Oz women seem to be in a position of power, because even though the Wizard is said to be the most powerful he is revealed as a fake and it seems that it is actually the witch’s that hold all the power and even then Dorothy seems to hold some sort of power over them. She would never have this power in Kansas, especially in America at the time where it was evident that if you wanted any position of power you had to be a man.
‘The truth is that once we have left our childhood places as started to make up our lives armed only by what we have and are we understand that the real secret of the ruby slippers is not that ‘There’s no place like home’, but rather there is no longer any such place as home; except of course, for the home we make or the homes that are made for us, in Oz; which is anywhere, and everywhere, except for the place from which we began.
(Rushdie:57)
Looking at this quote it could be argued that maybe Oz is the home that Dorothy has made for herself, this is how she wants her life to be; full of excitement, colour and music, and this is understandable because if given the choice this is how many people would want to live. The fact that it was all a dream justifies this point even further as Dorothy has created this world, it has come from inside her, and it is the home she longs for.
Also the reactions we have to the ending of the narrative can depend on our age. As a young child we may see this as the happy ending we long for in any story, where the main character overcomes all obstacles and in the end is reunited with the ones they love and everything goes on the way it always has, and in some ways we can take comfort in this and we know that everything is going to be alright and the characters will live ‘Happily ever after’. However someone who is older looking at the film may see that Dorothy is now back exactly where she started, in a place that still has all of the problems as before, for example Mrs Gulch, and a place that will after a while make her just as unhappy as she was before and that desire to escape will come back. Oz is a much more appealing place to be and as Dorothy grows older it may not be as easy to find Oz again. Also it is hard to ignore the fact that she has seemed to of just dismissed the friends she loved in this alternate world, we know from the narrative that Oz is not real but in Dorothy’s heart it was ‘A real, truly, live place’ so it is difficult for us to dismiss it completely. Maybe if the narrative was left more open ended that connection with the message it is trying to convey would not be so lost and it would be easier for us to believe that Oz really was this place we could all escape to.
In conclusion in The Wizard of Oz the message of ‘There’s no place like home’ is strongly conveyed however how we interpret it can be very different and whether we see Kansas or Oz as Dorothy’s real, true home can depend on how we see the relationships she has develop in both worlds. Even though we may not relate to the message that ‘There’s no place like home’, it is still easy to relate to Dorothy’s character in some way as at some point we are all in a situation that is new and difficult and we miss the familiarity of home. In a social context, the film was released in an era of depression in America so Dorothy is a character that many people could relate to at the time, because this notion of escaping to a far away world and leaving all problems behind would be incredibly appealing to an audience at this time. However still today this film can get people of all ages to relate to the characters and think about the message however we interpret it and is still extremely relevant to audiences today. At some point we have all wanted to escape from something and this film can make us realise that maybe we all want our own Oz to escape to but it is up to us to create it for ourselves.