Baum plays with language and children's tendency to take it literally. For example, in Chapter 20, he uses anthropomorphism to play with the meaning of an idiom:
‘Be quiet, sir!’ said the Princess; ‘can’t you see these are strangers, and should be treated with respect?'
‘Well, that’s respect, I expect,’ declared the Clown, and immediately stood upon his head.
‘Don’t mind Mr Joker,’ said the Princess to Dorothy; ‘he is considerably cracked in his head, and that makes him foolish.’
Dorothy and her friends are in the "China Country," where all of the inhabitants are anthropomorphized china. The Princess tells Dorothy that the Clown is "cracked in his head," which is typically an unkind idiom meaning mentally ill. Because the Clown is literally a piece of china with cracks in his head from trying to stand on it, Baum is able to call attention to the strange difference between the idiom's literal meaning and its figurative meaning. A child might be more likely to hear that someone is "cracked in his head" and think of an image like the Clown, rather than an image of a mentally ill person. Even the idea of the "Dainty China Country" draws on children's tendency to interpret language literally. In 1900, "China Country" might refer to China itself or to Chinese communities within Western countries. Baum imagines that to a child, adults' references to "China Country" might conjure the image of a country where everyone is made out of china.
Baum is not necessarily making a grand political statement by playing with these idioms. Instead, he is having fun with the way a child's imagination is unbound by reality and conventional ways of speaking and thinking. Aunt Em is often struck by how Dorothy can remain so cheerful on the dusty plains of Kansas. Playful moments like this suggest that it is Dorothy's young imagination that sets her free from the confines of the difficult life that has worn on Aunt Em for so many years. And in the end, Dorothy is able to go back home to Kansas with the colorful world of Oz in her mind as a permanent escape. This emphasis on youthful imagination sends the message that adults would do well to have a more childish outlook on life.
