Although she finds herself in the unfamiliar and often dangerous Land of Oz after being taken there by a cyclone, Dorothy soon finds comfort in the form of three new friends. As Dorothy travels towards the Emerald City in the hopes that the Wizard of Oz can send her back home to Kansas, she meets the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman, and the Cowardly Lion along the way. They join together as a group while they discuss what they want the Wizard to give them, and their bond of friendship is ultimately what defines their adventure. When Dorothy meets these new companions, each of them feels inadequate and incomplete. But ironically, the Wizard’s gifts aren’t what brings out the best in them. Instead, their friendship with Dorothy and with one another makes them complete. While none of them can see the value in themselves, their journey together helps them see the good qualities in one another, as they test their mettle against Oz’s many dangers.
Before Dorothy encounters them, each of her companions are alone and friendless. The Scarecrow stands immobile and useless in the cornfield, the Tin Woodman is frozen by rust, and the Lion is too ashamed of his cowardice to befriend any of the other woodland creatures. Their loneliness makes it easy to look inward and focus on their perceived flaws, but they all find that joining Dorothy’s party changes their perspective for the better. When they’re traveling and facing dangers together, Dorothy’s friends are compelled to look beyond themselves and use their talents to protect each other, which tends to bring out their best qualities. All in all, their friendship strengthens them and makes them better people, whether they realize it or not. This is especially evident towards the end of the novel, when all three of Dorothy’s friends generously agree to continue to help her get home, even though their own desires have already been satisfied. This illustrates that friendship and caring for others can, somewhat ironically, offer a person opportunities for growth and development that are, perhaps, impossible to experience otherwise.
Related Themes from Other Texts
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Friendship Quotes in The Wizard of Oz
It was Toto that made Dorothy laugh, and saved her from growing as grey as her other surroundings. Toto was not grey; he was a little black dog, with long silky hair and small black eyes that twinkled merrily on either side of his funny, wee nose. Toto played all day long, and Dorothy played with him, and loved him dearly.
‘We are lost, for they will surely tear us to pieces with their sharp claws. But stand close behind me, and I will fight them as long as I am alive.’
‘Is there anything we can do,’ it asked, ‘to repay you for saving the life of our Queen?’
‘Nothing that I know of,’ answered the Woodman; but the Scarecrow, who had been trying to think, but could not because his head was stuffed with straw, said, quickly, ‘Oh, yes; you can save our friend, the Cowardly Lion, who is asleep in the poppy bed.’
When, at last, he walked into Dorothy’s room and thanked her for rescuing him, he was so pleased that he wept tears of joy, and Dorothy had to wipe every tear carefully from his face with her apron, so his joints would not be rusted. At the same time her own tears fell thick and fast at the joy of meeting her old friend again, and these tears did not need to be wiped away.
Of course each one of them expected to see the Wizard in the shape he had taken before, and all were greatly surprised when they looked about and saw no one at all in the room. They kept close to the door and closer to one another, for the stillness of the empty room was more dreadful than any of the forms they had seen Oz take.
But the people remembered him lovingly, and said to one another:
‘Oz was always our friend. When he was here he built for us this beautiful Emerald City, and now he is gone he has left the wise Scarecrow to rule over us.’
Still, for many days they grieved over the loss of the Wonderful Wizard, and would not be comforted.
‘Certainly. If it wasn’t for Dorothy I should never have had brains. She lifted me from the pole in the cornfield and brought me to the Emerald City. So my good luck is all due to her, and I shall never leave her until she starts back to Kansas for good and all.’
She threw her arms around the Lion’s neck and kissed him, patting his big head tenderly. Then she kissed the Tin Woodman, who was weeping in a way most dangerous to his joints. But she hugged the soft, stuffed body of the Scarecrow instead of kissing his painted face, and found she was crying herself at this sorrowful parting from her loving comrades.
