Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West Analysis

WaterThere's definitely "water, water everywhere" in Wicked (Coleridge shout-out). Well, there's water symbolism and imagery at any rate. Oz suffers a severe drought for a large part of the novel,...

Oz and its various regions: Munchkinland, Gillikin, Quadling Country, the Vinkus, Shiz, the Emerald City, and the castle of Kiamo KoThe Oz of Wicked is definitely a lot bigger and more complex than...

Third Person (Limited)In an interview, Gregory Maguire gave a really interesting explanation of how he crafted the story of Wicked. Speaking of The Life of Emily Dickinson, by Richard Sewell, Magui...

FantasyOz is probably the ultimate land of fantasy, aside from Narnia and Middle Earth perhaps. Wicked has elements of fairy tales, magic, talking animals, lots of made-up places with odd names, an...

Evasive, Episodic, Detailed, HumorousStylistically, this book reads like a hybrid of realism and fantasy. We'll start with the realism. We get some very graphic descriptions of things, hence the de...

Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, is a very descriptive, biographical title, which we here at Shmoop applaud. You definitely know what you're in for when you pick up this...

"Tis very strange Men should be so fond of being thought wickeder than they are."– Daniel Defoe, A System of Magick "In historical events great men – so called – are but the label...

Spoiler alert: the Witch totally dies at the end, thanks to Dorothy's fire-safety training and a handy bucket of water. Given that we've all seen the 1939 movie, are we surprised by the ending of M...