Opening Brief
The box arrived unmarked. Corners split, tape frayed, its cardboard skin bruised as though it had tumbled through more than a postal route. Inside: onion-skin pages, mimeographed reports, memos stamped with red ink, and a case number I’d never seen before – OZ-01.
Someone had filed Dorothy Gale and her companions not as fictions, but as witnesses in a contested investigation. Not as bedtime characters, but as participants in a world we were never meant to see.
I was nine when I first held The Wizard of Oz in my hands. The pages smelled of dust and magic, and for the first time I realized a book could feel like contraband—like instructions disguised as story. Now, decades later, here was a file suggesting that what I felt as a child might not have been imagination at all.
I’ve chosen to share excerpts from this dossier. Whether they are satire, forgery, fantasy, or proof, I cannot say. All I can do is place them in order and annotate them where my own memories overlap.
Exhibit A: Dorothy Gale – Missing Person
Kansas County Sheriff’s Notice, 1934
“Subject: Gale, Dorothy. Age: 12. Missing since cyclone event, whereabouts unknown. Presumed deceased or displaced.”
Amended Report, 48 hours later:
“Subject returned unharmed. Claims extensive travel. No physical evidence provided. Recommend closure.”
✎ Age 9: I underlined “missing.” I knew what it felt like to be somewhere adults couldn’t follow.
Interpretation: Dorothy is not the innocent farm girl we imagine. She is the perpetual wanderer, the child who vanishes into absence. Her “home” exists only because she has left it behind. The official reports treat her return as a bureaucratic footnote, ignoring the truth of her journey and the magic she encountered along the way.
Her journey reminds us that identity is formed in motion, not in place. Every step along the yellow brick road challenges assumptions about safety, belonging, and choice. Dorothy’s resilience is both learned and innate, teaching that home is not a location, but a state of self-awareness and agency.
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Exhibit B: The Scarecrow – Field Notes
Botanist’s Log, Report No. 22
“Specimen found upright in cornfield. Cranial cavity appears empty of seed, yet subject speaks in riddles and philosophy. Local farmers suggest fire hazard, not miracle.”
✎ I thought he was dumb until I realized most adults just sounded smart.
Interpretation: The Scarecrow is not brainless. He is unprogrammed. A blank slate who speaks truths others cannot hear because they are bound by education and ego. His “lack” is not deficit—it is liberation.
He exemplifies the idea that intelligence is relational, not solitary. By observing and adapting to the world around him, the Scarecrow reveals that true understanding often arises from collaboration and attentiveness, rather than abstract knowledge alone.
Exhibit C: The Tin Man – Maintenance Log
Factory Recall Notice, 1931
“Model T-1N Series: Subject to corrosion at chest cavity. Recommend removal of sentimental functions. Substitute metronomic regulator to prevent emotional interference.”
✎ Age 10: I remember the first time I felt hollow, and how that emptiness thudded louder than my heartbeat
Interpretation: His tragedy is not absence, but regulation. He shows that true emotion sometimes requires rebellion against what limits it, and that even the hollowest vessel can overflow with empathy.
The Tin Man’s yearning illustrates how desire shapes purpose. Even in a mechanical body, longing animates choice and action. His quest for a heart is symbolic of the universal drive to connect, feel deeply, and transcend limitations imposed by circumstance or design.
Exhibit D: The Cowardly Lion – Theatre Program
Playbill for “Trial by Roar”
“One-night only performance. A lion stands accused of cowardice. Will courage reveal itself under the lights?”
✎ Age 11: I trembled during my first school play, but the applause made me braver than I was.
Interpretation: Courage is performative and internal at once. The Lion embodies the universal struggle to act despite fear, and reminds us that authenticity is its own kind of bravery.
His fear also teaches that vulnerability can be instructive. By confronting his insecurities, the Lion becomes a model for embracing imperfection as a necessary step toward growth, showing that courage is inseparable from self-awareness and reflection.
Exhibit E: Glinda the Good – Internal Memo
Memo, marked CONFIDENTIAL
“Subject Dorothy must complete journey unaided. Only at conclusion may power of return be revealed. Failure to comply risks compromise of Emerald Directive.”
✎ Age 12: Why didn’t she just tell Dorothy the truth?
Interpretation: Glinda teaches that benevolence can be strategic, and that guidance sometimes requires restraint. Her kindness is calculated, but effective.
Her subtle orchestration highlights the complexity of leadership. True influence often relies on timing, discretion, and insight into human nature. Glinda’s approach shows that power exercised thoughtfully can cultivate lasting outcomes without force or coercion.
Exhibit F: Wicked Witch of the West – Grievance Filed
Land Court Petition, 1934
“Complainant: Witch of the West. Grievance: Unlawful death of sibling via airborne domicile. Seeking restitution, land deed acknowledgment, and return of footwear.”
**Stamp: DENIED. Reason: Complainant deemed ‘wicked.’”
✎ I once asked my teacher if villains were ever right. She told me not to ask again.
Interpretation: She is the shadow of justice, a reminder that morality is not absolute, and that perspective determines whether an action is heroic or villainous.
The Witch also reflects how neglect and dismissal can breed resistance. Her persistence reveals that those labeled “evil” often arise from systemic disregard, reminding us that accountability and fairness are as vital as courage or virtue.
Exhibit G: The Wizard – Affidavit/Flight Log
Affidavit sworn by ‘Oz the Great and Powerful’
“I am all things. I am nothing. Pay no attention to the absence behind this declaration.”
✎ Age 9: The first time I caught an adult lying, I felt like Toto pulling back the curtain.
Interpretation: Authority can be spectacle. The Wizard reminds us that appearances are often more persuasive than facts, and that courage comes from seeing behind the veil.
His illusion underscores the power of narrative over reality. By crafting belief, the Wizard teaches that perception can manipulate action, and that discernment—the ability to look beyond surface—is as critical to wisdom as knowledge itself.
Cross-Examination
The files never agree.
Dorothy swears she stumbled by accident. Glinda’s memos reveal a plan. The Witch files her grievance in neat penmanship, only to be dismissed with a stamp. The Wizard signs his own contradictions.
✎ I realized adults contradict themselves too – and the contradictions are where the truth leaks out.
Findings/Closing: A Child’s Drawing – Expanded Interpretation
Interpretation: The Oz dossier closes with no final judgment.
Instead, it leaves us with absence, redaction, and contradiction. Perhaps that is the point. Truth isn’t in the testimony, but in the margins.
The final page left in the box was a child’s drawing: a crooked yellow road scrawled in wax crayon, leading somewhere we can only imagine.
The drawing reminds us that imagination preserves what bureaucracy and logic cannot contain. It is both a record and a prophecy: a child’s eye capturing complexity in lines, color, and form. In this final image, the dossier becomes less about answers and more about the act of witnessing—the persistence of wonder, the courage to trace paths where others see only blank space.
Some archives are maps.
Some maps are instructions.
