Character guide

Dorothy Gale

major

Also known as Dorothy, little Dorothy, So Dorothy, XIV Dorothy, the Tin Woodman Dorothy

Dorothy Gale is the child every Oz book is written toward — the one readers beg Mr. Baum to bring back — and here she washes up in Ev with nothing but her wits, a dinner-pail, and a talking hen. Her plain Kansas practicality is her real magic: she takes talking machines and headless princesses in stride, and her longing to get home keeps the strange journey grounded. She is the reader's eyes in a country where nothing behaves, and the reason Ozma's rescue mission becomes personal.

Ozma

major

Also known as Oz, Ozma of Oz, Most Royal Ozma, Royal Ozma

Ozma rules Oz with a child's grace and an adult's resolve, greeting queens as an equal and promoting privates on a whim. Her defining trait is that she cannot be talked out of a promise: when the Nome King hides the Tin Woodman, she simply announces they will go back and make him tell. She matters because the whole quest is hers — Dorothy is the heart, but Ozma is the will that turns a rescue into a reckoning.

Billina

major

Also known as XV Billina

Billina arrives as Dorothy's unlikely shipwreck companion and quickly becomes the party's resident skeptic, briskly puncturing everyone's dignity while quietly solving what soldiers and rulers cannot. She is practical where the others are noble, and her unglamorous cleverness — plus a well-timed egg — is what saves the company from the Nome King's enchantments. Without her, the quest's most dangerous turn has no exit.

Tik-Tok

supporting

Also known as Tiktok, IV Tiktok the Machine Man, Mr. Tiktok

Tik-Tok is wound up to walk, think, and speak, which makes him indispensable and perpetually at risk of stopping cold with one arm frozen in the air. His literal-minded honesty — he blames Smith & Tinker for any faulty thought — makes him both comic and oddly touching. He carries the expedition's history and its practical knowledge, and his vulnerability to a lost key keeps the adventure tense in small, human ways.

Scarecrow

supporting

Also known as Oz—the Scarecrow, The Scarecrow, The good Scarecrow, the painted Scarecrow, the poor Scarecrow

The Scarecrow has ruled Oz and gladly stepped aside for Ozma, and he joins her mission to Ev as a loyal, slightly vain elder statesman of adventure. He is all straw and courtesy, quick to denounce a villain and quicker to accept a compliment, and his long friendship with the Tin Woodman gives the quest its warmest pairing. When the Nome King's tricks scatter the company, his fate becomes one of the mysteries the others must undo.

Tin Woodman

supporting

Also known as the Tin Woodman, The Tin Woodman, Nick Chopper

Nick Chopper, once a flesh-and-blood man, now clanks through Oz as its kindest citizen, forever polishing his joints and fretting about his missing heart. He follows Ozma to Ev out of pure friendship, and his willingness to face the Nome King's transformations makes him the story's quiet emblem of courage without a pulse. His disappearance mid-quest — turned into something the others cannot even identify — raises the stakes for everyone who loves him.

Princess Langwidere

supporting

Also known as the Princess Langwidere, The Princess, Langwidere

Langwidere does not so much rule Ev as occupy its palace, spending the treasury and receiving visitors only through a trick door in the one wing left standing. She keeps thirty interchangeable heads and a mirror-lined room to admire whichever face she wears, so that no one, including her servants, can know her by sight alone. Her vanity and her refusal to be bothered make her the first real obstacle Dorothy's party meets in Ev, a gilded distraction standing between them and the captive royal family.

Nome King

major

Also known as the Nome King, Mr. Nome King, The King, XIII The Nome King Laughs, This Nome

Seated on a ruby-studded throne in a domed cavern, the Nome King greets Ozma and Dorothy with Santa-Claus good humor, smoking a pipe and quoting nursery rhymes while insisting he bought the Queen of Ev and her ten children fairly from their own king. His pleasantness is the trap: he twists every argument into a riddle of ownership, and his power over his enchanted slaves makes him the quest's central adversary. What makes him dangerous is not rage but the sense that he is enjoying himself.

Hungry Tiger

supporting

Also known as Tiger, VIII The Hungry Tiger, the Tiger, The Tiger, The Hungry Tiger

Introduced by the Cowardly Lion as a new friend, the Hungry Tiger yawns wide enough to startle anyone and explains, with real regret, that he was born hungry and will die hungry rather than commit a cruel deed. He considers himself a failure at tigerhood precisely because he refuses to act like one, and he has left the forest rather than live with that contradiction alone. His comic self-awareness and genuine gentleness make him one of the party's most oddly reassuring companions as the journey turns serious.

Cowardly Lion

supporting

Also known as The Cowardly Lion, the huge Lion, the Lion, The Lion

Reunited with Dorothy, the Lion greets her warmly and immediately confesses that every little thing still scares him and makes his heart beat fast. He has brought along his new friend the Hungry Tiger, and the two beasts trade confessions of flawed natures with disarming honesty. His presence matters because it reconnects Dorothy to Oz and its familiar courage-in-spite-of-fear, grounding the strange new land of Ev in old loyalty.

Uncle Henry

minor

Also known as Henry

Dorothy's uncle who is shipwrecked with her and later rescued.

Prince Evring

minor

Also known as Evring, little Prince Evring, Little Evring, little Evring

A young prince of Ev who is turned into an ornament by the Nome King.

Wheelers

minor

Also known as Wheeler, the Wheeler, This Wheeler, The Wheeler, the Wheelers, The Wheelers

Strange creatures with wheels instead of hands and feet who serve the Nome King.

Queen of Ev

minor

Also known as Ev

The former queen of Ev who was turned into an ornament by the Nome King.

Sawhorse

minor

Also known as The Sawhorse, the frightened Sawhorse

A wooden sawhorse brought to life that serves as a mount for the group.

King Evoldo

minor

Also known as Ev, Ev - ol - do, King Ev - ol - do, the King of Ev, The King

The deceased former king of Ev who drowned himself after his wicked deeds.

King Evardo Fifteenth

minor

Also known as Evardo, King Evardo Fifteenth

The eldest son of the royal family of Ev, turned into a bric-a-brac ornament.

Nanda

minor

A maid who serves Princess Langwidere and assists Dorothy.

General

minor

Also known as the general

The commander of the Nome King's army of twenty-six officers.

Chief Steward

minor

Also known as Steward, the Chief Steward

The steward of Princess Langwidere's castle who manages her household.

Jinjur

minor

A former leader of the Army of Revolt in Oz who briefly appears.

Aunt Em

minor

Dorothy's aunt who is mentioned but does not appear in the story.

Glinda the Good

minor

Also known as Glinda

The powerful Good Witch of the South who helps Ozma with magic.

Pshaw

minor

A minor character who appears briefly in the story.

Bill

minor

A character mentioned briefly in the narrative.

Mr. Smith

minor

Also known as Smith

A character referenced in the story with no major role.