Alice in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz are two of the most enduring children’s fantasy books of the past 160 years. The two stories have been compared to each other numerous times. However, Alice in Wonderland is the far better book for multiple reasons.

‘The Wizard of Oz’ wouldn’t be the same without ‘Alice in Wonderland’

Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland and its sequel, Through the Looking-Glass, had an immense impact on the fantasy genre. It led to many imitations and popularized the trope of small children going to another world and coming back. Who knows if we would have J. M. Barrie’s Peter Pan, C.S. Lewis’ Narnia books, or Jim Henson’s Labyrinth without it?

The most famous book inspired by Alice in Wonderland is L. Frank Baum’s The Wizard of Oz. According to The Annotated Wizard of Oz, Baum was a fan of Carroll and created the character of Dorothy Gale as a direct imitation of Alice. The books also share otherworldly settings and a sense of whimsy. 

However, Alice in Wonderland is sometimes whimsical to the point of being incoherent. That’s its greatest strength. The Wizard of Oz and most other fairy tales have their internal logic. Wonderland is completely liberated from all rationality, which makes it the perfect literary destination for all fans of the unusual. It’s like a child’s introduction to surrealism — and that’s why it’s been part of our cultural vocabulary for 160 years.

‘The Wizard of Oz’ isn’t funny

In addition, Alice in Wonderland is simply funnier than The Wizard of Oz. Carroll had a tremendous British wit, so it’s no surprise that phrases and paraphrases from Alice in Wonderland have appeared in everything from Batman comics to George Harrison’s “Any Road.” 

The Wizard of Oz has some cute moments but it’s not funny. The appeal is the setting and its moral that “there’s no place like home.” That clear moral of The Wizard of Oz is part of the reason that, while it is the lesser book, it has a better track record of being adapted by Hollywood.

Why the writer of ‘Wicked’ prefers ‘Alice in Wonderland’

One author who understands both Oz and Wonderland is Gregory Maguire. The author of Wicked, the most famous reimagining of The Wizard of Oz, he also penned a Wonderland reimagining called After Alice.

In a 2015 interview with Vice, he said Wonderland was more difficult to write about. “It was more difficult, partly because people know it’s so very, very much better than they know some of the fairytales,” he said. “Alice in Wonderland, as I say, is like [Pablo Picasso’s] Guernica: Every brush stroke is indelibly impressed upon the mindset of somebody who cares about it at all. It was daunting to walk up, stand in the bright glare of achievement, and say, “Well, I’m just gonna prop my little ladder up here, and take a [piece], knock the foot off [Michelangelo’s] Pieta and see what it looks like there.”

He prefers Wonderland to Oz. “L. Frank Baum had a good idea, but he is not a genius writer,” he said. “Alice in Wonderland, however, was written by a true literary genius. So I felt that The Wizard of Oz is good and is significant — and is even fundamental to the American psyche — but it’s not a work of absolute brilliance, like Alice.“