Ophelia wrote:Constance wrote:

The author brings up the religions Unionist, Paganism, and Pleasure Faith. Elphaba's father Frex is a minister who believes in the Unnamed God, names his daughter after a saint, and yet his daughter is then born green.

I'll start with definitions:

1- paganism:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paganism

2- I suppose "Pleasure Faith" is an invention? Is it based on any real movement?

3- "Unionist" drew a blank. Help?

4- Elphaba: what's the name of the saint?

I believe most of the religions in the book are the author's invention with the exception of the pagonism. The Pleasure Faith follows the prophecies of the Time Dragon, which Elphaba coincidentally was born in.

Frex is a Unionist minister who preaches on the Unnamed God, so to me he paralleled Christianity.

Elphaba was named for "Saint Aelphaba of the Waterfall" (page 31 in my copy), again which I believe is an invention of the author but apparantly a saint in her parents' religion.

JulianTheApostate wrote:I really enjoyed the musical version of Wicked, which I saw in San Francisco last year. When I tried reading the novel, I gave up after a couple of pages, but I didn't give it much of a chance.

The whole point of the musical was that Elphaba wasn't really wicked. Wicked was a revisionist take on The Wizard of Oz, in which the "Wicked Witch of the West" was a somewhat heroic figure fighting a corrupt and flawed system. The main theme was that good and evil are subjective, and that people don't conform to the simplistic black-and-white view of The Wizard of Oz, a mentality that comes up far too often in the real world.

Hi Julian,

I agree that the musical did indeed make Elphaba a heroic figure who, rather than being wicked, was tragically misunderstood. Her skincolor caused her to be shunned and caused her to become somewhat reclusive and shy which then in turn fueled people's assumptions as with any vicious circle.

The book however made things a little more gray in relation to Elphaba's wickedness. Without giving away any spoilers for those who are still reading, I thought the author left it up to the reader to decide. The show was actually just loosely based on the book and it was made to be much more uplifting than the book is.

Thanks Constance.
That's the trouble with blissful ignorance, having no clue whether "Unionist" is like "Baptist" or a writer's invention!

[When I studied English lit at university, a knowledge of the Bible would have been very useful (as opposed to studying French literature). All I had was a year's weekly instruction with the Catholic Church when I was 11, and even with that I knew much more than everybody else in my classes. I think our professors had no expectations from us in that field, so it never became an obvious problem.
My parents were raised as Catholics but the only reason we had a Bible at home was that a Protestant minister once came visiting everybody in the street and gave my Mom a Bible-- I still have it on a shelf with my reference books from all those years ago. ]

Ophelia wrote:Thanks Constance.
That's the trouble with blissful ignorance, having no clue whether "Unionist" is like "Baptist" or a writer's invention!

[When I studied English lit at university, a knowledge of the Bible would have been very useful (as opposed to studying French literature). All I had was a year's weekly instruction with the Catholic Church when I was 11, and even with that I knew much more than everybody else in my classes. I think our professors had no expectations from us in that field, so it never became an obvious problem.
My parents were raised as Catholics but the only reason we had a Bible at home was that a Protestant minister once came visiting everybody in the street and gave my Mom a Bible-- I still have it on a shelf with my reference books from all those years ago. ]

No problem Ophelia. It might parallel Baptist actually. I just assumed it was meant to be a "Christian" religion because of the belief in one God and the belief in the "Other Land" which I assumed was their version of Heaven. Maybe the author is trying to parallel a particular relition, but I have not studied religion extensively so if someone feels it is meant to be specific, please feel free to comment.

Ophelia wrote:4- Elphaba: what's the name of the saint?

According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicked_%28novel%29

Gregory Maguire fashioned the name of Elphaba (pronounced EL-fa-ba) from the initials of Lyman Frank Baum, L-F-B.

I know, that wasn't what you were asking about.

How is everyone coming along with the beginning of Wicked? Does anyone have any questions, thoughts, impressions?

I know I personally was a little confused about Elphaba's birth and had to re-read it to understand what was happening.

JulianTheApostate wrote:

Ophelia wrote:4- Elphaba: what's the name of the saint?

According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicked_%28novel%29

Gregory Maguire fashioned the name of Elphaba (pronounced EL-fa-ba) from the initials of Lyman Frank Baum, L-F-B.

I know, that wasn't what you were asking about.

I read this fact too Julian - pretty neat!

I think a lot of the names and terms that the author uses in the novel are his own invention but he is kind of renaming the things we are familiar with.

Well, I finished Wicked the other day, and I'm not entirely sure if I liked the book or not, which is a funny situation. I'll try and take care not to spoil things, but I already seem one thing here that I believe was addressed, at least partially, in the very end of the novel (Elphaba being a punishment or not to Frex). I find it difficult to talk about a book without considering the whole of it, so I felt I should finish it before discussion.

I'm not certain if Mr. Maguire intended his religions to be direct parallels to existing religions. I think he was more going for sorts of religions. Most religions would fall into one of his three categories, I wager (though I can think of a few that don't). I am admittedly one of the worst people to ask about that sort of thing, but that's the feeling I got.

Sometimes I think I'm a bit dense to symbolism. I don't know if anyone is yet at the part regarding Elphaba's sister? I don't really understand her significance.

Theomanic wrote:
Sometimes I think I'm a bit dense to symbolism. I don't know if anyone is yet at the part regarding Elphaba's sister? I don't really understand her significance.

That's a good question. At first I wasn't sure what her point was either except to become the Wicked Witch of the East. I just kind of compared her to Elphaba in that Nessa was physically handicapped and "religious" and therefore was an object of sympathy and pity, while Elphaba's being green and "athiest" was an object of scorn and prejudice. Maybe you have some thoughts on this as well, but I thought maybe the author was making a comment about society and how we might make judgements based on the surface of things, because Nessa wasn't all that nice under the surface.

Huh. Is Wicked a parody of the book or the movie? I'm confused now.