L. Frank Baum, author of The Wizard of Oz, seems to have used Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man as the inspiration for the Wizard in his most famous book, The Wizard of Oz:
“Monarchy always appears to me a silly, contemptible thing. I compare it to something kept behind a curtain, about which there is a great deal of bustle and fuss, and a wonderful air of seeming solemnity; but when, by any accident, the curtain happens to be open — and the company see what it is, they burst into laughter.”
—Thomas Paine, Rights of Man: Part 2, 1792
He was also a member of the Theosophical Society, which would have likely exposed him to Paine’s Age of Reason. Paine’s works were also popular at the turn of the century, so it seems quite likely he would have been exposed to Rights of Man, especially given his deep knowledge of politics.
Despite these assumptions, no hard evidence yet exists that L. Frank Baum read Paine…