The aspect of the promise is dependant upon two persons: the merchant and his youngest daughter. The promise cannot be fulfilled if not for the merchant’s original oath as well as the follow up completion of the oath by his daughter, which is to go and live with the lion. In her way of agreeing to the bargain, the youngest daughter comforts her father as she says, “Dear father, what you have promised must be fulfilled; I will go to the lion and soothe him, that he may let me return again safe home,” (Grimm 118). She is merely fulfilling her father’s promise as a binding contract and ensuring that honour is not lost, for she believes that goodness will ensue if their honour is maintained.
She believes that the situation will only be temporary and that her return to home will be a sweeter one after she has met all of the required obligations. It is her devoted love for her father that drives her to obey the lion and to go to live with him. The lion turns out to be a handsome, enchanted prince and this can be seen as the resulting goodness, with the daughter’s eventual marriage to this prince and a child that is borne. Even though her happiness is a slightly different one than anticipated, it is through her devotion to her father’s promise that this happiness is brought into her life for the better.
The fantasy story of The Wizard of Oz, is one in which a little girl named Dorothy travels to a far-off fantasy world of witches, wizards, and talking animals via an unanticipated cyclone. She finds herself in a place in which she knows no one and is all alone, but fortunately makes several good friends on the way to see The Wizard of Oz, the only one in the land that can solve her troubles and help her return home. However, things are not as easy as they appear, for this story is one in which many promises are both made and broken.
The idea of the promise takes shape right from the beginning of the story as Dorothy meets the scarecrow and after releasing him from his perch, befriends him. Dorothy assures him that she will accompany him to see the Wizard to help him get some brains, so that he can think for himself, as she promises, “If you will come with me I’ll ask Oz to do all he can for you,” (Baum 29).
Throughout the beginning of her journey, Dorothy proceeds to make friends with the Tin Woodsman and the Cowardly Lion and promises them her aid as well. It is through these important promises that Dorothy is eventually able to return home for her new friends find ways of protecting her and keeping her safe. She would have been all alone in a strange world without her companions and so it is important that she keeps her promises to each of them and see that they reach the Wizard alongside her.
It is her companions that support her and see her to her final destination and so by keeping her promises, goodness ensues with her reaching her goal of meeting the Wizard and ultimately returning home to Kansas. Through fulfilling her promises as well, Dorothy is able to guide her companions on a path to realizing that they already possessed their desired characteristics in themselves, independent of the false hopes derived from the Wizard. Without standing by her word, Dorothy as well as Toto, most likely would have been killed many times or gotten lost amidst the expanse of the unknown world around them.
The character of the Wizard is not the most moral nor the most considerate character to be found in the land of Oz. He fools everyone around him, even his subjects with his flashy props and his carnival talents into thinking that he is all mighty and powerful when really, as he puts it, “I am just a common man,” (Baum 158). Not surprisingly, when Dorothy and her companions approach him and ask him for each of their personal wishes, he selfishly demands a task to be done for him in return. He promises to grant their wishes in return for the death of the Wicked Witch of the East as he says to Dorothy, “There is now but one Wicked Witch left in all this land, and when you can tell me she is dead I will send you back to Kansas – but not before,” (Baum 109). He shows little concern for the safety of the selfless travelers and combined with his disregard for the truth, he shows his true, selfish colours.
He makes promises to each of the characters that he knows he cannot keep and when they end up completing his supposed improbable task, he cannot fulfill his end of the bargain. After discovering the Wizard’s true identity and demanding their payment for killing the Wicked Witch of the East, he can only regrettably tell them, “When you came to me I was willing to promise anything if you would only do away with the other Witch; but now that you have melted her, I am ashamed to say that I cannot keep my promises,” (Baum 162). It only serves him a dose of his own medicine that he takes a balloon over the desert, more than likely to never be heard from again. It is his uncertain, most likely dismal future that resulted from his immoral promises that he could not keep and the deceptive faults committed against his own subjects and guests. A better, brighter future may have resulted if only the Wizard had kept his promises, or at least made promises that he had a chance to fulfill.
Even though a person may not be the most loyal or the most respected in all the land, it has nothing to do with the everlasting sense of honour that one can feel when one’s word is kept. Through a thorough look at The Grimm fairytale “The Lady and The Lion,” J.R.R. Tolkien’s fantasy work, The Hobbit, and L. Frank Baum’s fantasy work, The Wizard of Oz, it can be seen that honour and satisfaction are the result of keeping those promises that are made in confidence with those around them. A happy ending is always a desirable form of wish fulfillment, so in essence, must promises be kept to fulfill such an everlasting satisfaction? How else can true happiness occur, without a lasting sense of honour to maintain that happiness? In a sense, these are both required however ultimately, it is up to each person to dig deep within themselves to find their own true, eternal answers as to what makes them happy…
