Glinda

Glinda is a literary creation of L. Frank Baum appearing in his Oz series beginning with The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1900) and in later books. Within Baum's fictional cosmology she is presented as an originally established magical figure of Oz who rose to political and magical prominence (including overthrowing the Wicked Witch of the South in the narrative) rather than as a being with a folkloric prehistory; the supplied sources identify her origin as Baum's invention and note later reinterpretations in adaptations.

Baum's texts, as summarized in reference sources, depict Glinda as a beautiful young woman with long, rich rare red hair and blue eyes who wears a pure white dress. Though she appears youthful, Baum states she is much older than her appearance suggests and 'knows how to keep young in spite of the many years she has lived.' Film adaptations (notably the 1939 MGM version) alter elements of her cinematic appearance by combining traits of multiple Oz witches, but the primary literary description is of a white-robed, red-haired sorceress.

Sources describe Glinda as the most powerful sorceress in Oz with broad magical knowledge and instruments. Specific powers and acts attributed to her in Baum's narratives and summaries include possession of a Great Book of Records that allows her to track events as they occur; creation of the Forbidden Fountain whose 'Waters of Oblivion' can redeem and make enemies forget malicious intentions; the ability to seal Oz from the Great Outside World so that mortals (e.g., people in airplanes) cannot perceive it; issuing the Golden Cap to the Winged Monkeys to control them; freeing and later guiding others in magic (she trains the former humbug Wizard in The Road to Oz). She also functions politically by ruling the Quadling Country from a palace near the Deadly Desert, maintaining a female court and army, creating refuges in specific instances (for example, the walled Bunnybury for rabbits), and intervening as protector or counselor to Ozma when requested. The sources emphasize both her magical potency and a pragmatic restraint in intervening in affairs of state unless asked or unless wider danger threatens Oz.