As Dorothy was traveling along the yellow brick road, she was passing straight through Elphaba’s life, challenging the green one’s very belief system by introducing something strange and new into her world. Travelers are not always welcome, and it’s not just about territorialism. People are often comforted by sameness, and afraid of things that fall outside of their world view.

Wicked is not the only story about the people beyond the road who are not altogether welcoming to the strangers who encroach on their sovereignty. Another that comes to mind is James Dickey’s Deliverance. These city men travel first a road and then a river, through territory untouched by city folk. By traveling here and bringing their city notions, they are a threat that must be handled with extreme prejudice.

One slightly less ominous journey occurs in The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, with a drag queen show that travels from the safety of the big city in Australia, across the unforgiving outback. In the end, they realize that city is a place that protects the travelers as much as the desert protects the people who live beyond that road. But the challenges along the way, those barriers broken, make the lives richer for it.

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 6th, 2009 at 12:39 pm and is filed under road tripping. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.