Heart Of The Tin Man

The collected writings
of Jack Haley

Edited by Mitchell Cohen

Immortality is not a distant and shiny phenomenon but a living reality. You live in others; others live in you. So long as any human being lives you have life. Your passport to immortality, to be valid, must have the stamp of the human community upon it.

Norman Cousins

As I read this chronicle of Jack Haley's autobiography, I became so engrossed that it carried me along the corridors of a life that was rich in countless ways. I found myself smiling and even chuckling as I read all the experiences that were Jack Haley.

I have known from other readings and stories that you hear in Hollywood about what a very nice man Haley was. He talks with such candor about these personal experiences. Most of all he bares himself as if to open his soul to the reader into the most inner sanctum of whom Jack Haley really was. The point does not seem to be any kind of white washing of his friends and certainly not himself but a genuineness of an honest, caring man with a very large heart.

I, being who I am, was most interested on his take about the Wizard of Oz. It was Jack Haley that set the tone of this movie as though a story was being told to a much-loved child. It is now obvious to me that is one of the most appealing aspects of the film. Who, adult or child does not like a well-told story?

He was also absolutely right in his rancor about the fact that the Wizard of Oz having made billions of dollars for the M-G-M studio and those who subsequently came to own everything about OZ. Most particularly the characters themselves having been marketed over the years and leaving the artists that brought this film to life with no residuals or even a pittance of the by products that Oz has generated now for over 60 years.

I must admit that my favorite part of the book are the beautiful lessons that Haley learned through living, through having wonderful parents, his personal family, and friends. His poetry made me cry and laugh and reflect on his life as well as my own. I suppose this appealed to me most, as many of these thoughts are mine as I too age down life's road. The most poignant poem to me was the poem, My Newsboy. If this is not a microcosm of life, I have never seen it. Whether Jack Haley knew it or not he was a philosopher, a theologian, a good friend, a good husband and father and most of all for the rest of us he brought great joy in his theatrical legacy. As I stated earlier on Jack Haley's page, he less than anyone else needed a heart from the Wizard of Oz. His own was more than adequate.