by Shelley Pineo-Jensen, Ph.D.
4/30/22
4/30/22
Witches I Have Loved
I was thinking about why witches resonate with me so much. Here is what I came up with.
Evidence
In the early 60s, I read all the books with stories about witches that were available at the Wenatchee Valley Public Library non-fiction collection.
My favorite character in The Wizard of Oz has always been the Wicked Witch of the West. I fell in love with her and her laugh from the moment I ever saw her. I can do a pretty good impression and know her final speech by heart. “Oh, what a world, what a world. . . who would have thought that a good little girl like you could destroy of my beautiful wickedness.”
As an adult, I adopted The Queen from Snow White for my Halloween persona. I had a wonderful half mask, really a devil mask from the nose down, but close enough, when combined with black clothes covered with a big black cloak and topped with a black pointy witch’s hat. I made a basket of apples with rubber snakes and spiders. I had a black glove with long black fingernails. I took my kids to the mall for trick or treating, (inclement weather made that the only real choice). At the mall, I always went up to the little ones dressed up as Snow White and offered them an apple. The parents loved it but the kids sometimes cried and then I had to take off my mask and explain that I was just an ordinary mommy.
I have made an informal study of witches that I expanded to include all popular culture female villains. I collected little action figures of them and used them when teaching fifth graders. I taught them about stereotypes in literature by having them brainstorm all the characteristics of a witch: black pointy hat, long noise, wart, red eyes, cackle, pale skin, and then had them describe the attributes of the White Witch in the Narnia stories, as a compare and contrast exercise.
Good times.
I was thinking about why witches resonate with me so much. Here is what I came up with.
Evidence
In the early 60s, I read all the books with stories about witches that were available at the Wenatchee Valley Public Library non-fiction collection.
My favorite character in The Wizard of Oz has always been the Wicked Witch of the West. I fell in love with her and her laugh from the moment I ever saw her. I can do a pretty good impression and know her final speech by heart. “Oh, what a world, what a world. . . who would have thought that a good little girl like you could destroy of my beautiful wickedness.”
As an adult, I adopted The Queen from Snow White for my Halloween persona. I had a wonderful half mask, really a devil mask from the nose down, but close enough, when combined with black clothes covered with a big black cloak and topped with a black pointy witch’s hat. I made a basket of apples with rubber snakes and spiders. I had a black glove with long black fingernails. I took my kids to the mall for trick or treating, (inclement weather made that the only real choice). At the mall, I always went up to the little ones dressed up as Snow White and offered them an apple. The parents loved it but the kids sometimes cried and then I had to take off my mask and explain that I was just an ordinary mommy.
I have made an informal study of witches that I expanded to include all popular culture female villains. I collected little action figures of them and used them when teaching fifth graders. I taught them about stereotypes in literature by having them brainstorm all the characteristics of a witch: black pointy hat, long noise, wart, red eyes, cackle, pale skin, and then had them describe the attributes of the White Witch in the Narnia stories, as a compare and contrast exercise.
Good times.
Final Answer
But to the point of this essay, for me as a preteen reader, there were virtually no powerful female figures in literature or in life. Sure, there was Cleopatra; she used her sexy wiles to advance her cause and died of suicide by asp when her plots failed. Then there’s Jane Eyre, a powerless orphan who needs the help of a big strong dangerous man to complete her world.
But to the point of this essay, for me as a preteen reader, there were virtually no powerful female figures in literature or in life. Sure, there was Cleopatra; she used her sexy wiles to advance her cause and died of suicide by asp when her plots failed. Then there’s Jane Eyre, a powerless orphan who needs the help of a big strong dangerous man to complete her world.
Who else do we have? Amelia Earhart, Nellie Bly, Florence Nightingale, and Eleanor Roosevelt come to mind.
I wasn’t reading Jane Austen at that point, so I had yet to meet Lady Catherine de Bourgh; Dicken’s Miss Havisham was also not yet in my realm. A Wrinkle in Time has a female hero, but she is not particularly powerful. And so it goes.
Some actresses from the Golden Age of Hollywood carried power well or at least were outspoken and took no prisoners, giving as good as they got. They were smart asses or dangerous trouble, acting with agency in various roles: Greta Garbo, Jean Harlow, Katherine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers, Myrna Loy, Barbara Stanwyck, Lauren Bacall, Ann Southern, Bette Davis, Mary Astor, and Rosalind Russell. From TV’s I Love Lucy, Lucille Ball comes to mind. These actresses played characters who didn’t take guff offa anyone, and they helped inform my notion of what a stand-up woman could do, even in a “man’s world.”
But witches . . . witches are another story altogether. They are powerful villains and only the most daring and bold can conquer them. They are the point of the story, the most interesting part.
Powerful female villains I have loved include the aforementioned Wicked Witch of the West and from the Disney oeuvre, The Queen from Snow White, as well as Maleficent, Cruella De’ Ville. I also love Angelica from Nickelodeon's Rug Rats.
I don’t love Ursula from Disney’s The Little Mermaid, but I do count her as a powerful female villain.
Other witches that impressed me are the witch at the top of The Glass Mountain and the witch at the top of Rapunzel’s tower. I am particularly fond of the wizened old woman who rewards the young adventurer in The Twelve Dancing Princesses; she is a witch in disguise who gives him a cloak of invisibility because he has shown her kindness.
Powerful female villains I have loved include the aforementioned Wicked Witch of the West and from the Disney oeuvre, The Queen from Snow White, as well as Maleficent, Cruella De’ Ville. I also love Angelica from Nickelodeon's Rug Rats.
I don’t love Ursula from Disney’s The Little Mermaid, but I do count her as a powerful female villain.
Other witches that impressed me are the witch at the top of The Glass Mountain and the witch at the top of Rapunzel’s tower. I am particularly fond of the wizened old woman who rewards the young adventurer in The Twelve Dancing Princesses; she is a witch in disguise who gives him a cloak of invisibility because he has shown her kindness.
Not a bad lot really. They wield power as cruelly and vengefully as any male villain. They make a worthy opponent. And most of all, they do not sit on the sidelines waiting for Prince Charming to rescue them. They are women of action. That is why they are the witches I love.
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