Review: The Witches by Stacy Schiff
The Witches: Salem, 1692
by Stacy Schiff
In 1692, during the bitter cold of winter, a minister’s daughter complains that she is being tormented. The diagnosis? A witch must be afflicting her. Soon other girls are complaining of being pinched and poked. They writhe in agony and scream in horror as shades and specters swirl around them. Soon accusations begin to fly against neighbors, spouses, parents, and children. The prisons swell as witches are arrested and held for trial. In an odd twist, confessed witches are allowed to live while those who refuse to admit their guilt are hanged. As panic spreads, the accusations increase. Before a year has gone by, the madness has ended, but not before twenty people lost their lives.
The notorious Salem witch trials are brought to life once again under the vibrant pen of Stacy Schiff. I think people who typically find history books boring would be pleasantly surprised. Schiff writes this almost like a thriller, very taut and full of suspense. The account is also very straightforward, and describes the politics of the era very thoroughly so that readers can understand the jockeying for power that accompanied the trial.
What the biography does not do - and perhaps what it never could do - is enlighten the reader about the personalities of the possessed girls or the accused witches. Trial transcripts tend to be spotty and subject to distortion, as the men who recorded the events were not bound to be impartial or journalistic in their approach. New England records from the time are also curiously sparse. Women were rarely prominent in the records before and after 1692, so other than a few notes in family genealogies and church records very little is known about their lives. Since there’s no way to know what set these women off or what they thought of the events afterwards, the events always remain somewhat distant.
The great question of “Why did this happen?” is never definitively answered, either. Several explanations that have been proposed over the years are presented, and it’s possible that all of these things were contributing factors to the Salem events. My conclusion, which I assume was Schiff’s as well, is that it’s impossible to know. Too much information was never recorded, or has been lost in the centuries since the witch trials.
3.5 out of 5 stars
To read more about The Witches, buy it or add it to your wishlist click here.
Peeking into the archives...today in:
2014:
2013: The Iron Traitor (Iron Fey #6/Call of the Forgotten #2) by Julie Kagawa
2012: Bibliomat: Book Vending Machine
2011: Another little break for school!
2010: The Virgin Widow by Anne O'Brien
2009: Doodle of the Day: Twilight
2008: Babylonne by Catherine Jinks
by Stacy Schiff
In 1692, during the bitter cold of winter, a minister’s daughter complains that she is being tormented. The diagnosis? A witch must be afflicting her. Soon other girls are complaining of being pinched and poked. They writhe in agony and scream in horror as shades and specters swirl around them. Soon accusations begin to fly against neighbors, spouses, parents, and children. The prisons swell as witches are arrested and held for trial. In an odd twist, confessed witches are allowed to live while those who refuse to admit their guilt are hanged. As panic spreads, the accusations increase. Before a year has gone by, the madness has ended, but not before twenty people lost their lives.
The notorious Salem witch trials are brought to life once again under the vibrant pen of Stacy Schiff. I think people who typically find history books boring would be pleasantly surprised. Schiff writes this almost like a thriller, very taut and full of suspense. The account is also very straightforward, and describes the politics of the era very thoroughly so that readers can understand the jockeying for power that accompanied the trial.
What the biography does not do - and perhaps what it never could do - is enlighten the reader about the personalities of the possessed girls or the accused witches. Trial transcripts tend to be spotty and subject to distortion, as the men who recorded the events were not bound to be impartial or journalistic in their approach. New England records from the time are also curiously sparse. Women were rarely prominent in the records before and after 1692, so other than a few notes in family genealogies and church records very little is known about their lives. Since there’s no way to know what set these women off or what they thought of the events afterwards, the events always remain somewhat distant.
The great question of “Why did this happen?” is never definitively answered, either. Several explanations that have been proposed over the years are presented, and it’s possible that all of these things were contributing factors to the Salem events. My conclusion, which I assume was Schiff’s as well, is that it’s impossible to know. Too much information was never recorded, or has been lost in the centuries since the witch trials.
3.5 out of 5 stars
To read more about The Witches, buy it or add it to your wishlist click here.
Peeking into the archives...today in:
2014:
2013: The Iron Traitor (Iron Fey #6/Call of the Forgotten #2) by Julie Kagawa
2012: Bibliomat: Book Vending Machine
2011: Another little break for school!
2010: The Virgin Widow by Anne O'Brien
2009: Doodle of the Day: Twilight
2008: Babylonne by Catherine Jinks