Behind her pointy hat and her flying broom, the witch embodies much more than a simple character from stories and films. According to Margot Adler, Wiccan priestess and journalist, “the very power of the word “witch” lies in its imprecision. It is not just a word but an archetype, a set of powerful images.” This is a broad term, with references spanning thousands of years, from Greek mythology to the Bible.
The iconic Witch of the West Wizard of Oz and the fearsome Evil Queen of Snow White have particularly contributed to shaping our collective imagination. But these fictional figures are also two facets of the same archetype, and the incarnation of cultural fears around women, according to the National Geographic media.
The Witch of the West, since her first appearance in 1939, has forever marked the image of the modern witch. His physique has very recognizable characteristics: a large black hat, a hooked nose, a pointed chin with a wart and incredibly long fingers ending in (also) sharp nails, all covered with green skin. Never without her broom, she leaves behind a thick plume of black smoke when she takes off from the ground. She is obviously very ugly, because in the land of Oz, only good witches are beautiful. His appearance is intentionally grotesque, making old age and ugliness an inseparable duo. This character crystallizes the idea of the aging and dangerous woman, who refuses to conform to the expectations of society, from which she is also excluded.
They don’t just reflect cultural anxieties: they create them
The Evil Queen Snow Whitefor its part, reveals another facet of this fear of the powerful woman. Beautiful and charismatic, she wants nothing more than to be the most beautiful in the country. The queen is a woman of icy beauty, with a slender figure. She has pale skin, green eyes, chest-length black hair, and her features are made up. Yet deeply jealous of Snow White’s beauty, she transforms into an old witch when the time comes to carry out her Machiavellian plans. Thus, on the one hand she embodies the fears linked to beauty stereotypes imposed on women and their tyranny; on the other hand, this transformation symbolizes the fear of aging and loss of power, anchored in Western societies.
In a way, the two witches, although very different, embody stereotypes linked to femininity in their own way. They illustrate and nourish a dichotomy still present today: beauty and youth as instruments of power, and age as a source of distrust and marginalization. They don’t just reflect different cultural anxieties (about aging, bad women, and all the ways appearances can be deceiving), they create them. Basically, as Mona Chollet, journalist and essayist, explains: “The witch is a summary of everything that is disturbing about women.”
Source: www.slate.fr
