Anna Dressed In Blood - Modern Witches and Witchcraft in K. Blake's Fiction

“It isn’t going to work. I can’t cast the circle. I’ve never had the knack for witchcraft. Mom must’ve told you. I messed up her Beltane cookies every year until I was seven.”  ("Anna Dressed in Blood", Ch. 13, Kendare Blake)

When I stumbled upon Kendare Blake's dark horror story, I expected some kind of violent fiction, full of characters' dark thoughts and intentions.. but it appeared to be a very pleasant read for a teenager age group, and okay, for adults, like me, though I don't feel like I am a grown up woman yet.

Most interesting for me in this story was a leitmotif of witchcraft (obviously!). The author creates a world where the souls are vengeful and like to kill and a hero who kills...  those vengeful souls. The hero's mother is  a witch who helps her son named Cas in his job of murdering the awoken dead. 

Cas calls his Mum a "mobile witch" because they move from one place to another quite frequently. She makes their living by "doing tarot card readings and aura cleansing over the phone, and selling occult supplies online". There might be some irony in those words about people believing in such things, but for Cas it is pretty much a reality of his life. 

I must say that the way Blake portrayed her witches is somehow close to what I got to know about modern witches's lives through some of my blogger friends. For us, people far from the practices of witchcraft (for the time being), what they do is what they believe in, this is their life, and it is not something to be afraid of or go away in disgust. Other story characters accept the fact of having witches as their neighbours totally normal and they are even not as much amazed to see the witches performing rituals accompanied by the ignition of flames out of nowhere or a tremor of the ground and so on.
Nevertheless the story's depiction of the witches is not free from representation in popular TV series. The witches control the weather, ignite flames, get inside your mind, and can destroy. I believe that the entertainment industry of course needs spectacular scenes, breath taking adventures, extraordinary characters. This could be the reason why the witches are presented in a such an "out of this world" way.
What I like about Blake's writing is that she has that witty irony through out the narrative. You can go by the extracted lines I gave in the very beginning of this post - messing up Beltane cookies? Oh my, that could be a catastrophe! But the author makes it feel like an ordinary thing (like burning an oatmeal cake), because it is such for her characters, and there is no exaggeration of the life of a modern witch.
"Anna Dressed in Blood" contains not only witches but also warlocks, one of them is a Cas's schoolmate, another - this schoolmate's granddad, who actually passed on the witchcraft skills to his grandson. So these two and Cas's mother make a magical team who fights with a powerful soul of an obeahman. There was also a good educational moment for me personally as I never knew who that was and had to read about it in the net. For me this novel was a novelty, a fresh insight into the modern witchcraft and a nice free from judgement depiction of what witches do or what they don't. 

Modern Witch - Transportation by ilura-menday-less

P.S. I have the 3d and the last post about Gogol's horror story in my mind, though I decided to switch to another witch in this post. Pannochka is yet to come! Stay tuned, my dears.

Yours sincerely,

Witchcraft and More.

Unconditional Love of The Witch Olesya - Part 1

 "Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres." (1 Corinthians 13:4-7). It's a little strange to start a post about a witch from the Bible's quote.. However these three lines is the foundation of the romantic stories by Russian writer Kuprin A.I.  These stories is another favorite read of mine I got from home this summer.

One of the most touching and beautiful of them is the one called "Olesya". I read it three days back, again. It always boosts my imagination and I walk half dreaming about it for few more days.

The protagonist, from whose side the story is narrated, is an official, sent to the "God-forsaken village in the Volhynian borderland of Polesye" as he says about the place. He tries to keep himself busy by game-shooting, giving medical help to locals, and noting the area's legends and tales. He doesn't like the place much and calls it "out-of-the-way corner... - simple manners, primitive characters". The relations with the peasants "never went beyond the fact that, on seeing me from a distance, they would take off their caps and, as they came alongside, would mutter sullenly "Speedjue," which was supposed to mean "God speed you." The locals would also start kissing the hands - "an old custom from the time of Polish serfdom". The main character is placed in such environment which doesn't relate his vision of the world. He underlines throughout the story the wildness of the local beliefs...

Ivan Shishkin (1832-1898), The hut in the Forest

The rationalism of the main character is opposed to the superstitions which fill the minds of the peasants. One winter day the main hero, which is called master by his helper Yarmola, sat in his room, while the severe storm was blowing outside...
"Where do you think this horrible wind comes from, Yarmola?"
"The wind?" Yarmola looked up lazily. "Why, don't you know, master?"
"Of course not. How could I know such a thing?"
"Don't you, really!" Yarmola was roused. "I'll tell you," he went on, a shade mysteriously. "Either a witch has been born, or a wizard's making merry." I pounced eagerly on this. "Who knows," I thought, "perhaps I may worm out of him some interesting story of magic, hidden treasures, or werewolves."
"Have you got any witches here in Polesye?" I asked..." This is how the main hero started getting involved in the world of witchcraft and... love. Yarmola then tells the master the tale that there was a witch but "the lads drove her away" to the forests, burning her house "so that not a chip would be left of her accursed nest".
Here we can see that the attitude towards witches is completely negative, moreover, the witch is blamed in whatever bad happens in the village. Thus the witch was driven away because she was believed to do loads of harm like casting spells, plait the stalks in the sheaves...and of course to cause serious illness in the family and furthermore a death of one woman's child!
The curiosity of the master rises as he gets to know that the witch is now living in the forest with her daughter or granddaughter. He intends to see her as soon as the days get warmer. Yarmola tells that the witch's name is Manuilikha...
I am going to cover the rest of the story in the next post, as this one gets too long to read at once. I am going to tell about the relations which tie up between the main hero and  the witch's granddaughter...Do you think it's going to be as successful as the mystic venture of the Master and Margarita?
P.S. the citations are from the  book "Olesya" translated from the Russian by Stepan Apresyan. The book is available here.

Origin of Witchcraft - Greek Hecate

 I had opened a big topic related to a reflection of a witchcraft in ancient Greek literature. Therefore, I would like to continue my thoughts on the subject of the first witch/wizard in the human's history. And I would like to descry ancient Greek mythology and Goddess Hecate and her relation to witchcraft.
Hecate is an ancient Goddess who is presented mostly as a triple formed Goddess: triple headed, triple bodied, six armed and six legged. I also found that  "earliest Greek depictions of Hecate are single-faced, not three formed" (wiki), and that her mystic nature was created later.

Ancient Hecate, 3rd century BCE

Goddess Hecate has associations  with a variety of phenomenon as fire, light, the Moon, crossroads, entrance ways, knowledge of potions and herbs, necromancy, sorcery, magic and witchcraft. Hecate also has a universal rule over the earth, sky and the sea, what might be reflected in her triple bodied figure.

Modern Hecate

Hecate's image as a witch can be treated as much valuable and powerful than any other. I must say that Hecate also figures in a myth about Jason and the Argonauts, discussed here in regard with Medea. Nevertheless, Hecate shall be considered as the source of witchcraft, probably it's origin, or the origin of belief in it.
In the Michael Strmiska's book "Modern paganism in world cultures" I found the lines about the origin of witchcraft and Hecate's cult, where the author says that Hecate conflated with Diana (Roman Goddess) was a protector of witches and sorcerers in their work and was most active at night. This then, in late antiquity and early medieval period, gave a ground for association of Hecate with witchcraft and night rituals.
According to Greek tradition Hecate can be called the first Goddess in humans history which used to have links with witchcraft and officially could be called as a Goddess of witches. However, in my opinion, we can't really know how she was treated by ancient Greeks and did they really worship this side of her deity. For that matter I also would like to know about the magic as a tool of mortal people in ancient Greece. How they used magic and how magic was treated that time.

Why I like the topic of witchcraft

    This is not a question, this is a try to explain myself why I like to read about magical stuff or watch it. Well, as far as I remember, I was fond of such things since childhood. Thanks to my Mum, who was always interested, on a hobby level, in astrology, stones properties, chiromancy and so on. It was not that she especially presented all her interests to me, but I am myself used to pick up some book on these topics and read it. It was all curiosity of course. Why not? This is indeed interesting and deserves our attention.

    I don't specifically like a witchcraft or all this black magic things or especially to do it (no way), but as soon as it exists  in our world and it is something what we can't explain yet - it becomes an object of our observation and even research.

    As soon as I am a philologist, I have a special interest in witchcraft. How many of the writers and poets  made magic and wizardry as part of their works! I can't leave the fact that this theme can also inspire to create. You can see different dimensions of it's presentation in the literature, however some books can be called "magical", if you take an example of Harry Potter, the latest top book (hence, movie) about the world of witches and wizards.

   In the next posts I would like to explore the witchcraft, and everything related to it, from the point of view of the literature. All the best to me and hope to realize my witch explorer potential!

Yours Sincerely,
Witchcraft and Literature