The Witch

Johnston, Mary, 1870-1936Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.4

Word count: 597K words
Chapters: 60

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.The Witch by Mary JohnstonAuthor: Johnston, Mary, 1870-1936,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: Sep 21, 2016

Editor's review

Mary Johnston's The Witch is set against the seventeenth-century European witch hunts, placing individual lives within an era woven from faith, fear, and power. Its appeal lies not in sensationalism but in its portrait of people: how a woman accused of witchcraft navigates the gaze of her community, the authority of the church, and the suspicions of her neighbors, and how those around her turn on one another out of fear. Through delicate psychological insight and slowly built atmosphere, the author keeps the supernatural in suspense, leaving readers wavering between rational explanation and mysterious possibility. It suits readers interested in historical fiction and in questions of gender and persecution, and works well as a text for discussing how stigma takes shape. The pace is slow, weighted toward atmosphere and inner drama; those expecting fast-paced fantasy or a clearly defined magic system may find it unsatisfying.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers who enjoy historical fiction, especially set against European witch hunts
Readers interested in gender, stigma, and collective persecution
Readers who prefer psychological depth and atmosphere and can accept a slow pace
Teachers and students looking for material for classroom or book-club discussion

Not a good fit for

Readers seeking fast-paced plotting and intense action
Readers expecting a defined magic system or fantasy adventure

Reading tips

Start with some basic background on the seventeenth-century witch hunts; the main text will read more smoothly.
Pay attention to where the narrator leaves the supernatural unexplained, and revisit those passages after finishing the book.
Sketch a simple relationship map of the chain of accusations and suspicion in the community to discuss how stigma spreads.
After reading, compare with related historical sources to distinguish the novel's fiction from historical fact.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Does this novel have a clearly defined magic system?

There is no systematized magic. The book revolves around accusations of witchcraft, but the supernatural remains ambiguous; the narrative focuses more on psychology and community atmosphere, leaving readers to judge for themselves what is real and what is a projection of fear.

Can I understand it without knowing the history of witch hunts?

You can follow the story, but knowing the social background of seventeenth-century European witch hunts—religious conflict, neighborly denunciation, judicial and church authority—will make characters' motives and plot developments easier to grasp. It is worth spending a little time on background first.

Is it suitable for middle-school students?

The subject involves persecution, fear, and death, but there is no excessive gore, and the language is fairly literary. Suitability depends on students' reading patience and discussion guidance; it works well as a shared text on historical and ethical questions.

The pace is slow—what if I struggle to keep going?

Focus first on the central character's psychological arc, skim the atmospheric description, and hold on to the main thread of how the accusation builds step by step; an audiobook or a book-club read-along can also help sustain momentum through discussion.

Comments

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About the author

Johnston, Mary, 1870-1936 Author

Mary Johnston (Johnston, Mary, 1870-1936) was an American novelist, with 18 of her works held in this collection. Public information about her is limited, and many details of her life are difficult to verify, yet her fiction is fairly consistent in subject matter: she was skilled at narrative set against historical backgrounds, especially the society and fates of characters in colonial Virginia. Prisoners of Hope: A Tale of Colonial Virginia, By Order of the Company, and 1492 all draw on the early colonial and maritime era, while The Long Roll and Cease Firing concern the American Civil War. Her writing often uses love, loyalty, and conflict as threads, placing individual lives within large historical change; her plots move briskly and the atmosphere of the period is distinct. Representative works such as To Have and to Hold and Lewis Rand had some influence among readers of popular historical fiction at the time, making her one of the notable writers of early twentieth-century American historical romance.