This post was written as a Master's course assignment for Texas Woman's University.
1. BIBLIOGRAPHY
Hemphill, Stephanie. 2010. WICKED GIRLS. New York, NY: Balzer & Bray, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. ISBN 9780061853289.
2. BOOK SUMMARY
This fictional account of young girls involved with the Salem witch trials of 1692 is based on the real women that lived in Salem during that time. The story is written in verse, with each poem switching between the perspectives of the main girls: Ann, Margaret, Mercy. This characters are fiction, but the trials that happened in Salem were very real, and this book serves as a haunting reminder of the strange happenings, the accusations, and the deaths that occurred during the witch trials.
We meet Ann and her cousin Margaret, young women of stature who are among main group of young women who "see" the witches and their work. Mercy, the house servant for Ann's home, is also highly involved in the disturbances and the finger pointing. The language used in the book is speckled with words from the time: "thee," "ye," and "I be..." The girls play at "fortune telling" with egg whites, and the hysteria begins slowly, grinding, gathering momentum as the accusations start, and bringing the witch hunt to full throttle.
The descriptions of being "pricked" by a witch leave the reader wondering, at first, if the tormenting is possibly real. Ann says: "Someone makes my legs/whip about like sheets in the wind" (p.58). Meanwhile, Margaret is in hot pursuit (and is pursued, herself) with Isaac, her emotions wildly rising as she sneaks away to meet with him: "His eyes catch on me/like he be holding lightly/my face with his hand" (p.26). Margaret, and most other girls in town, becomes extremely jealous of the blonde beauty, Mercy, who works as a servant, but seems to have higher expectations of her place in society.
Betty, Abigail, Elizabeth, and Susannah also play roles in the rising hysteria, acting out their spasms, screaming, and writhing on the floor with the rest of the girls. Mercy sees that Ann is not entirely consumed by something outside of herself: "But [Ann's] eyes blaze/They bid me,/Come into the madness, Mercy" (pg. 75). The first mention of AFFLICTION (pg.89) affirms the seriousness of the girls' actions, especially when the society elders and leaders listen quite seriously and closely to their words, taking them at face value. Playing with their new power, the hunt marches terribly on, until the girls, one by one, begin to realize what they have truly done.
The author's details, especially sounds and smells, are pungent and memorable: "While whirling high above us/the wind screams/wild lashings/across the leaves" (pg. 131). The free verse poems move quickly over the pages, from one girl's mind to the next, carrying the dialogue. The author's note at the end of the book explains her motivation for writing this novel, and gives historical background about the true young women involved and the outcome of the witch trials in Salem.
3. POEM HIGHLIGHT
The poem I would like to highlight, SHADOWS IN THE SUN (pg. 224), from this hair-raising collection, falls almost in the center of the story, and gives a good indication of the emotional temperature of Salem. As an educational follow-up activity, I would gather other scary stories about witches and ghosts, and have the students share their favorites aloud. We would conclude with a brief writing exercise about what they think really happened during the Salem witch trials, and how the students themselves would have reacted, had they been alive at that time.
SHADOWS IN THE SUN
July 1692
Hot, stuffed in skirts
and screaming "Witch!"
some of us girls point fingers
from positions of sunlight,
others of us hide
under a parasol of leaves.
Sisters all, we choir a cacophony
of caws together.
None in the Village dare step
on the shadows we forge,
lest their name
be next proclaimed.
For as evening approaches
and heat subsides
our elders shrivel and shrink,
and we girls
grow spine tall.
By Stephanie Hemphill
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