The Last Witchfinder

James Morrow

Harper Collins

Otago Daily Times, November 4th 2006

The Last Witchfinder begins in a promising manner, with its author introducing itself as none other than Newton’s Principia, working through the subconscious of James Morrow.

As the Principia tells us, “Our human scribes remain entirely ignorant of their possession by bibliographic forces.” (I bet you didn’t know that Mein Kampf was responsible for most of the Hallmark cards from 1958 to 1976, or that Waiting for Godot writes Windows software documentation; think about it).

In appropriately florid style, Newton’s masterwork has produced a prolix tome detailing a key skirmish in the battle between science and superstition, with numerous other adventures thrown in along the way.

In 1688, young Jennet Stearn (daughter of the Witchfinder-General for Mercia and East Anglia) is left in the care of her Aunt Isobel while her father and brother, Dunstan, scour the countryside for witches.

Isobel, a proponent of natural philosophy, is much enamoured of Newton’s newly published Principia. Convinced that Satan acts by manipulating natural forces, she and her willing pupils, Jennet and the vicar’s daughter Elinor, embark on a series of scientific experiments to find empirical proof of demonic influence.

No such proof is to be found, but Isobel’s investigations lead to her being cried out as a witch herself and burnt at the stake upon the order of her own brother-in-law, Jennet’s father.

In response, Jennet devotes her life to eradicating the vile practice of witch-hunting, by exposing it to the purifying light of scientific reason.

Along the way she encounters much adventure, spending years with an Indian tribe who kidnap her as a trophy wife, shipwrecked on a desert island with her lover, Benjamin Franklin. Meanwhile, Dunstan has continued in his father’s footsteps — aided and abetted by certain Abigail Williams (late of Salem) — and the final showdown sees Jennet facing them both in a trial for her life.

All this is related in a sprawling narrative that reminded me of Neal Stephenson’s Baroque Trilogy (which I now suspect was written by Leibniz’s Hypothesis Physica Nova), but lacking the intricate layering that sustained the latter.

The Last Witchfinder is certainly a rollicking yarn, but one that is constantly diverted rather than diverting. Enjoyable, yes, but I can’t help feeling that more would have come from 300 pages less.