{"id":388,"date":"2006-11-04T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-01-04T23:37:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/?p=388"},"modified":"2024-12-31T12:52:31","modified_gmt":"2024-12-30T23:52:31","slug":"the-last-witchfinder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/2006\/11\/04\/the-last-witchfinder\/","title":{"rendered":"The Last Witchfinder"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-large-font-size\"><strong>James Morrow<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-large-font-size\"><em>Harper Collins<\/em><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-medium-font-size\">Otago Daily Times, November 4th 2006<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\"><em>The Last Witchfinder<\/em> begins in a promising manner, with its author introducing itself as none other than Newton\u2019s Principia, working through the subconscious of James Morrow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">As the <em>Principia<\/em> tells us, <em>\u201cOur human scribes remain entirely ignorant of their possession by bibliographic forces.\u201d<\/em> (I bet you didn\u2019t know that <em>Mein Kampf <\/em>was responsible for most of the Hallmark cards from 1958 to 1976, or that Waiting for Godot writes Windows software documentation; think about it).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">In appropriately florid style, Newton\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">Isobel, a proponent of natural philosophy, is much enamoured of Newton\u2019s newly published Principia. Convinced that Satan acts by manipulating natural forces, she and her willing pupils, Jennet and the vicar\u2019s daughter Elinor, embark on a series of scientific experiments to find empirical proof of demonic influence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">No such proof is to be found, but Isobel\u2019s 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\u2019s father.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">In response, Jennet devotes her life to eradicating the vile practice of witch-hunting, by exposing it to the purifying light of scientific reason.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">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\u2019s footsteps \u2014 aided and abetted by certain Abigail Williams (late of Salem) \u2014 and the final showdown sees Jennet facing them both in a trial for her life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">All this is related in a sprawling narrative that reminded me of Neal Stephenson\u2019s <em>Baroque<\/em> Trilogy (which I now suspect was written by Leibniz\u2019s <em>Hypothesis Physica Nova<\/em>), but lacking the intricate layering that sustained the latter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\"><em>The Last Witchfinder<\/em> is certainly a rollicking yarn, but one that is constantly diverted rather than diverting. Enjoyable, yes, but I can\u2019t help feeling that more would have come from 300 pages less.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>James Morrow<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p>Otago Daily Times review November 4th 2006<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[47,370,59,18,407],"class_list":["post-388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-book-reviews","tag-47","tag-fiction","tag-james-morrow","tag-odt","tag-speculative-sci-fi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=388"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1366,"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388\/revisions\/1366"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}