In Defense of Witches: The Legacy of the Witch Hunts and Why Women Are Still on Trial

Renowned French feminist Mona Chollet celebrates the witch as a symbol of female resistance and independence against patriarchy and persecution in her book In Defense of Witches.

As feminist symbols, pagans, and villains from fairy tales, witches continue to arouse a special curiosity even centuries after the tragic witch hunts that swept over Europe and America. Witches are the ultimate downtrodden as well as the obstinate, elusive rebel. But who were these women who were accused of witchcraft, often to their death? Which kinds of women have been suppressed, erased, and censored for centuries?

Famous feminist author Mona Chollet examines three different categories of women who faced accusations of witchcraft: the independent woman, since widows and celibates were primarily targeted; the childless woman, since those who claimed to control their fertility were no longer tolerated during the hunts; and the elderly woman, who has always been viewed with at best sympathy and at worst horror. Chollet thinks that these women are still subjected to harassment and oppression after examining contemporary culture. The persecution of witches is not only a historical incident; rather, it serves as a symbol of society's apparently pervasive sexism, since women today are descended directly from those who were persecuted and slaughtered for their beliefs and deeds.

In Defense of Witches aims to bring together the mythological image of the witch with contemporary women who live their lives according to their own terms via ferocious writing and arguments that span from the intellectual to the cultural.