The Witches

The witches subvert unequal gender norms that often apply to women. The narrator says real witches “dress in ordinary clothes and look very much like ordinary women” (9). Witches use the appearance of women as a disguise—“what makes her doubly dangerous is the fact that she doesn’t look dangerous” (11). In other words, witches appear as normal women because society doesn’t think that women pose a threat. In her legal memoir, Bad Lawyer (Grand Central Publishing, 2021), the writer and cultural critic Anna Dorn says, concerning women: “The only role we are entitled to play is the victim; this is the role we’ve always played” (unpaginated). The witches use society’s misogynistic idea of women to their advantage.

The narrator declares: “A witch never gets caught” (11). Their spotless record relates to their apparent gender. Society doesn’t suspect them because people regularly underestimate women. They don’t think women can be something else—something powerful or predatorial like witches. The witches manipulate sexist gender norms to hide their identities. They’re beyond gender—they “are not actually women at all” (32).

Grandmamma destabilizes gender norms. She smokes cigars like a powerful man, stands up to men like the hotel manager and Mr.