List of female witches and sorceresses in SF
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Witches and sorceresses are people with magical powers, usually gendered female. They may be distinguished from gendered male terms ("wizard" or "sorcerer") or distinguished by type of magic ("hedgewitch", "trained wizard").
"Witch" is sometimes used to describe anyone with power, or women who don't fit the mold for how they live. For instance, in science fantasy, people with apparently scientifically explained psychic powers may be described as witches by a primitive society that doesn't understand the source or scientific nature of the power. "Witch" may also be used as a euphemism for "bitch" or used to describe any older or single woman.
Witch may carry a connotation of someone who has powers on their own, or gets their powers from some supernatural source ("the devil"). Sorceress may carry a connotation of someone who has been trained to use magic, or "sorcery".
In some depictions, witches are not human but another human-like race, like vampires; e.g., Black Blood. It is also common for characters with powers from some other source to be considered or described as "witches", e.g., River Tam who had psychic powers from government experimentation was almost burned at the stake as a witch in one episode.
List of witches
- Bellatrix Lestrange in Harry Potter series
- Miss Hardbroom in Jill Murphy's The Worst Witch series.
- Mildred Hubble in Jill Murphy's The Worst Witch series.
- Elphaba in Wicked
- Wicked Witch of the West in The Wizard of Oz
- Mother of all Witches
- Medea
List of works featuring witches & sorceresses
- Marion Zimmer Bradley.
- Brian Daley, The Doomfarers of Coromande and sequel - a kick-ass sorceress, who does commune with dark powers but is sympathetic nonetheless; interesting with eternal sorceress and her normal-lived offspring
- Diane Duane. So You Want to Be a Wizard and sequels feature protagonist Nita, and later her younger sister as wizards in this YA series
- David Eddings. Polgara in the Belgariad series.
- Ellen Galford. The Fires of Bride
- Elizabeth Hand. Waking the Moon.
- Marie Jakober. The Black Chalice (2000)
- Graham Joyce. Dark Sister (1999) [suburban housewife becomes a witch]
- Peg Kerr. The Wild Swans (1999) - AIDS story & retelling of old fairy tale. With real witches, and real witch-hunts, although not of real witches.
- Melissa Kwasny. Modern Daughters and the Outlaw West (Spinsters Book, San Francisco, 1990). A small Wyoming town is infested with quirky lesbians, ghosts, and politics. The witchery is subtle, practical, perhaps even spiritual ... Although it does break out into the open occasionally.
- Fritz Leiber. Conjure Wife (1943) (Secret society of, well, probably all women, are witches who really determine the success or failure of the men. Creepy & well-written.)
- Gregory Maguire. Wicked (Oz retelling from the point of view of the "wicked" witch)
- Rebecca Ore. Slow Funeral
- Rachel Pollack. Godmother Night
- Anne Rice. The Witching Hour ("witches" are people with the psychic ability to commune with or control spirits)
- Diana Rivers. Daughters of the Great Star.
- The Hadra
- H. C. Turk Black Body (witches are another species)
- John Updike. The Witches of Eastwick. I wouldn't really call this feminist per se, but it's lots of fun and there are memorable female characters who are sexual beings and have some feminist concerns.
- Sylvia Townsend Warner, 1893-1978. Lolly Willowes or, The Loving Huntsman (1925) - a middle-aged English spinster accepts Satan in this amusing and engrossing work ... Highly recommended. (witches are spinsters who may or may not have relations with saturnine visitors)
Anthologies
- Shahrukh Husain, editor. Daughters of the Moon: Witch Tales From Around the World. (illustrated by Liane Payne). Boston, London: Faber & Faber, 1993.
- Shahrukh Husain, editor, The Virago Book of Witches (1994)
- Susan M. Shwartz, editor. Hecate's Cauldron
- Witches, edited by Isaac Asimov , Martin H. Greenberg , Charles G. Waugh. (1984)
- 9 "Introduction: Witches" (1984) essay by Isaac Asimov
- 12 "My Mother Was a Witch" (1966) shortstory by William Tenn
- 18 "A Message From Charity" (1967) shortstory by William M. Lee
- 37 "The Witch" (1943) novelette by A. E. van Vogt
- 58 "The Witches of Karres" (1949) novelette by James H. Schmitz
- 99 "Spree" (1984) shortstory by Barry N. Malzberg
- 107 "Devil's Henchman" (1952) shortstory by Murray Leinster
- 121 "Malice in Wonderland" (1957) novelette by Rufus King
- 140 "Operation Salamander" [Afreet] (1957) novelette by Poul Anderson
- 166 "Wizard's World" (1967) novella by Andre Norton
- 212 "Sweets to the Sweet" (1947) shortstory by Robert Bloch
- 221 "Poor Little Saturday" (1956) shortstory by Madeleine L'Engle
- 236 "Squeakie's First Case" (1943) novelette by Margaret Manners
- 258 "The Ipswich Phial" [Lord Darcy] (1976) novelette by Randall Garrett
- 303 "Black Heart and White Heart" (1896) novella by H. Rider Haggard
Movies
Many, many movies. But a few notable ones:
- "Bell Book and Candle" (1958) Kim Novak & her family are Manhattan witches. "Bewitched" the TV series took a lot of cues from this story initially.
- "The Witches of Eastwick" (1987) with an excellent cast (Susan Sarandon, Michelle Pfeiffer, Cher, Veronica Cartwright, and Jack Nicholson as, perhaps, the Devil).
- "The Wizard of Oz" (1939), featuring both "wicked" and "good" witches.
Television series
- "Bewitched" (1960s TV series featuring a surburban housewife witch, as well as her mother, who is more of a conventional witch and less of a conventional suburban in-law). This series is often discussed as a metaphor for gay people living in the 1960s suburbs
- "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" (1997-2003 TV series) -- numerous witches, particularly Willow and Tara.