This article needs additional citations for verification .(January 2024) |
Esmerelda Weatherwax | |
---|---|
Discworld character | |
First appearance | Equal Rites (1987) |
Last appearance | The Shepherd's Crown (2015) |
Created by | Terry Pratchett |
Voiced by | Annette Crosbie Sheila Hancock |
In-universe information | |
Occupation | Witch |
Affiliation | |
Home | Lancre |
Esmerelda "Esme" Weatherwax (also Granny Weatherwax or Mistress Weatherwax) is a fictional character from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. She is a witch and member of the Lancre coven. She is the self-appointed guardian of her small country, and frequently defends it against supernatural powers. She is one of the Discworld series's main protagonists, having major roles in seven novels.
She is a very powerful witch, and is reckoned to be more powerful than the most well-known witch on the Discworld, Black Aliss. Granny says in Lords and Ladies that she "learned my craft from Nanny Gripes, who learned it from Goody Heggety, who got it from Nanna Plumb, who was taught it by Black Aliss". The witches of the Lancre coven reflect the roles of Maiden, Mother, and Crone, with Granny being most associated with the Crone (tactfully referred to as "the other one").
Due to her prowess, Granny Weatherwax is first among equals of the Ramtops witches: "Witches are not by nature gregarious, at least with other witches, and they certainly don't have leaders. Granny Weatherwax was the most highly-regarded of the leaders they didn't have." In Wyrd Sisters , the ghost of the King of Lancre addresses her as " Doyenne of Witches" ("Senior Lady of Witches"). Granny Weatherwax's reputation extends to other species: the Trolls of the Ramtops call her "Aaoograha hoa" ("She Who Must Be Avoided"; mentioned in Maskerade ), the Dwarf call her "K'ez'rek d'b'duz" ("Go Around the Other Side of the Mountain"; also mentioned in Maskerade), and the Nac Mac Feegle call her "The Hag O' Hags" ("The High Witch").
According to Witches Abroad , Esmerelda "Esme" (later "Granny") Weatherwax is the younger of two daughters. Her father was a hunter who taught her that "a bad hunter chases, a good hunter waits" ( Lords and Ladies ). Little is revealed about her mother except that she had a long illness and Esme nursed her until her death.
Magical ability runs in the Weatherwax family; a distant cousin, the wizard Galder Weatherwax, is Archchancellor of Unseen University at the time of The Light Fantastic . When Esme was a child, her older sister Lily began misusing magic and behaving in a "wanton" and "wilful" manner. Lily left home as a teenager and never returned to Lancre.
By the time Esme reached her teens, she was determined to become a witch. She occasionally struggles with temptation to become a "wicked witch", but also feels obligated to be "the good one" to balance her sister. In Lords and Ladies she reveals that she was not chosen as an apprentice by an established witch, but "camped on old Nanny Gripes' garden until she promised to tell me everything she knew. Hah. That took her a week and I had the afternoons free... No I chose..."). As a young woman, Esme was involved in a summer-long romance with student wizard Mustrum Ridcully, but ultimately they were both committed to their respective paths of witchcraft and wizardry. She was also acquainted with Gytha Ogg, who is about the same age, although their friendship does not develop until they are older. Esme eventually became the witch for village of Bad Ass and the Kingdom of Lancre as a whole.
Granny, as she comes to be known, is in her 70s or 80s during the events of Wyrd Sisters , Witches Abroad , Lords and Ladies , Maskerade and Carpe Jugulum . She dies quietly at home at the beginning of the final Discworld novel, The Shepherd's Crown . When Death comes for her, he tells her that her candle will continue to flicker long after her passing and that she has left the world in a better condition than it was when she entered it. Author Neil Gaiman, a friend of Pratchett's, has said that Pratchett died before writing a scene he had intended for the ending of The Shepherd's Crown. According to Gaiman, this would have revealed that Granny's spirit had lingered to watch over her young successor Tiffany Aching, and that when she did finally depart with Death it was on her own terms. [1]
Granny Weatherwax has striking blue eyes and a penetrating gaze, a hooked nose, and a determined set to her jaw. In Equal Rites she is described as "handsome", having an excellent complexion, no warts, and all her teeth, although it is implied she finds this a bit inappropriate for a witch. Granny is thin, mentioning in Lords and Ladies that she weighs 9 stone (130 lb), and is described as being taller than Nanny Ogg and Magrat.
She typically wears a plain black dress, a somewhat battered black cloak (occasionally lined with dark red) and a tall, pointed witch's hat, skewered to her "iron-hard grey bun" hairstyle with multiple hatpins. Her broom is a hand-me-down from another witch, Hilta ( Equal Rites ), and has been repaired many times. Due to its age, it requires the user to pick up speed by running along the ground before taking off.
Granny Weatherwax has a near-unshakeable, and usually accurate, belief in her own abilities. She believes in doing what is right rather than what is easy or even what seems "nice". Granny appreciates practicality and hard work, and distrusts fiction and theater because of their powerful influence on people's minds.
The journal Gender Forum has posited that Granny Weatherwax bears some similarity to Sam Vimes and Death. [2] All three are effectively 'good' characters, who exert a rigid control over the darkness inside themselves, which they secretly fear but (crucially to their characters) are able to conquer.
According to The Pratchett Portfolio Granny's typical saying is: "I can't be having with that kind of thing".
Granny is adept at 'Borrowing', the art of overlaying her mind on the mind of another creature so that she can see through its eyes and steer its actions. She can sense the moods of plants, animals, and even places such as the Kingdom of Lancre and Unseen University. While Borrowing, her body falls into a deathlike trance; it is revealed in Lords And Ladies that in order to prevent embarrassing accidents, she has taken to wearing a placard reading "I ATE'NT DEAD" when she does so (when she actually died, she edited this placard to state "I IS PROBLY DEAD", with 'ATE'NT' scratched out).
Although capable of powerful magic, Granny Weatherwax prefers to avoid using it. She often relies on headology, a sort of folk-psychology that makes use of the placebo and nocebo effects. For instance, although Granny is capable of placing curses upon people who anger her, she will instead simply allow them to believe that she has cursed them. This causes the "cursed" person to worry and attribute any misfortune they experience to the "curse". Nanny Ogg has implied that this avoidance of magic prevents Granny from being tempted into becoming a very successful "bad" witch. In The Sea and Little Fishes, Nanny Ogg attributes Granny's magical abilities more to hard work than innate talent.
Because of her reluctance to openly use magic, Granny Weatherwax is sometimes accused by others of "working by trickery alone", and of "having little or no real power". Yet when the need arises, Granny Weatherwax has demonstrated skills such as psychokinesis (Lords and Ladies) and pyrokinesis (The Sea and Little Fishes). In Wyrd Sisters she sends the entire nation of Lancre forward in time fifteen years to allow the lost heir to come of age.
Granny Weatherwax is one of Terry Pratchett's most prolific recurring characters. She is a major character in six Discworld novels ( Equal Rites , Wyrd Sisters , Witches Abroad , Lords and Ladies , Maskerade and Carpe Jugulum ) and the short story The Sea and Little Fishes , and a supporting character in the five Tiffany Aching books ( Wee Free Men , A Hat Full of Sky , Wintersmith , I Shall Wear Midnight , and The Shepherd's Crown ). She is referred to in three other Discworld novels, Mort , Thief of Time , and Going Postal , and appears in The Science of Discworld II: The Globe .
A. S. Byatt considered that Granny "became more and more complex" as she appeared in more novels, [3] while National Public Radio considered her an "iconic" character and "one of [Pratchett]'s clear favorites". [4]
In the Wyrd Sisters animated adaptation, Granny Weatherwax was voiced by Annette Crosbie and in the BBC Radio 4 dramatisation she was played by Sheila Hancock.
A fossil species of Mesozoic ginkgo has been named Ginkgoites weatherwaxiae in Granny Weatherwax's honour. [5]
Wyrd Sisters is Terry Pratchett's sixth Discworld novel, published in 1988. It re-introduces Granny Weatherwax of Equal Rites.
Stephen Briggs is a British writer of subsidiary works and merchandise surrounding Terry Pratchett's comic fantasy Discworld. The Streets of Ankh-Morpork, the first Discworld map, was co-designed by Briggs and Pratchett and painted by Stephen Player in 1993. This was followed by The Discworld Mapp (1995), also painted by Stephen Player, and A Tourist Guide to Lancre (1998), painted by Paul Kidby.
A major subset of the Discworld novels of Terry Pratchett involves the witches of Lancre. The three main witches introduced in 1988's Wyrd Sisters—crone Esme Weatherwax, mother Nanny Ogg and maiden Magrat Garlick—are a spoof on the Three Witches in Shakespeare's Macbeth, and a tongue-in-cheek reinterpretation of the Neopagans' Triple Goddess. The three witches are portrayed as more sensible and realistic than the often-foolish residents of the Discworld, and Granny Weatherwax "especially tends to give voice to the major themes of Pratchett's work."
Maskerade is a fantasy novel by British writer Terry Pratchett, the eighteenth book in the Discworld series. The witches Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg visit the Ankh-Morpork Opera House to find Agnes Nitt, a girl from Lancre, and get caught up in a story similar to The Phantom of the Opera.
Gytha Ogg is a character from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. She is a witch and a member of the Lancre Coven. Gytha is known for her practical approach to magic and her no-nonsense attitude. She is also renowned for her culinary skills and is an excellent cook. Gytha Ogg is often depicted as a strong, capable, and independent character, with a sharp sense of humor. She frequently appears in the Discworld series, particularly in the books featuring the Lancre witches.
Witches Abroad is the twelfth Discworld novel by Terry Pratchett, originally published in 1991.
Lords and Ladies is a fantasy novel by British writer Terry Pratchett, the fourteenth Discworld book. It was originally published in 1992. Some parts of the storyline spoof elements of Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream.
A Hat Full of Sky is a comic fantasy novel by British writer Terry Pratchett, set on the Discworld and written with younger readers in mind. It is labelled a "Story of Discworld" to indicate its status as children's or young adult fiction, unlike most of the books in the Discworld series. First published in 2004, the book is set two years after The Wee Free Men, and features an 11-year-old Tiffany Aching.
Carpe Jugulum is a comic fantasy novel by English writer Terry Pratchett, the twenty-third in the Discworld series. It was first published in 1998.
Tiffany Aching is a fictional character in Terry Pratchett's satirical Discworld series of fantasy novels. Her name in Nac Mac Feegle is Tir-far-thóinn or 'Land Under Wave'.
The Discworld is the fictional setting for all of Terry Pratchett's Discworld fantasy novels. It consists of a large disc resting on the backs of four huge elephants which are standing on the back of an enormous turtle, named Great A'Tuin as it slowly swims through space. Magic is an everyday feature of life on Discworld, whilst even science has unearthly qualities. The similarities to Planet Earth only exacerbate the strangeness of Discworld itself.
Wintersmith is a comic fantasy novel by British writer Terry Pratchett, set in the Discworld and written with younger readers in mind. It is labelled a "Story of Discworld" to indicate its status as children's or young adult fiction, unlike most of the books in the Discworld series. Published on 21 September 2006, it is the third novel in the series to feature the character of Tiffany Aching. It received recognition as a 2007 Best Book for Young Adults from the American Library Association.
The Sea and Little Fishes is a short story by Terry Pratchett, written in 1998. It is set in his Discworld universe, and features Lancre witches Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg. It was originally published in a sampler alongside a story called "The Wood Boy" by Raymond E. Feist, and later in a collection called Legends.
A Tourist Guide To Lancre is the third book in the Discworld Mapp series, published in January 1998, and the first to be illustrated by Paul Kidby. As with the other maps, the basic design and booklet were compiled by Terry Pratchett and Stephen Briggs.
The Discworld Diaries are a series of themed diaries based on the Discworld novels by Terry Pratchett. Each one is based on an Ankh-Morpork institution, and has an opening section containing information about that institution written by Pratchett and Stephen Briggs.
Wyrd Sisters is a six-part animated television adaptation of the book of the same name by Terry Pratchett, produced by Cosgrove Hall Films, and first broadcast on 18 May 1997. It was the second film adaptation of an entire Discworld novel.
Discworld is a comic fantasy book series written by the English author Terry Pratchett, set on the Discworld, a flat planet balanced on the backs of four elephants which in turn stand on the back of a giant turtle. The series began in 1983 with The Colour of Magic and continued until the final novel The Shepherd's Crown, which was published in 2015, following Pratchett's death. The books frequently parody or take inspiration from classic works, usually fantasy or science fiction, as well as mythology, folklore and fairy tales, and often use them for satirical parallels with cultural, political and scientific issues.
In the fictional world of Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of novels, the Nac Mac Feegle are a type of fairy folk. They appear in the novels Carpe Jugulum, The Wee Free Men, A Hat Full of Sky, Wintersmith, I Shall Wear Midnight, Snuff and The Shepherd's Crown. At six inches tall, they are seen as occasionally helpful thieves and pests.
The Shepherd's Crown is a comic fantasy novel, the last book written by Terry Pratchett before his death in March 2015. It is the 41st novel in the Discworld series, and the fifth based on the character Tiffany Aching. It was published in the United Kingdom on 27 August 2015 by Penguin Random House publishers, and in the United States on 1 September 2015.
Tiffany Aching’s Guide to Being a Witch is a guide to witchcraft written from the in-world perspective of Discworld character Tiffany Aching, with annotations from other characters from the Discworld novels including the witches Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg.