A Spell in the Wild

Alice Tarbuck
Two Roads

Witches loom large in our collective imagination. There are the fun witches: Sabrina, Bewitched’s 1960s housewitches and the uncanny, campy witches of Roald Dahl’s imagination. But witches have also become part of our rhetoric, especially since 2016. ‘We are the daughters of witches you couldn’t burn,’ proclaimed signs at the Women’s Marches on Donald Trump’s inauguration day, while the men accused of harassment during the #MeToo movement declared themselves to be the victims of a ‘witch hunt.’ Nearly five-hundred years since the European witch trials—when an estimated 50,000 women were killed—the witch remains a political figure, a symbol of power and victimhood, that still resonates today.

While a book exploring the intersection of witches and feminism isn’t particularly original, Alice Tarbuck’s A Spell in the Wild: A Year (and Six Centuries) of Magic is a down-to-earth, do-it-yourself, introduction to witchcraft. Tarbuck herself is a witch and her book is broken into twelve chapters, each one ending with a spell to try at home. The chapters are named after a month and explore something witch-related that’s connected to the time of year. In October, the history of Hallowe’en—or rather Samhaim—is the topic, while December explores Christmas’ Celtic roots, and June is about the magic of Midsummer. 

Tarbuck dives into the historical and cultural significance of the witch in each chapter. ‘When we walk in the world as witches, we make a statement,’ she writes, exploring the witch’s anti-establishment and anti-patriarchal roots. At the same time, Tarbuck offers up personal anecdotes and meditations, and her refreshing vulnerability is the throughline of the book. Tarbuck doesn’t care if you’re a witch or not, rather wanting to show how witchcraft is a perspective on the world.

A Spell in the Wild can be read as a nature book as much as a history of witches or memoir. Chapters focus on ecological concerns: our place in the landscape, the fetishization of rural spaces, the climate crisis. Witches are connected to the natural world, Tarbuck explains, but even those of us who aren’t witches (yet) can relate to this tie to nature, whether we’re city people or rural dwellers.

Tarbuck’s writing is wonderfully grounded, and although she’s not afraid to get lyrical, she’s also realistic—about city life, sex, money and mental health. As serious as Tarbuck takes her craft, A Spell in the Wild is also playful and self-aware—about how outsiders see witches and the need to provide an intersectional overview of witchcraft, that considers gender, sexuality, race, class and looking beyond a Western lens. Tarbuck presents the thoroughly modern witch and A Spell in the Wild is a perfect primer for anyone who wants to get to know her.

—Katie Goh