Author Links Historic Witch Hunts to Modern Gender and Environmental Issues

During a visit to Fibershed, a regenerative farming collective in California, author Lucianne Tonti was struck by a setting that felt reminiscent of a spell-casting circle, prompting her to explore the visual overlap between women’s traditional labor tools and witch symbols. Her research led to a deep dive into the witch hunts that spanned the 15th to 18th centuries, a time she says laid the groundwork for capitalist exploitation of both women and nature.

Good Witch is organized into five sections—Gardener, Gossip, Spinster, Healer and Nymph—each recounting specific trials from places such as the Norwegian coast, English woods and New England, highlighting how outspoken or unconventional women were punished. Tonti connects the scientific rationalism of figures like Francis Bacon and James I with a shift toward viewing the world as a profit-driven machine, marginalising communal land use and female agency.

She links these historic patterns to present-day gendered violence, citing recent Australian statistics, and to modern political movements that vilify immigrants and restrict reproductive rights, referencing leaders like Pauline Hanson. The book ends with an optimistic appeal to honor the resilience of accused witches and to revive collaborative, caring practices as tools for societal transformation.