"Witchery is merely a word for what we are all capable of"
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“Witchery” lands here as a deliberate act of reframing: de Lint takes a loaded word - one historically used to police women, outsiders, and anyone who didn’t fit - and strips it of its prosecutorial sting. By calling it “merely a word,” he demotes witchcraft from taboo category to linguistic costume, a label society pins on behaviors it doesn’t want to admit are ordinary: intuition, influence, persuasion, pattern-reading, care-taking, rage, desire. The move is classic de Lint: urban fantasy as a civic argument that the “otherworldly” is less a separate realm than a way of seeing.
The second half of the sentence is the real provocation. “What we are all capable of” doesn’t just democratize magic; it implicates everyone. Capability suggests agency and responsibility, not ethereal gifts bestowed on a chosen few. The subtext is that enchantment is already embedded in daily life - in art that alters mood, in stories that reorganize values, in charisma that redirects a room, in the quiet power of attention. If witchery is common, then so is the ethical question: what are you doing with your influence?
Context matters because de Lint writes in a tradition that treats folklore as living infrastructure, not antique décor. In that lineage, reclaiming “witchery” is also a pushback against modern cynicism: a reminder that wonder isn’t childish, it’s a skill. The line works because it turns a scare word into a mirror.
The second half of the sentence is the real provocation. “What we are all capable of” doesn’t just democratize magic; it implicates everyone. Capability suggests agency and responsibility, not ethereal gifts bestowed on a chosen few. The subtext is that enchantment is already embedded in daily life - in art that alters mood, in stories that reorganize values, in charisma that redirects a room, in the quiet power of attention. If witchery is common, then so is the ethical question: what are you doing with your influence?
Context matters because de Lint writes in a tradition that treats folklore as living infrastructure, not antique décor. In that lineage, reclaiming “witchery” is also a pushback against modern cynicism: a reminder that wonder isn’t childish, it’s a skill. The line works because it turns a scare word into a mirror.
Quote Details
| Topic | Wisdom |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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