44 pages • 1 hour read
BromSlewfoot: A Tale of Bewitchery
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2021A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
Chimeric Bodies
Chimeras—beings that are half-animal, half-human—abound in Slewfoot. The wildfolk all have the bodies of animals but the faces of children; Mamunappeht has the body of a man with skin “made up of tiny bumps and scales” (202); and Martha, after being cured, has a vision of Abitha as an angel with horns. It is Abitha who undergoes the novel’s primary chimeric transformation: By ingesting Samson’s blood, Abitha loses her purely human form and gains a goat’s legs along with pupils that are “slits, like some wild beast, only filled with hatred, all but gleaming with venom” (269). The many chimeric bodies in Slewfoot are part of the novel’s horror; they call into question the very boundaries that humans use to differentiate themselves from animals, hence underpinning the novel’s exploration of The Relationship Between Humanity and Nature.
Abitha’s movement toward becoming a chimera mirrors her descent toward the need for revenge. Samson warns Abitha when she takes his blood that “[i]f you walk with the beast you become the beast” (261). Her need for vengeance can only be sated by taking on her chimeric body and using that body to enact the violence she craves. In this way, the chimeric body represents the eruption of the base, animal instincts that humanity tries, but often fails, to keep at bay. Furthermore, her choice suggests that it is sometimes necessary to surface these instincts in order to deal with damaging, oppressive systems.
Abitha’s Braids of Hair
Abitha has only one of her mother’s possessions still with her, “woven loops of braids” of hair belonging to her mother and grandmother (69). Abitha goes back to these braids whenever she is in trouble and needs to access memories of her foremothers’ folk magic. She touches the hair before figuring out how to protect her home from dark magic, and again when she needs to remember the cure for Martha’s measles. In the early stages of the novel, the braids of hair represent matrilineal knowledge, which is passed not through the written word, which would be subject to male gatekeeping, but in secret through intimate, familial, and communally-built connections.
Abitha’s braids are destroyed by her captors in the climactic moments of her imprisonment. The men don’t ask her what the hair is; they simply immediately assume that it is witchcraft even though it is, ironically, the one charm associated with Abitha that doesn’t directly produce magical effects. The destruction of Abitha’s braids speaks to the ways in which patriarchal communities monitor, censor, and obliterate female knowledge and community. By the end of the novel, Abitha is able to forge a connection with the Earth Mother after destroying Sutton, but the connection to her biological mother is forever lost.
The Pawpaw Tree
The Pawpaw Tree, “a large tree with brilliant crimson leaves” and “dozens of egg-shaped fruits dangling from its branches” (304), is the motivating concern for the wildfolk. They insist that Samson must become the slayer again in order to protect it from humanity, and they use its fruit in order to revitalize him. When Forest confesses the full truth of his history with Samson, he reveals that Pawpaw was at the heart of the spell that transformed Samson from docile protector to bloodthirsty slayer. The wildfolk gathered before it, fed it their blood, and used its fruit to complete the spell. When Samson wasn’t able to defeat Mamunappeht, Mother Earth burned Pawpaw with lightning. The Pawpaw embodies the struggle of the wildfolk, as well as the possibility of their rebirth and survival.
The Pawpaw Tree is an ambiguous symbol of the natural world. On one hand, it is the figurehead of Mother Earth and the wildfolks’ wilderness; it conjures images of Yggdrasil (a sacred tree in Old Norse cosmology) and similar “tree of life” symbols from various mythologies. On the other, though, Pawpaw is a death-focused symbol, with its blood-red leaves and appetite for its adherents’ flesh. Even the egg-shaped fruit of Pawpaw is a strangely alien feature that distances the tree from other growth native to this region. Pawpaw emerges at the very end of the novel when Samson solidifies his dual role as slayer/shepherd by sacrificing Ansel at the base of the tree. Like Samson, Pawpaw has a dual role: It feeds on death in order to produce life, acting as the embodiment of both destruction and rebirth. In this way, Pawpaw symbolizes the interlocking vibrance and brutality that marks this land.
