MAGIC MAKES THE WORLD GO ROUND
Lydia Bell
Sabrina the Teenage Witch. Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Charmed. Do we need more popular representations of the cosmic realms of girl power? Apparently so, for piling on the shelves Australia-wide this month is Life's a Witch: A Handbook for Teen Witches.
Gone are the eye of newt death-prophesiers and hairy hags. Only the blonde, aromatherapised derivative is left. Dumbed-down, kick-boxing, well-waxed and sweet-smelling: couldn't tell a broomstick from a toboggan.
Television presenter and former pop singer Fiona Horne puts me right on that, as well as a few other things, such as how to feed frozen rats to 2.5m pet coastal carpet pythons (when you're basically a vegetarian.)
Witchcraft is not just something to dabble in or a cool affectation, but a lifestyle choice and taking control, a rejection of mainstream religions that have been foisted on teenagers by well-meaning parents.
"Teens are growing up fast, increasingly forced to compete in an adult world, as marketing and advertising - especially of a sexual nature - is geared towards them in an attempt to manipulate and control their attitudes." Horne says.
"With this pressure on them, they need to establish a personal identity, and those (who) are getting past that vague dabbling interest are finding it very rewarding because it's answering the questions they're asking about their lives."
The running joke of witchcraft, according to Horne, is that a lot of witches are former Catholics, young girls who have shaken off a Catholic upbringing they find incompatible with their fledging womanhood: "That there can only be a god; that woman are inherently unclean and evil because we ate the apple in the garden of Eden; that in life you have to be really careful, because you'll go to hell. The emphasis is placed on fear and pain, guilt and torture, and suffering."
Blimey.
Conversely, witchcraft embraces nature and rejuvenation: "Even entering a church, and looking at the images of Jesus being tortured on the cross, I found it not at all reassuring but quite macabre." She says.
Witchcraft accepts all of life's larger facts: death, destruction, decay, birth and renewal.
"Most witches are Darwinists in that we believe we evolved of this planet," says Horne.
"We can feel the power of this planet within us as well as outside us, so we work with the energies of air, earth, fire and water, which we believe are the essential components of natural power."
There's also the technology backlash factor. The overriding acknowledgment that we are natural biological creatures is for teenagers a relief in a Playstation world.
'It's reassuring; they're brought to understand their bodies are not essentially unclean, that there's nothing wrong with sexuality - nothing to be scared or ashamed about. It's a natural wonderful element of being alive,' says Horne.
Basic tenets of Wicca (modern witchcraft) are "that if you harm none, do what you will" and "as you sow so shall you reap". Recognising the responsibility of your actions as a witch is part of being cognisant that everything is interconnected, Horne believes. "Nothing is a coincidence. A tragic event like the death of a loved one or great personal loss is not seen as a futility but a lesson."
Black magic is not worth mentioning in the same sentence, as far as Horne is concerned. But witchcraft does recognise the validity of less attractive emotions such as "anger, hatred, fear… they're all valid emotions to be expressed and used in rituals as much as love and compassion", she says.
While Wicca takes morsels from Christianity - compassion, tolerance, unconditional love - Horne thinks it's more progressive.
"It's most valuable offering is that it's forgiving itself now, in a profound, fertile period of evolution. There's no one voice telling you the answers - they come from you and that's demanding," She says
Horne has joined the queue of those who are mad about Harry Potter. She observes that author Joanne Rowling, who mentions herbs and anagrams common in witchcraft, may be more of a witch than she really lets on.
"I really like Harry Potter because there's a dark side to it and I think that's really real. Shit happens and magic is an understanding of that," she says.
"It's just part of life. That's what is really healthy and responsible about witchcraft. You don't have to see it as something that will destroy you.
"As witches, girls understand that it's okay for relationships to end, that things don't always work out,"
And what cheeky spells has she been casting recently?
"It was flooding in London when I was there and I did a spell that I wouldn't get rained on and I didn't, not once. I did the same spell at the Caulfield Cup. Three minutes before the main race the rain stopped, the clouds parted, the sun shone on the track."
It's not all about impressing your mates with a bit of divine intervention,
though. "Witchcraft isn't something you do, it's something you are,"
says Horne. You go, goddess!