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The Grand High Witch of All The World or just The Grand High Witch is a title given to the leader of all witches according to Roald Dahl's 1983 book The Witches, in which she is the main antagonist. She is described as being "without mercy" and she travels all around the world summoning all the witches of whatever country she is in, giving congratulations or reprimands to them depending on how good she judges them at fulfilling their ultimate hobby: destroying children. She is said to own a money-making machine that leaves her no problem in travelling wherever she likes, or helping her lesser witches financially if she feels they need some assistance in their quest to eliminate all things juvenile.
Role in the story
Template:Spoiler The Grand High Witch appears fairly late in the story, but is mentioned quite early on by the unnamed narrator and protagonist's grandmother who is "a retired witchophile"- by which she means she knows a lot about witches and in her youth travelled around the world looking for them- above all The Grand High Witch, although she admits that she "never came close to succeeding" with her. She warns her grandson to be careful after he sees a witch himself when he is out in the garden, as it is implied (though never asserted) that her own last encounter with a witch attributed to the loss of her missing thumb. After falling ill, rather than return to her native Norway, she and her grandson decide to go on holiday to a nice hotel in Bournemouth- not knowing that all the witches of England, along with the Grand High Witch herself have booked it as well, as the narrator discovers to his horror when he goes to explore the place with his pet mice.
The Grand High Witch within this story is noted for being particularly intolerant and demanding. She claims to want all children in "Inkland" to be eliminated by the time of her next visit to the country the following year. When one brave (or foolish) witch points out the impossibility of such a thing, The Grand High Witch tauntingly versifies her impertinence and uselessness and promptly burns her to oblivion with magic that jumps from her eyes- a technique of execution that the narrator's grandmother later explains is known in the witches' community as "getting fried".
The Grand High Witch then goes on to explain that elimination of children will be easily done if all the witches set up trades as sweetshop owners. (One witch interprates this as meaning she wants the children to be poisoned and she looks as though she is about to "get fried" as well, but curiously she does not.) The Grand High Witch then recites to them ingredients of a potion that will turn anyone who consumes it into a mouse- a creature detested by so many that parents and teachers alike would be sure to exterminate them on sight, and thus render children to extinction. The witches (and the narrator) then witness a young boy, Bruno Jenkins, enter the room, whom the Grand High Witch fed a chocolate bar with potion in it the day before, which has been so timed that he will turn into a mouse after just a few seconds in the room- which is precisely what happens, so they know it works.
The witches, satisfied that they will indeed meet their leader's demands to destroy all children in England, are just about to leave when one of the witches then picks up the scent of the narrator of the story. They catch him, pour some more potion down his throat, and leave him to scamper away. Bruno Jenkins and himself then find their way back to his grandmother's room. The narrator descends, via some of his grandmother's knitting, into The Grand High Witch's room (which is right below his own), steals a small bottle of the same potion fed to him and Bruno, and then afterwards takes it into the hotel's kitchen. After hearing that all the witches are having pea soup, he pours the entire bottle into the saucepan in which it is being made. All the witches, including The Grand High Witch, are transformed into mice and instantly are chopped to pieces by the cooks. The narrator and his grandmother decide to move into the castle she resided in, in order to find out the names and addresses of all the other witches in the world. They then make a pact to feed the same potion to the next Grand High Witch, and afterwards travel around the world in order to deliver it to all the witches they can find.
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Personal characteristics
Like all witches within the story, The Grand High Witch inevitably will have no toes, no hair, claws instead of fingernails, blue saliva, a small but terrifying flame in the middle of her eyes and slightly larger-than-average nostrils for sniffing out children. The Grand High Witch that the narrator encounters, however, also has a face that looks as though it has been "pickled in vinegar" and worm-eaten, and so she disguises it with a very realistic mask. She also has a somewhat guttural accent (hence her pronunciation of England as "Inkland") that gives her "difficulty" in pronouncing the letters "R" ("rrr") and "W" ("v"). Besides frying witches with her eyes, another personal eccentricity of hers is that she has several frogs living with her in her hotel-room that the narrator (when he is in there stealing her potion) overhears her threatening to throw outside to be eaten by seagulls- although it is implied that they, like him, were children once upon a time that she transformed with some other form of potion.
Quotes
"Who spoke?... It vos you vos it not?"
"A stupid vitch who answers back/ Must burn until her bones are black!/ ... A stupid vitch vithout a brrain/ Must sizzle in the fierry flame!/ ... An idiotic vitch like you/ Must rrroast upon the barbecue!/ ... A vitch who dares to say I'm wrrrong/ Vill not be vith us verry long!/ ... I hope no vun else vill make me crross today."
"Childrren are rrrevolting!"
"Who dares to trrrespass?" | | |
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