Hannah Jay Pierce

“Half-Hanged Mary,” by Margaret Atwood tells the story of the author’s eccentric ancestor, Mary Webster, who was hanged for a witch in the 1680s and lived to tell the tale.

Atwood’s rendering of Mary’s long night—the hunt (and the hypocrisy of her Puritan hunters), the lynching, the excruciating hours hanging by her neck, and the trippy liberation that came after “listening to the gospel/ of the re Read more of this blog post »