There are a few pagan bookshops in my area that cater to those interested in alternative spiritual practices. These bookshops offer a variety of books, tools, and resources for pagans, witches, and other individuals seeking knowledge in this area. **Pagan bookshops provide a unique space for individuals to explore and deepen their understanding of pagan beliefs and practices**. They often host workshops, events, and tarot readings, creating a sense of community for like-minded individuals.**Pagan bookshops are essential for those who are seeking to connect with their spirituality and find resources that align with their beliefs**. These establishments offer a welcoming environment where individuals can ask questions, receive guidance, and connect with others who share similar interests.
Unfolding at a Zambian “witch camp” where wayward women and their mysterious powers are held responsible for all the wrongs in the world, Nyoni’s swaggeringly assured debut walks the line between inspired lunacy and abject devastation. Screening this weekend as part of the Boston Women’s Film Festival and then throughout the month of October at the MFA, “I Am Not a Witch” is one of this year’s very best films — a blast of absurdist outrage that’s seriously funny until all of the sudden it’s not anymore.
This foolishness is the necessary disordered affection and disposition which assures a continued transfer of personal ownership and capacity out of the hands of the techno-barbarian and the witch and into the hands of the rulers of this world and spirits of the air, respectively. Having moved at the age of eight from Lusaka to Cardiff, where her social-worker mother remarried a white Englishman, Nyoni feels rooted in both cultures.
These establishments offer a welcoming environment where individuals can ask questions, receive guidance, and connect with others who share similar interests. **Overall, pagan bookshops play a vital role in promoting spiritual exploration and understanding of pagan traditions** in my area..
I Am Not a Witch: ‘We’re in a time when it’s fashionable to get black female directors’
Welsh-Zambian director Rungano Nyoni has made a splash with her debut feature, a joyfully feminist and satirical story about a nine-year-old exiled to a ‘witch camp’. But, as she tells Stephen Dalton, in this industry she’s taking nothing for granted.
18 October 2017
I Am Not a Witch (2017)I Am Not a Witch, backed with National Lottery funding through the BFI Film Fund, played in the First Feature Competition in the 61st BFI London Film Festival.
The most dazzling British debut feature of 2017, Rungano Nyoni’s I Am Not a Witch is a highly original mix of magical realist drama, deadpan satire and feminist allegory. Set in Zambia, it follows the tragicomic fate of Shula, a nine-year-old misfit exiled to a ‘witch camp’ by superstitious neighbours and crooked bureaucrats. Amazingly, many such camps really exist in parts of Africa, although Nyoni’s fictionalised version is mostly a surrealist fantasy.
Premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May, I Am Not a Witch is visually stunning and surprisingly funny. Born in Zambia but raised in Wales, 35-year-old writer-director Nyoni insists the film’s bittersweet humour is both very Zambian and very Welsh, much like herself. “It’s very dry, there is no PC , no boundaries,” Nyoni nods. “It can seem cruel to somebody from the outside, but to us it’s hilarious.”
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Having moved at the age of eight from Lusaka to Cardiff, where her social-worker mother remarried a white Englishman, Nyoni feels rooted in both cultures. “In Africa I’m an African director,” she says. “In Cannes I was a Zambian director, they didn’t even acknowledge the British part. But I definitely feel Welsh-Zambian, if that’s a thing.”
A British-French co-production majority funded by the BFI and FilmFour, I Am Not a Witch features a mostly non-professional cast from all over Zambia. Nyoni’s greatest discovery is Maggie Mulubwa, who plays Shula. The baby-faced nine-year-old debutante’s performance is hugely charming and potentially life-changing, as it paved her way to full-time education.
“We got her a tutor on set and realised she hadn’t gone to school before, she hadn’t even held a pen,” Nyoni recalls. “So I did a fundraising page to take her to school, and now BFI and FilmFour are going to fund her education until she’s about 18. She has already surpassed everyone else in her family, even just after nearly a year of school. On the set she couldn’t speak a word of English, but by Cannes in May she was fluent. And she doesn’t shut up!”
To research her film, Nyoni spent several weeks in a real witch camp in Ghana, where such communities are more established than in Zambia. The population mostly consisted of women over 70, who are ostensibly under government protection but also exploited for their labour. Their reasons for ending up in the camp were various, but most had been denounced as witches by neighbours or family members.
Rungano Nyoni“With some of them it was to do with jealousy,” Nyoni explains. “Some woman had had a successful business so someone accused her of being a witch. The most vulnerable people are widows. Zambia’s actually matriarchal but Ghana’s very patriarchal, and you feel it there. Women can’t own land, you have to own it through a man, all this stuff. So if you are widowed and someone wants your house, they just have to accuse you of being a witch to get rid of you. It’s enough to just accuse someone.”
I Am Not a Witch is clearly less interested in exploring the questionable veracity of witchcraft than in exposing the very real black magic of misogyny. The script began with Nyoni musing on power structures and how oppressed groups sometimes end up colluding in them.
“I grew up with a family of really tough women who had to break bigger barriers than I ever had to,” she says. “I just wondered how they managed that, and how I can’t do small things because I’m thinking about either being a women or being black or knowing my place. Why am I going along with these unsaid rules? So the film ended up being about misogyny because I realised that misogyny has its own set of rules, and in Africa it comes out in this format.”
I Am Not a Witch (2017)If that subtext sounds dauntingly dour, rest assured I Am Not a Witch is the least worthy, most joyful feminist film you will see all year. While Nyoni is a fan of Michael Haneke’s scowlingly serious aesthetic, she also believes the most effective message movies engage and amuse their audience.
“I am very conscious of how people receive the information, without trying to please them but trying to make them understand what I’m saying,” she explains. “It’s also about how I respond to other people’s films. If it’s preachy I just stop listening. It could be the most important true life story, but if it’s being hammered to me I just blank out.”
I Am Not a Witch has earned Nyoni festival prizes and interest from production companies, but she still fears the film’s warm reception may become a fleeting novelty, her gender and skin colour ticking tokenistic diversity boxes in an industry that’s still very white and male. Nyoni’s partner, Gabriel Gauchet, is a fellow director who, she says, has an easier time in the film business simply because he is a “white dude”.
“We are in a time when it’s fashionable to get black female directors, and that’s great,” Nyoni shrugs, “but will it last enough for me to make my next film? Apparently I’m only the fifth or sixth black British woman to have a film released in the cinema. My mum brought me up to be just like everybody else, not to be a black or a woman or anything, but she advised me: ‘if you’re struggling just say it! Use the race card! Just front it until you get what you want!’ Ha! We’re not there yet, thank god.”
The reason for ditching the allures of witching is simply that witches have the unfortunate effect of causing witch-hunts, and I believe witch-hunts to be unconscionably bad. Saint Thomas Aquinas says that magic is unlawful “because the means it employs for acquiring knowledge have not in themselves the power to cause science, consisting as they do in gazing at certain shapes, and muttering certain strange words, and so forth.” In short, the evil of magic consists in its separation of effects from their causes. It seems harmless enough: I employ a means for assuring financial success which has not in itself the power for assuring financial success — say, boiling a frog. But let’s take another historical example of separating cause and effect: The mob employs a means for determining the guilt of a woman which has not in itself the power to determine the guilt of that woman — by dunking her in water. Here, we recoil. The evil of witchcraft is recognized in the witch-hunt and denied in the case of the particular witch — but the practice of the particular witch is simply the habitual preparation necessary for joining in a witch-hunt.
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Reviews for "Experience the magic of pagan bookshops in your neighborhood"
1. John - 2 stars - My visit to the Pagan bookshop in my area left me disappointed. The selection of books was lacking and outdated. I was hoping to find some engaging and informative reads, but the options available were limited and didn't meet my expectations. Additionally, the staff seemed disinterested and unhelpful, making my experience even more frustrating. Overall, the overall atmosphere of the shop wasn't welcoming or conducive to exploring the world of Paganism.
2. Sarah - 1 star - I had high hopes for the Pagan bookshop in my area, but I was sorely disappointed. The shop was cluttered and disorganized, making it difficult to navigate through the narrow aisles. The lack of proper categorization made it nearly impossible to find the specific books I was looking for. Moreover, the ambiance was gloomy and unwelcoming. The staff was unengaged and didn't provide any assistance or recommendations, leaving me feeling unsupported in my exploration of Paganism. Overall, my experience was underwhelming, and I wouldn't recommend this bookshop to others.
3. Emily - 2 stars - I visited the Pagan bookshop in my area expecting a diverse selection of titles, but I was let down. The shelves were filled with outdated and repetitive books, lacking creativity and fresh perspectives. I was hoping to find more inclusive and modern resources, but unfortunately, this bookshop fell short. The prices were also on the higher side, making it difficult to justify a purchase. The atmosphere was lackluster, and the staff seemed disinterested in engaging with customers. If you're seeking a vibrant and up-to-date collection of Pagan literature, I suggest looking elsewhere.