Book description
The White Witch is a story set at the time of the beginning of the
English Civil War and the men and women drawn into it on both sides.
Robert Haslewood, the local squire turns puritan and follows his boyhood
hero to war leaving his children and wife behind him. His cousin
Froniga, half gypsy and the White Witch of the title, a wise woman with
the power of healing lives in danger. Her gypsy cousins sometimes camp
near her but will always move on. They have befriended Yomen, who
conceals a grand past but is now a tinker and royalist spy. He loves the
puritan Froniga. A journey man painter, Francis, delights in painting
the Haslewood children while spying too for the royalist cause. Their
lives entwine until the bloodiness of war forces them to be loyal to
their side whatever their personal ties, threatening to destroy
friendships and humanity and kindness in the process. Elizabeth de
Beauchamp Goudge was born on April 24th 1900 in Wells, Somerset, where
her father was Principal of Wells Theological College. Although she had
privately intended writing as a career, her parents insisted she taught
handicrafts in Oxford. She began writing in her spare time and her first
novel ISLAND MAGIC, set in Guernsey, was a great success here and in
America. GREEN DOLPHIN COUNTRY (1944) projected her to fame, netting a
Literary Guild Award and a special prize of £30,000 from Louis B. Mayer
of MGM before being filmed. In her later years Elizabeth Goudge settled
in Henley-on-Thames. She died on April 1st, 1984.
