White Is for Witching

Content Warning: This section of the guide mentions suicide, self-harm, and disordered eating. It also includes racist and xenophobic content, including offensive terms for Black people and undocumented citizens, which is replicated in this guide only in direct quotation of the source material.

National identity in England is continually contested in White Is for Witching, and xenophobia literally haunts the country through the Silver House’s ancestral spirits. Dover, where the Silver House is located, sits on the chalky cliffs of England, standing sentry over the English Channel—serving as both gateway and locked door to the benefits of English citizenship. The housekeeper Sade, a legal immigrant and English citizen, recalls that Dover was historically known as the key to England—a “[k]ey to a locked gate, throughout both world wars, and even before. It’s still fighting” (125).

Sade’s description of Dover alludes to its history of exclusion and fear of foreigners, a characteristic it shares with Anna Good (Anna Silver) and the Silver House. World War II and the death of Anna’s husband, Andrew Silver, in 1943, help create the malevolent personality of the house—but as Sade asserts, England’s history of xenophobia predates these events. Anna sees her granddaughter Lily’s dismissal of patriotism as a consequence of “too many” immigrants.