The Rules of Magic

Hoffman’s Practical Magic series intermingles real-life historical events and settings with a world of fantasy. This is particularly the case with The Rules of Magic, which is set both in New York, against the backdrop of social change in the 1960s and ’70s, and in the fictional Massachusetts town where the Magnolia Street house is located. These settings and the mundanity of the characters’ daily lives—going to school and earning a living alongside their magical activities—give Hoffman’s novel elements of the magical-realism genre. Writer and educator Sean Glatch notes that in magical realism, “the focus isn’t on the fantastical elements of the story, so much as on What those elements mean for the characters. Fantasy often acts as an extended metaphor, externalizing some sort of internal conflict or moral quandary in the protagonist’s life” (Glatch, Sean. “What is Magical Realism in Literature? Exploring El Realismo Mágico.” Writers, 2022). This is especially the case for the Owens children, whose magical coming-of-age parallels existential concerns about life and love.

Hoffman uses a variety of techniques, especially the juxtaposition of mundanity with internal conflict, to convey the Owenses’ witch ancestry and their inability to stay away from magic. While they are children, under strict orders to be as normal as possible, Hoffman uses sensory imagery to show their magical affinity. The children’s striking appearances instantly mark them as different; for example, Frances’s “skin as pale as milk and blood-red hair” is on the heightened end of the spectrum for human coloring, while her gawky height makes her impossible to ignore (3). Next, their abilities—such as the capacity to commune with birds in Frances’s case, to read thoughts in Jet’s, and to see the future in Vincent’s—interfere with ordinary life. While the children are still teens, they perform fantastical transgressions of the laws of nature, such as levitating objects and making quarters appear behind classmates’ ears. This reflects a childish excitement in newfound abilities and a brief sense of omnipotence. As they reach adulthood, an element of fantasy is retained in their relationships with magical animals, such as Lewis the crow and Harry the Alsatian. These animals, who provide an extension of the children’s instincts, are familiars rather than pets, in the manner of the wild animals kept by witches of legend. Another folklore reference occurs in the children’s inability to drown, as this was a popular trope in defining witchcraft during the Salem trials of 1692 through 1693.

Hoffman also draws on a traditional depiction of witches as healers. While the children are gifted, much of the magic in the novel derives from more laborious methods, such as Aunt Isabelle’s cultivation of plants for medicinal purposes. The time and specialist knowledge needed to become a plant witch who can earn from her magic is given significance in the novel, as it makes magic more of a vocation than an automatic privilege. It also pays homage to the tradition of Owens women engaging in the same craft and so brings new generations closer to the pursuits of their ancestors. Much of the herbal law takes the form of received wisdom and anecdote, and the superstitions of wearing blue for protection and carrying lavender in one’s pockets cross the boundary between magic and grandmotherly advice. (Vincent, who because of his maleness and restless temperament initially feels excluded from the matrilineal plant magic, adopts The Magus, a book of dark spells, and uses his powers for malice and profit until he finds William and the true love that restores him to himself.)

As one of the key threads in the novel is becoming oneself, danger awaits those who deny their magical abilities to fit in with the normal world. This is the case with cousin Maggie, who seeks to deny that she is an Owens, befriending the locals instead. When she tries to curse the family, “each word Maggie spoke was turned back upon her” (29): Her magic evaporates, and she is transfigured into a powerless rabbit. The hyperbole of being reduced not to a magic-less human but to an even more vulnerable creature illustrates the danger of self-denial.

Still, even as Hoffman shows the perils of self-denial, she illustrates its temptation through the intergenerational trauma of the curse, brought about by Maria Owens following her lover’s failure to return to her. This is the key limitation in her magical world. Here Hoffman weaves the historical element of the Salem trials into the Owens family’s personal history. As Maria’s lover is the historical witch-hunter John Hathorne, the descendants of this union between a witch-finder and a witch “were fated to try their best to deny who they were and to refute their true selves” (138). As a result, their lovers are all fated to meet early, untimely deaths. Jet and Frances see this viscerally when two boys they casually date in Massachusetts are struck by lightning. The prospect of doom hanging over any love relationship incites them to deny the parts of themselves that can fall truly in love. The courtship between Jet and Levi, descendants of Hathorne, in many ways echoes the tension at the heart of the witch-and-witch-hunter relationship of Maria and Hathorne. Their parents are actively opposed to their relationship, and Jet encounters traditions of witch-hunting folklore, such as a copy of The Scarlet Letter filled with nails, following the old superstition that witches can be caught by nailing their steps to the ground. Because the fervor of the parents’ pursuit is as much to blame as the love affair itself for Levi’s death, Hoffman invites the reader to consider whether love or one’s resistance to it is the curse.

In a strong show of character agency, Hoffman has Franny and Vincent renegotiate the terms of the curse and attempt to outmaneuver it in their love affairs. Vincent, who dies and is resurrected into a new identity in Paris, attempts to prevent it by opting out of his bloodline, while Franny and Haylin remain non-cohabiting lovers until Haylin is certain of his death. In each case, the curse makes life difficult; however, in order to triumph and live fully as themselves, the Owens must surrender to love. The novel thus becomes a testament to human ingenuity and love over a life lived in the shadow of ancestral magic.