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A modern witch-hunt

For centuries, elderly women have been scorned as crones, hags and scolds – but it’s not only men who are belittling them now, says Victoria Smith

4 March 2023

9:00 AM

4 March 2023

9:00 AM

Hags: The Demonisation of Middle-aged Women Victoria Smith

Fleet, pp.368, 16.99

Where are all the father-in-law jokes? You won’t find them, because fathers-in-law are not fair game in the way middle-aged women are. There is no male ‘Karen’. Men are not mocked as wizards, but we are witches. Victoria Smith has subtitled her timely book ‘The Demonisation of Middle-aged Women’, and if you are one of them you will know that is no exaggeration.

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