The Day Boy and the Night Girl by George MacDonald

First appearing in Harper’s Young People as a serial, the piece focuses on the extraordinary tale of a young boy and a girl who have been brought up in a secluded and controlled environment by a wicked witch, incognizant of the world outside of their custom tailored settings. Enriched with magic, fantasy, romance, and allegory, The Day Boy and the Night Girl is a great instance of MacDonald’s excellent use of metaphors to express a deeper meaning to a seemingly simple fairy tale. The novel begins with the introduction of Watho, a wicked witch who has an insatiable thirst for knowledge. In her pursuit of knowledge, she decides to conduct her very own experiment, where she seeks to shape the characters of two infants by controlling their environment with utmost caution. In order to carry out such an experiment, she deviously accommodates two expectant mothers in her castle, lodging one of the women in a sunlit, airy room, while placing the other in a dark, confined space. Accordingly, P