Slippers. Masks. And now midnight! This month’s “Fun Facts” are all about symbols from Cinderella. And while the concept of “midnight” itself might seem self-evident, I had to choose it for today’s post. With Cinders to Dust coming out next week, we’re on the cusp of the book release . . .
. . . Just as “midnight” is the cusp of deep night! 😉 Jokes aside, talk of folklore and midnight might have you thinking “the witching hour.” That’s a very traditional, folkloric idea–particularly in European or Christian communities–that the devil (and/or witches) roam at a specific time in the middle of the night. There’s debate about what time, though. Miriam Webster will tell you the witching hour is midnight; Encyclopedia Britannica says it’s more likely 3am. Either way, it’s supposed to be a scary time when evil is strong. It may stem from old night terrors, especially because for most people, waking up suddenly around 3am disrupts the deepest point of the REM cycle, often resulting in stress and anxiety.
But Cinderella isn’t a ghost story, so how is this relevant? Honestly I think it comes down to the show of it. The folklore and stories of witches give “midnight” a sense of power. So, a spell that ends at midnight feels much more impressive and magical than a spell that ends at 11:15. Personally, I also like the idea of the danger that lurks beyond midnight. No matter when exactly the “witching hour” is, it’s definitely somewhere on the other side of 12am, and the idea that Cinderella must flee before it arrives makes a kind of instinctive sense.
Midnight comes around a few times in Cinders to Dust. Hey, as Officer Thorn would say, solving crime deserves a late night or two! 😉 In the end, it’s more a danger for the criminal than anyone else . . . But I won’t say more than that. 😀
Selected Sources
No books today, but if you poke around online, you’ll find plenty of listicles detailing the horror of “the witching hour.” The dictionary entries I linked to above are fairly short (although Britannica does go into some literary and modern connotations). Actually, in this instance, Wikipedia does have a nice overview, too. Browse with care!
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