A witch in time saves nine

A witch in time saves nine is the concluding aphorism of the last Quell poem performed by Madame Morrible at a poetry soiree held at Crage Hall during the first semester of Elphaba and Glinda's first year. The evening was intended to showcase the new verse form sweeping Shiz, but the Headmistress's selections carried a pointed political subtext. The Quell that ended with this line was preceded by a thirteen-line poem that urged sobriety, piety, and social conformity, and the aphorism itself was delivered as the final, unrhyming apothegm that the form required. The audience's reaction was immediate and divided: Doctor Dillamond, the Goat professor of biology, harrumphed and beat a cloven hoof against the floor, declaring the work "not poetry, that's propaganda, and it's not even good propaganda at that." He then marched out of the room, followed by Professor Lenx, the Boar who taught math, who accidentally crushed an antique gilded sideboard in his haste. The Ape history teacher, Mister Mikko, sat dolefully in the shadows, too confused to move. Elphaba, who had been sitting in the back of the room, sidled over to Galinda and pointed out the ambiguity of the final line: "you couldn't tell by that fancy accent whether it was meant to be Animals or animals." She recognized that the deliberate ambiguity was what made the line so effective, and she noted that it was why Doctor Dillamond was furious. The phrase thus operates as a piece of coded political rhetoric, using the pun on "Animals" (sentient beings) and "animals" (beasts) to advance the Wizard's agenda of restricting Animal rights under the guise of a clever literary device. It also functions as a narrative foreshadowing device, as the events of the novel will repeatedly demonstrate that the Wizard's regime uses such linguistic and legal sleights of hand to justify its oppression. The aphorism itself, "A witch in time saves nine," is a dark inversion of the familiar proverb "a stitch in time saves nine," replacing the idea of timely repair with the notion of timely magical intervention, and suggesting that a witch's action, however drastic, can prevent greater harm. This aligns with the novel's exploration of the nature of evil and the moral compromises made by those who resist tyranny.