Shale Shallows

The Shale Shallows is a remote outpost mauntery, a community of religious women known as maunts, situated twelve miles southwest of the Emerald City. It operates under the authority of the larger Cloister of Saint Glinda in the city. The location is first mentioned as the place where Elphaba spent five years of her life after a period of two years at the main cloister in the city, a total of seven years in religious life before her departure for the Vinkus.

Elphaba's Life at the Mauntery

Elphaba arrived at the Shale Shallows after a traumatic period: she had failed in her attempt to assassinate Madame Morrible on Lurlinemas Eve, and her lover Fiyero had been attacked and presumably killed by the Gale Force. She took refuge at the Cloister of Saint Glinda in the city, where an elderly maunt named Mother Yackle took her in. From there, she was transferred to the Shale Shallows, where she lived under a vow of silence for three years, followed by two years of whisper, and then two years working on the ward for incurables. During this time, she tended to the dying and those too debilitated to die, finding a pattern in the process of dying that she described as beautiful in its way. Her life was one of undifferentiated time, washing terra-cotta floors without dipping her hands in water, making wine, and working in the infirmary. The routine of the mauntery allowed her to sink selflessly into daily patterns, finding the little changes—a red bird landing on a windowsill, leaves to rake—sufficient for her existence.

Departure and the Grasstrail Train

After seven years, the Superior Maunt decided it was time for Elphaba to leave. The Superior Maunt told her she was returning to herself and that the unquestioning silence of the cloister was no longer what she needed. She was sent from the mauntery with the love and expectations of the community, to conduct an exercise in expiation for her mistakes, though even the Superior Maunt did not know what they were. Elphaba was given a broom, a basket of simples, paper, a pfenix feather pen, and three pots of black ink. She was also given a young boy named Liir to accompany her. The mauntery paid Oatsie Manglehand, the leader of the Grasstrail Train, a decent penny to escort Elphaba through the Great Kells to the Vinkus. The Superior Maunt told Oatsie that Elphaba had spent many years in solitary life and in nursing, and that the habit of gossip was lost. Elphaba left the Shale Shallows as Sister Saint Aelphaba, but she soon told Oatsie to call her simply Elphie.

Narrative Significance

The Shale Shallows represents a crucial period of withdrawal and recovery for Elphaba, a time when she was stripped of her former identity as a political agitator and lover. It is a place of penance and silence, where she confronts her failures and begins to heal, but it is also a place of preparation. The mauntery provides her with the broom that will become her iconic mode of transport, and it is from here that she sets out on the journey that will lead her to Kiamo Ko, to her role as the Witch of the West, and to her final confrontation with Dorothy. The location is a liminal space between her past life of action and her future life of isolated power, a hidden sanctuary that allows her to re-emerge into the world, changed but still driven by her unresolved grief and anger.