The Witcher
The Witcher is a series of nine fantasy novels and 15 short stories by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski. The series revolves around the eponymous witcher, Geralt of Rivia. Witchers are monster hunters given superhuman abilities for the purpose of killing dangerous creatures. The Witcher began with a titular 1986 short story that Sapkowski entered into a competition held by Fantastyka magazine, marking his debut as an author. Due to reader demand, Sapkowski wrote 14 more stories before starting a series of novels in 1994. Known as The Witcher Saga, he wrote one book a year until the fifth and final installment in 1999. A standalone prequel novel, Season of Storms, was published in 2013. Another prequel, Crossroads of Ravens, was published in 2024.
The books have been described as having a cult following in Poland and throughout Central and Eastern Europe. They have been translated into 37 languages and sold over 15 million copies worldwide as of July 2020. They have also been adapted into a film, two television series, a video game series, and a series of comic books. The video games have been even more successful, with more than 75 million copies sold as of May 2023.
Overview
The Last Wish contains four of the five stories in The Witcher, in addition to three other stories. The fifth story, "A Road with No Return", is not in the book.Production
Short stories
In 1985, Andrzej Sapkowski was a 38-year-old traveling fur salesman with an economics degree and a love of fantasy literature. He decided to enter a short story competition, limited to 30-pages, held by Polish science fiction and fantasy magazine Fantastyka. He did so at the urging of his son Krzysztof, who was an avid reader of the magazine. Sapkowski submitted "", which was conceived as a retelling of a Polish fairy tale where a princess turned into a monster as punishment for the incest of her parents. He had to wait about a year for the results of the contest, and came in third place. Sapkowski felt that his work was the best in the competition, but the jurors relegated it to third because fantasy was considered to be for children at the time in Poland. However, reaction from readers was overwhelmingly positive and Sapkowski wrote more stories, about one or two a year, in response to their demand.He based "A Question of Price" on the universally known fairy tale in which a monster or sorcerer saves somebody's life and then demands payment. The first four stories dealing with the witcher Geralt of Rivia were collected into a 1990 short story collection titled The Witcher — now out of print — by publisher Reporter. It includes 1988's "A Road with No Return", which is set before The Witcher stories and features Geralt's mother-to-be.
After what he called a chance meeting, Sapkowski made a deal in 1990 with SuperNowa to publish the series. They released the second short story collection, Sword of Destiny, in 1992. The Last Wish was published by SuperNowa in 1993 to replace The Witcher as the first book, and includes all of its stories except "A Road with No Return". Although new short stories were also added to The Last Wish, they chronologically take place before those in Sword of Destiny.
"Something Ends, Something Begins" is an alternate ending to The Witcher Saga about Geralt and Yennefer's wedding that was written in 1992 as a wedding gift for Sapkowski's friends. It and "A Road with No Return" are included in some Polish editions of The Last Wish or Sword of Destiny.
''The Witcher Saga'' and prequels
With the positive reader reception to his short stories, Sapkowski decided to write a fantasy saga. He claimed that Polish publishers at the time believed only Anglo-Saxon fantasy authors were worth publishing and that Polish writers of the genre were too risky. SuperNowa were the only publisher willing to take the risk, and "Now everybody envies" them. For the saga, the author expanded on the story he used for "A Question of Price" and "Sword of Destiny". Blood of Elves, the first novel in The Witcher Saga, was published in 1994. The story focuses on Geralt of Rivia and Ciri, who are linked by destiny. Ciri, princess of a recently conquered country and a pawn of international politics, becomes a witcher-in-training. Geralt is drawn into a whirlwind of events in his attempts to protect her.Three more novels quickly followed at a pace of one a year; Time of Contempt, Baptism of Fire, and The Tower of the Swallow. The fifth and final installment, The Lady of the Lake, was published in 1999.
After 14 years, Sapkowski released Season of Storms in 2013. Set between short stories included in The Last Wish, it is a standalone prequel to The Witcher Saga. In 2020, Sapkowski stated that he had "some plans" for a new entry in The Witcher, but "My future plans are vague, nothing is fixed yet". On 29 November 2024, the ninth installment of the series — Crossroads of Ravens — was published in Poland. The book is a prequel to both the Witcher Saga and the short stories and describes Geralt as a young and inexperienced witcher shortly after completing his training in Kaer Morhen.
Non-''Witcher'' anthologies
is a 2000 collection of short stories by Sapkowski, including two from The Witcher: "A Road with No Return" and "Something Ends, Something Begins". That collection was republished in 2012, with two additional stories, as Maladie i inne opowiadania.Chosen by Fate: Zajdel Award Winner Anthology is a 2000 English anthology by SuperNowa, in cooperation with the Silesian Club of Fantastika, that includes a translation by Agnieszka Fulińska of "" short story entitled "The Hexer". 2010's A Polish Book of Monsters is an English anthology edited and translated by Michael Kandel that includes a translation of "The Witcher" entitled "Spellmaker". Maladie and Other Stories is a 2014 English e-book sampler with translations of "The Witcher", "The Edge of the World", and the first chapters of Blood of Elves and Baptism of Fire.
Spin-offs
With Sapkowski's permission, the Polish publishing house Solaris published a collection of eight short stories entitled . Written by Russian and Ukrainian fantasy writers, they are set in the world of The Witcher and feature its characters;Vasilyev story is part of his The Witcher of Grand Kiev universe. Szpony i kły, a similar collection of eleven short stories by authors chosen through a 2016 competition by the Polish magazine Nowa Fantastyka, was published in 2017 by SuperNowa.
Setting
When he first created The Witcher, Sapkowski had not yet conceived of the background of the series' world. "I began with short stories; you don't create universes in short stories, there is—literally and metaphorically—no place for them". But when he switched to writing full novels, "the necessity of some coherent background became imminent. And slowly, step by step, something resembling a universe started to emerge. But it's only in the background, so it plays a secondary role in the story". Although admitting to using Slavic mythology often due to it being very rich and abundant, Sapkowski said he does not have any preferred mythologies, folklores or bestiaries that he draws on for monsters in The Witcher: "The story dictates the necessity. And, mostly, I put aside existing mythologies and invent something myself". He said that the monsters in the series can be put into one of three categories. First, those that already "exist" with established names, appearances, habits and habitats, such as dragons. Second are those that he invents, but gives names that can be found in nature, mostly insects, because they are "horrible and scary." Third are those that are completely original creations, some of which are only named, because, "When it has no importance as far as the storyline is concerned whatsoever, why bother?" Sapkowski has also stated that he personally abhors politics and considers his books to be politically neutral.Background
The stories are set on an unnamed Continent, which was settled several thousand years earlier by elves from overseas. When they arrived, the elves encountered gnomes and dwarves. After a war between the elves and dwarves, the dwarves retreated into the mountains, and the elves settled in the plains and forests. Human colonists arrived about five hundred years before the events in the stories, igniting a series of wars. The humans were victorious and became dominant; the non-human races, now considered second-class citizens, often live in small ghettos within human settlements. Those not confined to the ghettos live in wilderness regions that humans have not yet explored or settled. Other races on the Continent are halflings and dryads; werewolves and vampires appeared after a magical event known as the Conjunction of the Spheres.During the centuries preceding the stories, most of the Continent's southern regions have been taken over by the Nilfgaard Empire; the north belongs to the fragmented Northern Kingdoms. The Witcher Saga takes place in the aftermath of the first major war between the Nilfgaard Empire and the Northern Kingdoms, with a second war beginning in the middle of the series.
Major characters
- Geralt of Rivia, also known as Gwynbleidd and the "Butcher of Blaviken", is the protagonist of the series and its adaptations, a witcher who travels the Continent and makes a living hunting monsters that plague the land. He is linked to Ciri by destiny. Kacper Pobłocki argues that he embodies the "neo-liberal anti-politics" spirit of the Polish popular culture of the 1990s. Geralt has been played by Michał Żebrowski in the Polish shows and movies and by Henry Cavill in seasons 1–3 of the Netflix series The Witcher; from season 4 on, he is portrayed by Liam Hemsworth.
- Cirilla Fiona Elen Riannon, also known as "Ciri", the "Lion Cub of Cintra", "Child of the Elder Blood", "Falka", and the "Lady of Time and Space". Cirilla is the princess of Cintra, daughter of Pavetta and Duny and granddaughter of Queen Calanthe. She is also Geralt's destiny and adopted daughter, as well as the focus of much of the plot. Ciri is a descendant of Lara Dorren and possesses Elder blood, granting her the ability to cross space and time. Ciri has ashen-grey hair and emerald-green eyes, a trait that runs in her family. In the 2002 film and TV series, she was played by Marta Bitner; she was played by Freya Allan in the Netflix series.
- Yennefer of Vengerberg first appeared in the collection of short stories, The Last Wish, featuring in the short story of the same name. She is a powerful sorceress and a mother-figure to Ciri, and she becomes Geralt's lover. As an avid reader of fantasy, Sapkowski said he was sometimes bored and disgusted with stories in which the hero could easily have sex with any woman he wished; as such, he created Yennefer to "complicate things a little" as a woman character who refuses to be a fantasy cliché. In the Polish 2002 film and TV series, she was played by Grażyna Wolszczak; she was played by Anya Chalotra in the Netflix series.
- Dandelion is a poet, minstrel, and bard and Geralt's best friend. The Polish word jaskier refers to the buttercup flower. Some of his more famous ballads were about the relationship between Geralt and Yennefer. He accompanies Geralt in many short stories and ends up joining his hansa while searching for Ciri. He is played by Joey Batey in The Witcher TV series. In the 2001 Polish film Wiedźmin, he was played by Zbigniew Zamachowski.
- Triss Merigold is a sorceress and a friend of Geralt and Yennefer. She took care of Ciri for some time and is like an older sister to her. She was a member of the Lodge of Sorceresses. Triss is in love with Geralt. The image of Triss Merigold from The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings appeared as the cover girl in the Polish edition of Playboy in May 2011. She also appeared in a live model calendar for the game in Russia.