Maladies and Remedies

This chapter deals with the social aspect of the baby’s deformity. The young girl is given the name Elphaba, after Saint Aelphaba of the Waterfall. The reader also learns that Melena’s old nanny, has come to visit and help take care of the baby. She is not thrilled, due to the lack of enthusiasm that Melena and Flex are showing. The nanny helps the couple out by showing them that their baby is not abnormal, and only her skin colour is different. Frex on the other hand, decides to perform an exorcism on the child, to see if that will help with the discolouration of her skin. However this tactic does not succeed. During this, the nanny and Melena chat about a possible affair that could have led to the skin disorder. After learning that Melena was taking drugs, as well as drinking certain ‘drinks,’ the nanny discover that Melena drank a ‘miracle elixir’ while pregnant and that could have been that cause of the discolouration. The final line in this chapter shows a side of the story that no one has thought about up until this point. “Perhaps, thought Nanny, little green Elphaba chose her own sex, and her own color, and to hell with her parents.” (Maguire)