CHARACTER
A Discovery of Witchesby Deborah Harkness

Diana Bishop

Diana Bishop

Quick Facts

  • Role: Protagonist and first-person narrator; a Yale historian of science and alchemy who is also an extraordinarily powerful witch
  • First appearance: Chapter 1, in Oxford’s Bodleian Library, when she calls up the bewitched manuscript Ashmole 782
  • Lineage: Last of the Bishop witches; descended from both the Bishop and Proctor lines
  • Distinctive details: Tall, athletic, straw-blond hair; striking blue eyes flecked with gold and gray
  • Key relationships: Matthew Clairmont (vampire scientist and lover), aunts Sarah Bishop and Emily Mather (guardians), antagonists Peter Knox, Gillian Chamberlain, and Satu Järvinen

Who They Are

At heart, Diana Bishop is a contradiction she must learn to reconcile: a rigorous scholar who trusts archives, data, and lab notebooks, and a witch whose power refuses to stay suppressed. Her life of research and rowing is upended the moment she encounters Matthew Clairmont, a centuries-old vampire with a scientist’s mind and a predator’s patience, and calls the lost manuscript Ashmole 782 from the stacks. The last of the Bishop line and a descendant of Bridget Bishop, she carries the weight of persecution and legacy—an embodiment of The Power of History and Memory. Diana’s story traces how a woman trained to measure and prove must learn to feel and claim, turning a private denial into a public destiny.

Personality & Traits

Diana’s defining struggle is to balance the empiricism that shapes her career with the magic that shapes her blood—a personal version of Magic vs. Science and Reason. Her intellect is real, earned, and hard-edged; her magic is instinctive, fearful, and—when unleashed—devastating. The book’s tension lies in watching her stop choosing one half of herself at the expense of the other.

  • Intellectual and rational: A tenured Yale historian who insists on evidence and peer review, Diana initially refuses to use spells even for simple problems—like retrieving a book on a high shelf in the Bodleian—until the need cracks her resolve (Chapter 2).
  • Independent to a fault: She purposefully built her career without magical shortcuts and bristles when family or allies try to manage her choices, whether that’s her aunts urging training or a vampire’s protective instincts.
  • Repressed and fearful: Haunted by her parents’ murders, she equates magic with danger, suppressing her abilities so successfully that her body manifests anxiety—panic, sleeplessness—even as her power still leaks out in witchwind, witchwater, and witchfire.
  • Brave and resilient: Diana stands her ground against powerful adversaries, refuses to cooperate with coercion, and endures torture without betraying herself or those she loves—proof that courage for her is action in the presence of fear.
  • Fiercely loyal and protective: Once she commits, she defies ancient laws to protect her chosen family. Her willingness to risk everything for Matthew and others reveals a protective instinct that’s as strategic as it is passionate.

Character Journey

Diana’s arc moves from denial to integration, the novel’s clearest exploration of Identity and Self-Acceptance. She starts as a scholar who treats magic like a childhood myth she’s outgrown. Ashmole 782 shatters that façade, attracting creatures to her study table and to her life. As danger escalates, her power refuses to stay buried: elements answer her, and instinct repeatedly overrides rationale. Trauma resurfaces in her abduction and torture, a crucible that strips away her self-protective rationalism. The turning point comes when love and survival align—she calls witchfire, bargains with the goddess, and gives her blood to save Matthew. By the end, Diana isn’t fleeing what she is; she’s choosing it, preparing to travel back in time not to hide but to learn, master, and return.

Key Relationships

  • Matthew Clairmont: What begins as scholarly wary respect becomes a transgressive bond that challenges laws, politics, and biology. Diana resists Matthew’s protectiveness even as she recognizes his vulnerability, insisting on her agency as their partnership evolves toward shared leadership. Their love, at once scientific curiosity and visceral attachment, anchors the novel’s tension around Forbidden Love and Inter-species Relationships.

  • Sarah Bishop and Emily Mather: Raised by her aunt Sarah—sharp-tongued, practical, impatient—and Em—gentle, nurturing, quietly formidable—Diana is held in place by their fierce, complicated love. Their home offers refuge and a living archive of Bishop magic, grounding the novel’s exploration of Family, Lineage, and Belonging even when Diana pushes them away.

  • Gillian Chamberlain: A colleague and rival who prizes status within witch society, Gillian’s envy curdles into betrayal. Through her, the novel reveals how ambition and fear feed Prejudice, Segregation, and Intolerance, making her less a villain of power than a cautionary tale of conformity.

  • Peter Knox: A calculating wizard who treats Diana as a resource to be exploited, Knox’s pressure clarifies the stakes: submission to institutional authority or self-definition on perilous terms. His manipulation sharpens Diana’s resolve to claim her consent and her power.

Defining Moments

Diana’s transformation crystallizes in a series of set pieces where intellect, instinct, and identity collide.

  • The discovery of Ashmole 782 (Chapter 1): She calls the lost manuscript from the Bodleian stacks, feeling its uncanny pull. Why it matters: It marks her as unique among creatures, collapses her carefully normal life, and sets the covetous world in motion.
  • First deliberate spell in the library (Chapter 2): She uses magic to reach a book in full view of a vampire. Why it matters: A small, human-scale choice fractures her binary logic—scholar vs. witch—and opens the door to both danger and intimacy.
  • Kidnapped and tortured by Satu Järvinen (Chapter 29): Stripped of defenses at La Pierre, Diana refuses to surrender her secrets. Why it matters: Suffering becomes revelation; pain forces her power toward the surface and transforms fear into resolve.
  • Unleashing witchfire to kill Juliette (Chapter 31): Faced with Matthew’s mortal peril, Diana’s love ignites lethal precision. Why it matters: It’s her first fully conscious, destructive use of power—claimed, not accidental—redefining her as protector rather than protected.
  • Offering her blood after a pact with the goddess (Chapter 31): She bargains and bleeds to save Matthew’s life. Why it matters: The act fuses devotion and destiny; Diana accepts the cost of her magic and the depth of her bond.

Essential Quotes

Here, with my hard-earned doctorate, tenure, and promotions in hand and my career beginning to blossom, I’d renounced my family’s heritage and created a life that depended on reason and scholarly abilities, not inexplicable hunches and spells.
Analysis: Diana names the bargain she thought would keep her safe: achievement in exchange for denial. The line frames her core conflict—professional identity as a shield against ancestral power—and sets up its inevitable collapse.

"Living without magic is the only way I know to survive, Matthew."
Analysis: Survival, for Diana, has meant control and containment. Addressing Matthew, she articulates not just a preference but a coping mechanism born of trauma—one their relationship will challenge and ultimately undo.

"I decide who I love, and how, and when. Stop telling me what to do, Matthew. My ideas about vampires may be romantic, but your attitudes toward women need a major overhaul."
Analysis: This flare of defiance is a manifesto for autonomy within an unequal power dynamic. Diana rejects chivalric control, insisting that love must coexist with consent and equality.

"I love you, and I’m not going to stop."
Analysis: Simple and absolute, the declaration refuses external law and internal fear alike. It converts private emotion into public stance, binding her choices to the risks that follow.

"We don’t expect anyone else to fight with us. But understand this: our army has one general. Matthew. If you don’t like it, don’t enlist."
Analysis: Diana’s willingness to defer tactically while asserting strategic boundaries shows her evolving leadership. She can share command without surrendering voice—a nuanced balance of love, trust, and resolve.