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“ | Do you want to distract me from holy work today? We're facing the presence of real evil in Rush Margins. I couldn't live with myself if I ignored it. | ” |
— Frex to Melena, Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West |
Frexspar the Godly (né Frexispar Togue) is a Gillikin-born Munchkinlander Unionist minister and the father of Elphaba, Nessarose, and Shell Thropp.
History[]
His backstory is given in Elphie: A Wicked Childhood, where it is revealed that Frex was born in the Pertha Hills from a dissipated, yet holy branch of the Munchkinlander Togue clan, a family of sugar beet merchants.
In the beginning of the first novel, Frexspar lives in Rush Margins as a Unionist minister. He married Melena Thropp, the heiress to the noble Thropp family after the two had met during a ball her family was throwing and while he was requesting an application for the family estate’s patronage. The two would ultimately elope and settled in Rush Margins, a small fishing village in South-East Munchkinland. A devout man, he attempted to keep his followers in Rush Margins from magic and especially from the Clock of the Time Dragon. However, his attempts led to him being humiliated by the Clock and assaulted, on the same night that his daughter Elphaba was born. This incident apparently ruined his reputation as a minister. He is originally depressed over Elphaba's green skin color but comes to love her after she has grown up. He takes to a hermetic life after Elphaba's birth but returns around the time Turtle Heart appears and becomes his lover. While awaiting the birth of Nessarose, he and his family were forced to flee to Colwen Grounds, where Turtle Heart is ultimately sacrificed by the Munchkinlander populace thinking it would help the drought. The guilt of losing the glassblower led him and Melena to become a missionary in Quadling Country. His missionary work has limited success, and he even stoops as low as using Elphaba's skin condition and singing talent to his ends. He also favors Nessarose over his other children. At some point he has a son, Shell but birth complications result in the death of Melena.
Later, when his daughters have gone to Shiz University, he apparently takes on a quest to find Ozma Tipperatius, though this fails, and he sends Nessarose the magic slippers, which he made using skills he learned from Turtle Heart.
By the time of Nessarose's ascension as Eminent Thropp, Frex is retired and living with her and Shell at Colwen Grounds. He tries to make Elphaba take the Eminent position from her sister, stating that she has the birthright, but she refuses as she believes he just wants her to take the blame if Nessarose does something wrong. He is later devastated by Nessarose's death.
He dies later on, though his death is not shown.