HELLO! This is an independent & selective multi-muse blog for various characters primarily MYTH  based. Below you’ll find some helpful links that’ll assist you in interacting with this blog. LOW ACTIVITY. Written by Darks, 30+.

Shortly after Sophie is born, her mother dies, leaving her father, Mr. Hatter, to raise her alone and manage the family’s hattery. Because Mr. Hatter is trying to manage single parenthood and the business, he has a difficult time keeping on a steady apprentice as duties within the shop also involve helping out with the baby.

He ends up accepting a girl by the name of Fanny to be his apprentice, despite her being much too old and nearly his age. Fanny can’t keep an apprenticeship. She’s tried a variety of professions and either grew bored of them or was fired from the position. Despite this, she still held a very good rapport with two former teachers, a bakery owner, and a witch.

It doesn’t take long for Mr. Hatter to become smitten with her ditzy and simple minded behavior. She is easily won over by Sophie as well as the hats within the shop. He showers her with gifts and eventually the two get married. They have two more daughters, Lettie and Martha. Fanny loves all her children equally.

Because of Fanny’s more extravagant lifestyle and  foolhardy personality, Sophie grows up rather fast, becoming her father’s true apprentice and eventually managing the shop finically as Fanny has rich tastes and her father likes to shower her every whim. By Sophie’s 25th birthday, she’s far surpassed apprenticeship, and her father dies as a sickness passe through her hometown. Fanny inherits the shop and decides its time for her daughters to all have apprenticeships. The problem is that she doesn’t know her daughters very well and simply finds apprenticeships for them based on what she thinks looks the best for them. For Lettie, she finds her an apprenticeship in the bakery (because Lettie would look so lovely in the uniform) and for Martha, she arranges an apprenticeship with a witch : Ms. Fairfax ( her nose is long,  and would be better suited behind books and incantations).

As for Sophie, Fanny decides that she’s best suited to be er apprentice at the hat shop. Sophie can’t see she’s being taken advantage of as being a formal apprentice means that Fanny doesn’t have to pay her—its quite the opposite. Sophie has to pay Fanny. They work out an arrangement in which Sophie continues to manage the shop as well as make the hats within the shop. Fanny continues to spend and live as lavishly as she’s used to. She isn’t malicious in any of these ventures, she’s simply dimwitted.

Sophie settles into her discontent and begins to talk to the hats.   She dreams up great lives for them and is unaware that she’s enchanting them and this is leading to greater success for the shop.  Sophie often goes to visit her sisters on her days off, which leads to her meeting Howl  who saves her from two of the King’s soldiers who pressure her into an uncomfortable situation, as well as the henchmen of the Witch of the Waste. Sophie isn’t aware who either of them are, and is safely deposited to her destination. It’s her sister Lettie who guesses that that was Howl who rescued her, but also argues that he eats women’s hearts and probably orchestrated the whole thing to try and woo her. Sophie finds this hard to believe as she does not think herself beautiful and has this notion further reinforced by Fanny. Lettie is very adamant that that isn’t true and that Sophie is being taken advantage of. Lettie also states that Sophie should go do something nice for herself, as Sophie’s 30th birthday is the next day. Sophie can tell that her sister is also discontent as Lettie talks about how Sophie should abandon the hat shop and seek her fortune.

Sophie promises she’ll be safe on her way home and jokes she makes no promises once there. Upon arriving back to the shop, she finds the door open after closing hours. Thinking someone has robbed the shop she goes to investigating, finding a very tall and beautiful middle-aged woman inspecting the hats she’s made. Sophie explains that the shop is closed (and reasons Fanny forgot to close the shop as instances like this have happened before).

The woman criticizes the hats and Sophie’s appearance. Sophie returns the rudeness and demands the woman leaves.  She reveals herself to be the witch of the waste and curses Sophie before leaving. Sophie can’t talk about her curse at all.  The curse makes Sophie into an old woman and this rightly horrifies her. She hurries off to bed. Upon waking up the next morning, she finds herself still cursed and tells her reflection that this seems a suitable birthday present. She finally feels as pretty as she looks, which is frail and elderly. Because Fanny is not the brightest, Sophie decides she can’t stay at home anymore and uses her sister’s Lettie’s idea of finding her fortune as a good excuse for leaving. She writes a letter that her taking a trip and going on an adventure is a birthday present to herself.

In other thoughts--the trouble with a lot of female characters in arthurian lore is that they are either evil because they are autonomous or evil because they lack their autonomy. We hate them because they are women. We hate them because they are objects. Pity is also acceptable. It isn't any kind of irony that the only woman to truly survive into modern times with any level of respect is Guinevere. You really think the victorian arthurian revival period ( largely an English movement) is going to belittle its queen? While it serves largely as a bridge between legends and modernism with only a few authros really surviving into modern times (Alfred, Lord Tennyson, William Morris, and Sir Walter Scott to name a few) what remains is not necessarily the stories themselves but more so the morals of that era. it does not surprise me that what else is consistently taken forward is the misogyny that has morphed with these stories.

BEEP BEEP! HOW'S MY PORTRAYAL?

OOC; i actually really needed to hear this today. Thank you. I haven't been writing anything for my three newest Arthurian muses ( or in Lancelot's case, posting privately) because I just got really insecure about them lately, especially since they are all characters that mainly affect more popular muses stories and therefore have been very prominent in other peoples headcanons on the dash.