FIRE AND LIGHT

when we first meet sophie, she's grappling with where she fits in to society. she's illegitimate, born of her mother's world but claimed by her father but she fits into neither brackets neatly. she's searching for love in all the wrong places, and she's still a kid, but hardened by her upbringing. araminta rewrites her identity, locks it tight shut and tells her the only way she can lead a life is if she leads it in secret. if she becomes a maid - indiscernible from the furniture in the room, invisible.

araminta tells her to be no one.

sophie cannot claim her father as such, she wears her mother's regret like a noose around her neck. who she is, truly is heavily concealed behind layers and layers of who she is expected to be. sophie's self hatred is informed by her stepmother's cruelty and over time, she subscribes to the opinion that "she shouldn't expect her father to love her", that she was a burden to all of them, that she is "better off in the streets" and surprised that araminta didn't have her ousted already.

it all boils down to what sophie is claiming to be - "the daughter of a nobleman".

araminta doesn't take offense to the "nobleman" part. she's aware of richard's dalliances, heck she honours his request to take care of sophie (in exchange for money for her trouble, but honours it nonetheless). she is more offended by sophie's claiming of herself as a daughter of the household - a daughter of penwood house. on equal footing with her own daughters, meant to be treated in that way.

araminta's children are not of richard's blood, which adds in its own layer of insecurity. she forces them to perform their femininity - trot around in balls, have their worth tied down to a gentleman for the promise of financial security, compelling them into unfavourable marriages to gentlemen twice their age. araminta is a victim of social ostracisation. she's twice widowed, left alone by her husbands to care for children, but she does not make an effort to realise the evils in the system that has antagonised her. to her, it is simply a case of conforming to society's rigorous standards for women that her children undoubtedly are forced to inherit.

sophie's story is in tandem with cinderella's but the similarities do not extend beyond the realm of fantasy, as the ultimate social message is different. in cinderella's case (the disney version which is adapted from the fairy tale), cinderella and the evil stepmother represent the madonna and the whore. cinderella is the madonna, who stays true to herself, who adopts chastity and virtue and other becoming traits for a woman of that time. the stepmother is twice widowed, indicating her state of impurity. cinderella is good and kind of heart, a virgin at that. the stepmother is vindictive because her cruelty is innate, jealous of cinderella's natural beauty and wants the prince for her own daughters. the stepmother lives vicariously through her daughters, clinging to the innocence of her youth and obsessing over cinderella. the kind of message fairy tales like cinderella give out is apparent - it equates beauty to being moral goodness and ugliness to evil. the stepmother is, much like in other fairy tales, is an aging woman who envies this 'natural beauty' and is vengeful as a result. the fairytale doesn't attempt to dissect her convictions - or society's, but might as well be a giant "don't have sex before marriage or you'll die" advert.

araminta is all of that, but her vindictiveness is not a result of sophie's inner beauty - rather what sophie represents. this is where s4 makes the cinderella story its own, much like other modern day adaptions.

araminta doesn't like the name sophie gives herself - i.e "a daughter of her husband". she knows she's illegitimate. she knows she's also the only piece of her husband he had left behind on earth. she knows all of these as objective facts, but she doesn't want sophie to realise them. she doesn't like sophie finding comfort in her identity because it goes against all she's known about femininity - as an unblemished, picture-perfect identity. as a performance. as her trump card to play to avoid closer introspection into her own grief and role as a mother. it is her excuse of projecting her perfectionism- herself - onto her daughters and never having to pay the price for it.

sophie's comfort in her existence in her earlier years is a provocation in of itself. the sort of strict definitions araminta gives her own womanhood goes unchallenged by society, as it is a product of the ton she lives in. it is reminiscent of terf ideology - the idea that gender is innate, the idea that womanhood is biological alone, similar to araminta's belief that sophie can never be a daughter of penwood house because of her skewed identity. that sophie must be forced into a life of indentured servanthood, in step with her mother, because she can "never" be a daughter of a nobleman. that she cannot escape her class, the circumstances of her birth. it is what lady danbury tells violet. sophie's upward mobility will not go unnoticed because "... not if the mother was a maid".

class and gender are completely different issues, but the marginalisation hangs on the belief that one's class and one's gender is dictated at birth. it takes away blame from the systems that feed into it, and turns to blaming the individual for their so-called innate failures, and of course, dictated by religious doctrines. class and gender converges into one in sophie's story. she is forced into servanthood by araminta as to make her never forget who she is supposed to be. being a servant fulfills araminta's wishes for her to be invisible, like throwing a carpet over a spillage. it also ties her forever to penwood house, thus further limiting sophie's exposure to the world and hindering her chances of finding community.

sophie's performance of femininity is different from how araminta forces her girls into. and this is evident in sophie's masquerade outfit. firstly, it is a borrowed dress coupled with a mask that is too big for her. it is inundated with bows. it is otherwise simple. it doesn't tell her a story, the way the other masquerade outfits do. it tells the truth of sophie - pays homage to her identity which has stayed a secret. sophie doesn't neatly fit into society's conventions, as dictated by her dress. but the dress doesn't wear her - she wears it. she makes it her own. benedict doesn't know her as the "lady with the borrowed dress", no she's the "lady in silver". she makes femininity her own.

unlike the other people at the masquerade who exist in reference to something (alice and will as cleopatra and antony?) colin and penelope as pirates, eloise as joan of arc, fran and john as swans, it is unclear what sophie is, but sophie is everything she says she is. she takes in old dresses, old shoes and old gloves and turns it into hers for a night. it is worth noting in the original cinderella, the fairy godmother magicks her a dress to wear. in sophie's case, she makes do with what she has - a direct contradiction to araminta and the girls who have had their dresses prepared specifically for this occasion months in advance.

this direct defiance of araminta's concrete definitions of what being a noble lady is like is what pisses her off the most, because it subtly reflects her own dissatisfaction with life and tells her she's destroyed it to an audience of no one. sophie's comfort in her identity is a failure on society's part to keep the strong lines of division prominent and therefore grows cracks on the thrones of those that uphold it in their service. araminta knows the harm society has done to widows like her, but she plays the part of the oppressor in turn - wanting their power instead of recognising the deep-rooted evils in the perpetrating system. she isn't interested in dwelling in her own skewed identity as a twice widowed woman, and in her helplessness wishes to dedicate her life to diminishing those who wish to live their truths - fearing introspection herself and seeking comfort in her own ignorance.

araminta's theft of sophie's dowry is the final nail in this coffin. by doing so, she rejects the idea of sophie ever coming to terms with her self- the idea of her father, a faceless spirit in their lives affirming his daughter's identity. by stealing her dowry, araminta poses the age-old question of "what is it, to truly be a woman?" and deems sophie unworthy to have something she is owed. she's stolen sophie's very life from her in order to prove her losing case, to sow more seeds of division between them because if there is none, it challenges araminta's humanity - her very existence as a person, as a maternal figure. it renders her hate obsolete, her struggles partially self-inflicted and the fracturing psyches of her daughters her fault.

in a way, araminta and benedict both have similar views on people with non-conforming identities. benedict however, has spent time with people like him to know society is not privy to people who are different or love differently. where araminta weaponises seclusion, benedict finds solace in it. he has his community that sophie lacks. benedict has the empathy to put up a fight against the ignorance from being a privileged gentleman. however, seclusion is a short term solution for a long-term problem. benedict's mistress offer is a recognition of sophie's gender and her class. a life in secrecy is the best he can give her, when she's spent so long trying to cultivate an identity for herself. sophie's love for parties and balls is yet another attempt at wanting to affirm her identity when no one can do that for her.

sophie likens the mistress offer to being a "glorified courtesan" which is such an interesting choice of words. against the backdrop of a society that actively hypersexualises its poorest and the marginalised, its women objectified - seen as an erotic fantasy than a human being, sophie searches for a life of dignity. she seeks autonomy and movement, and she's been trapped in penwood house only for a man to ask her to move into another house with him. it is reflective of the unique sexual objectification of trans women, their bodies not their own, defined by pleasure and prejudice of others, in exchange for fickle, financial security. it is the very thing sophie and araminta (and benedict in between) fundamentally disagree on - the idea of dignity and romance entitled to a select few, and the rest others fending for scraps, as such is society. people like araminta uphold the system that restricts dignity, and sophie's very amphibian existence as neither nobility nor of the working classes invites a discussion into who is "allowed" what, and how one's birth affects it.

benedict's role in sophie's story is affirming her affirmation and faith in herself. he's part of her community and uses the power at his disposal to make her a secret no more. the final shot of them in the queen's ball - in front of society at large - not hiding anymore is an integral part in sophie's arc. this is all she's yearned for. a life of respect, a life of dignity, a life where she's on par with the other ladies. it is not one of assimilation, it is a story of participation and recognition. sophie is a woman, a daughter of penwood house and is beloved by all. she is free to live her life for herself, in whatever ways she wishes to. ultimately she carves her own meaning to her gender, her purpose in life and she returns to places where she is affirmed for who she is, as a person - the gazebo, the kite, the dance, pretty dresses and the wedding where instead of walking into our cottage, she walks from it.