You can recognise her instantly. Her face will be angular, her body towering. Her clothes will be lavish, her jewellery ostentatious. Her expression will be smug, her smile superior. Most of all, though, you’ll notice her personality. For she’ll be absolutely vile, a combination of humanity’s very worst traits, ranging from jealous and vindictive to downright malevolent. I’m talking, of course, about the wicked stepmother.
For anyone who’s ever read a fairytale or watched a Disney film, the trope of the wicked stepmother hardly needs an introduction. Nonetheless, it seems we may need to be reminded of the sexism attached to it, with the trope very much alive and well in 2023 thanks to Prince Harry’s tell-all memoir, Spare, and the discussion it has sparked about his own stepmother, Camilla the Queen Consort.
