What is the reason for the prevalence of the “evil stepmother” trope?
In: Other
As other posters have said, childbirth is dangerous and before modern medicine, it was very common for people to die having kids. So Mom croaks while having her fifth baby or whatever, and Dad remarries and has a couple kids with Wife #2. So it was also pretty common to have a strange woman, or at least a woman who’s not your recently deceased mom, roll up to your house and be in charge of you now, without your having any input.
That causes enough anxiety, right? Is she nice? Is she mean? What if she doesn’t like you? Nothing you can do about it! Then you also have the problem: say Dad’s rich and/or titled, who gets his stuff when he dies? The stereotype was that Wife #2 would favor her biological children to be the heirs, and wouldn’t want her stepkids to get anything—and might take some extreme measures to clear out the line of succession.
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