Woman of the Month: Kate Sharma

Kate Sharma from Bridgerton

Sometimes choosing a Woman of the Month is like searching for a needle in a haystack; other times I have a surfeit of riches to choose from. This month it’s feels like there’s been dozens of great female characters to enjoy: Meilin Lee from Turning Red, Freydis from Vikings: Valhalla, Peggy Scott from The Gilded Age, Oona Lee from 5 Worlds... but March really belonged to Bridgerton’s Kate Sharma.

I wasn’t a huge fan of the first season as anything but the lightest of fluff, but was drawn back in after seeing promotional pictures of the Sharma sisters: Kate and Edwina. They looked gorgeous and I was curious to see how the show would handle two Desi girls in this particular context. Certain comments in season one made it clear the world these characters inhabited wasn’t entirely colourblind and there is a literary precedent for wealthy Indian women coming to England in search of titled husbands, as briefly touched upon in William Makepeace Thackery’s Vanity Fair.

But the handling of the show’s Black and mixed-race characters last season wasn’t done particularly elegantly, and it would seem that at some point during the hiatus the showrunners came to the simple decision to treat their 19th century England as an alternative universe, free from any racial prejudices. As such, the Sharmas demonstrate some Indian customs (they perform the Haldi cleansing ritual the night before Edwina’s wedding) and vocabulary (the sisters call each other “Didi” and “Bon”, which – according to a Google search – means “older” and “younger sister” in Hindi) but otherwise their race and background is barely a factor in the way their story unfolds.

Or is it...?

In the discussions surrounding the release of season two, many have noted that the portrayal of Kate’s psyche and worldview has resonated deeply with other South Asian women, and it doesn’t feel like a coincidence that the most important beats of her story-arc are grounded in characterization we’ve also seen recently in the likes of Encanto and Turning Red. That is, the immense pressure and responsibility that’s felt by many of the daughters of Asian and South American families. Generally referred to as Oldest Child Syndrome, there’s been plenty of talk in the wake of these projects as to how deeply viewers of similar backgrounds have related to the likes of Luisa, Meilin and Kate.

In this case, Kate is motivated almost solely by her need to serve and protect her family, to the point where she responds with confusion and even anger at the possibility that she might want anything for herself. She’s completely internalized the expectations and sense of obligation that has been placed upon her, and because no one has ever prioritized her, she can only outsource this feeling of duty and self-love to others.

Kate and Edwina are half-sisters who share a (deceased) father rather than a mother. Kate’s mother died when she was very young and she’s been raised by her father’s second wife Mary, who was cut off from her family after she made what was considered an unsuitable match. But the marriage brought about Edwina, who Kate loves fiercely. At times she’s more like a second mother than an older sister, and on coming to England to find Edwina a husband, Kate stringently vets the available suitors. Only the very best will do for her baby sister.

That’s already a fascinating family dynamic, and there’s more than a little of The Taming of the Shrew woven throughout, from Edwina’s eligibility being carefully gatekept by the behaviour of her older sister, to the Belligerent Sexual Tension that erupts between Anthony and Kate, to (most obviously) Kate’s very name.

Anthony Bridgerton, still heartbroken from the events of last season, wants to secure a wife with as little fuss as possible. With Edwina announced as the diamond of the season, Anthony sets his cap at her, though Kate is less convinced – first due to overhearing his mercenary opinions about marriage with some other men, and then because the two of them grow increasingly attracted to one another.

The ensuing love triangle is only able to play out the way it does due to Anthony and Kate’s personal neuroses. I won’t get into Anthony’s hang-ups, but Kate’s sharp tongue, competitive edge and standoffish persona are a direct result of her upbringing, and the usual clichés and contrivances of the romance genre are rooted specifically in Kate’s generational trauma (another big theme of Encanto and Turning Red).

To her, the wellbeing of her sister – and by extension, the rest of her family – trumps every other consideration. Kate defines herself by what she can do for them, demonstrating overwhelming guilt and horror at the possibility that her own desires might somehow act as an obstacle between her family and their success in society. The whole mess only gets as far as it does because she sublimates her feelings, to the point where she doesn’t believe she deserves any happiness at all.

A pertinent conversation with Edwina takes place near the end of the season, in which she astutely points out that everything Kate has provided for her under the guise of helping her, is in truth what Kate wants for herself. In fulfilling the duties that have always been expected of her, and in staunchly suppressing her own feelings, Kate has unconsciously projected herself onto her sister. It’s a surprisingly complex psychology at play.

So ultimately it’s Edwina who gets the more obvious self-actualization arc, in which she comes to learn of unpleasant truths that have been concealed from her and finally decide for herself what she wants in life. In comparison, Kate’s story is one of release. By the final episode she is freed from her obligations, both real and imagined, and given herself permission to take what she wants for herself.

I need to stress at this point that I’m a white kiwi girl, so cannot write any of this from personal experience and don’t presume to speak for anyone. But I’m fascinated by the discussions surrounding the likes of Meilin, Luisa and Kate (both positive and negative) and what they mean to viewers that exist outside the usual mainstream target audience. It’s like a shaft of illumination has fallen on a type of female character we’ve never seen before, one based on cultural mores, generational trauma, the expectations of women, and a specific kind of psyche that emerges from the intersection of all those things. Going forward, I think Kate Sharma will have a much bigger impact on the representation of South Asian women than she’s so far been given credit for.