profile.
Name: Prudence Beatrice Ashford. Yes, that is the worst name in the world and she would like to slap her mother in the face for it.
Nicknames: She realises the irony in this in regard to her tale, but she's answered to Ash or Asher since she was primary school. She'll still introduce herself as Ash to people she meets, but will simply be that much more reluctant to tell them what her tale is.
People who are either too stupid to know otherwise or simply don't know her that well will call her Pru. To their own peril.
Age/Birthdate: 31/19 November 1976.
Sexuality: SHE LIKES BOYS, OKAY.
Occupation: Prefers the term "intellectual" to "professional student," but the latter would probably be a far more apt description.
If you're referring to what she actually gets paid for, she plays day assistant to Edwina Dickering. Humiliating and horrifying as that is, it's an inordinately small amount of work for an inordinately large amount of pay, so she's willing to shoulder the utter shame while she finishes her almighty Meisterwerk of a thesis. She has also been known to publish a smattering of articles and essays on a variety of topics, guest editorials and the like, but she's dropped out of the academic journals for the most part in the past year or so.
Fairytale: Cinderella.
Ability, if any: None to speak of, unless you count an uncanny ability to fit into just about any shoe she tries on.
Status: She's been absent from the Tale community since her introduction, courtesy of Anser, and has yet to even make her first journal entry, so most (except perhaps the librarians) are unaware that she even exists. In the past, upon coming across another Tale in public, she would do her utmost to ignore that uncomfortable Tale sense and probably avert her eyes until she was safely distant.
Summarily: On the one hand, a belligerent, self-seeking bitch. On the other, probably the best person to have in your corner in a sketchy situation - fiercely devoted, good-humoured, and knows how to handle a Glock. Handy qualities all.
Personality: While Prudence likes a good laugh as much as anyone else, she's not one to pull any punches to ensure anyone else's comfort. Honest to a fault, Prudence doesn't have much tolerance for people who aren't quite as quick to understand things as she -- she's definitely been known to snap at people she considers slow or illogical. Rarely will she hesitate to inform someone that they happen to be wrong or that she simply doesn't care for them or their opinion; Prudence is about as straightforward and upfront as it gets when she has a bone to pick, which is surprisingly often. It's extremely difficult to get her to back down in the midst of an argument, even when it's clear she's wrong. She'll just soldier on in a disarmingly calm, almost amused voice.
Otherwise, she is not nearly as serious as most people might expect -- Prudence is pretty good humoured and extremely playful. She enjoys teasing people and just about everyone in her circle of friends has some kind of embarrassing nickname that she devised for them on a whim. These often end up falling on the more irreverent side of the spectrum, as Prudence's sense of humour tends to be a little vulgar.
She certainly has a sense of sympathy for the poor and downtrodden that she has yet to find a logical explanation for, other than the obvious sentiment of relating to their plight from lifetimes past, but that's something she'd rather not admit to. Prudence tries to quash whatever slight similarities she may bear to her tale in a classic attempt of mind over matter, but principal aspects such as these (sympathy, the rare slip of sincerity) seem to remain despite her direst efforts. Though she tries to project a certain image of indifference, Prudence finds herself growing increasingly susceptible to the occasional lapses of sweet-temperedness when she least expects it as she delves further into Taledom.
Prudence is not one to set up a gameplan. Despite her frequent efforts to buy and use a day planner, some subconscious force will cause her to lose it within the first twenty-four hours of the endeavour, so everything in her life is more or less played by ear. She sincerely loathes being told what to do, even if it's following directions she laid out for herself. Prudence does her best to rely on her memory or writing notes down on her arm in Sharpie, but for the most part, she can't really be expected to be a reliable date.
The fact that her tale is so often associated with graciousness is somewhat grating on Prudence's nerves, particularly considering she's not the most affable person herself. She privately holds something of a grudge towards people who would expect her to allow herself to be walked all over because of this. She is certainly not the type to wait around for a prince to show up, that's for sure. Intensely proactive, Prudence is convinced that if you're not willing to go out and fight for something yourself, you probably don't deserve it.
That said, she's not exactly the type of person to look before she leaps. Prudence's hastiness has gotten her into a scrape more than once, though she maintains that she has never regretted one of her split second decisions.
History: Alfred Ashford was the curator of the British Museum, while his wife, Dora, was a well-respected English professor at Trinity. Theirs was a happy union -- for the most part, their only disputes were of an academic nature, and even then they were at least gratified to be arguing with someone of equal intelligence. They married in 1968 and welcomed their first child, Alfred Jr., into the world in 1971. Their second child, Prudence, was born five years later at Oxford University, as her mother was about to give a guest lecture at St Edmund Hall.
Prudence spent a great deal of her childhood following her brother Alfie around. Five years her senior, Alfie was regarded as the troublemaker of the family, and Prudence often felt compelled to (generally unsuccessfully) follow suit. Her formative years were more or less spent happily in his shadow as they cavorted about the family home in the countryside.
Her idyllic, if not muddy, experiences with her brother came to a full stop when he was shipped off to boarding school in Germany. With no one in particular to look to for guidance in all things mischievous, Prudence stopped tormenting the housemaids and began raiding her father's study. Alfred Sr. was admittedly pleased to discover his youngest's sudden interest in all things literary and began schooling her in a variety of subjects. Though history was by far his favourite, he soon realised that Prudence's was philosophy. Whether it was laughing at deconstruction or circling fallacies in the local newspaper, Prudence was preoccupied with ontology from that point on.
When Alfie returned, however, he was very much changed. Prudence's big brother was no longer the chubby-cheeked rabble rouser she had so admired -- he had done the unthinkable and grown up. What was more, he now only came as part of a duo. Alfie found a best friend in Rick Jones, one of the other boys at his school in Germany. Despite the fact that Rick was later shipped off to a series of other boarding schools, the pair stayed in touch and young Master Jones became a regular fixture at the Ashford home during the holidays, much to Prudence's chagrin. Thankfully, she only had to deal with their boyish snickering for very long, being shortly afterward enrolled at Marlborough College and after that Cambridge to read Philosophy.
Not long after finishing her B.A. at Cambridge, Prudence received a visit from Anser. She had been having a variety of dreams for the past few months, but had been doing her best to ignore them and focus on her schoolwork. Ultimately, learning that she was a Tale was deeply traumatising. It was a truth that would force her to completely reevaluate her worldview -- assuming she accepted it, anyways. Rather than doing so, Prudence made what was probably the least rational decision in her life and ran away, burying herself in her studies at Yale. Until recently, her Compendium has been sitting in a drawer in her desk beneath a mountain of Schopenhauer papers. However, the recent death of her father and attaining her master's degree has made her rethink her life and "follow the evidence wherever it leads," however much she may dislike it. For the time being, she is attempting to make something of her life -- picking up the pieces following her father's death, salvaging her financial affairs (footing the bill for a funeral after having supported herself towards her Master's degree in several of the highest educational establishments equals a severe blow to the bank account), while reluctantly facing the truth of her situation as a reincarnated fairy tale. She recently relocated to New York at the drop of a hat following her father's funeral after receiving an invitation to lecture at Columbia, but that fell through somewhat unceremoniously, leaving Prudence to gape stupidly and wonder what the hell she was supposed to do next.
Played-By: CHARLOTTE GAINSBOURG.
Appearance: She hasn't changed since she was about seventeen, and she's not sure whether or not to be happy about it. Always asked for ID and possesses the gangly limbs and frame of a prepubescent boy. Virtually no chest. Prudence would happily trade another woman a couple of her wrinkles for a RACK. Has a certain unkempt, frazzled air that she must've picked up from one of her eccentric Oxford uncles -- can carry off unbuttoned shirtsleeves and a blazer haphazardly thrown on and still seem reasonably well put together.
Apparently incapable of dressing herself, Prudence is outfitted almost exclusively in old man tweeds (probably her father's), the occasional pair of drainpipes (snatched from her brother), and an extremely faded black leather jacket (I WONDER WHOSE THAT COULD HAVE BEEN). Whenever she heads home to England, her mother inevitably drags Prudence to Oxford Street to find something suitable to wear, and to her credit she has convinced Prudence to take home at least one or two dresses in the past twenty odd years. Unfortunately, they're still hanging in their garment bags at the back of her closet.
Musical Taste: The Rolling Stones. The Clash. George Harrison.
the obligatory bit
Frankly, Prudence hopes and prays that one day she's going to wake up and the whole fairy tale thing will have been a terrible, illogical dream. She doesn't particularly appreciate the Atheneum coming along and messing with her head the way it did, still less getting flashbacks of her past lives. Her original incarnation as Cinderella featured experiences far more traumatic than the stories would credit (you'd be surprised how much ash she ended up inhaling in her sleep).
Prudence doesn't think all that much of Cinderella, to be honest. Some wishy-washy girl who let herself get pushed around by her step-family? Not to mention the whole getting rescued by the handsome prince aspect. It all runs very much against her nature, which isn't so much pro-feminism as it is specifically pro-Prudence. She would never expect some guy to come whisking her away with glass footwear and she hates the fact that she might (however inadvertently) have a part in endorsing that message to little girls the world over.
For whatever reason, in each lifetime Cinderella is forced into a situation from which she requires a helping hand. After the damsel in distress scenario had replayed itself over the course of a few lifespans, this particular reincarnation has a certain repugnance towards fairy godmother or princely types embedded into her very personality. She likes to think of it as her own individual nature responding to the nonsensicalness of Taledom, but it is in actuality a direct side effect of her being Cinderella -- lifetime after lifetime of being saved by a proverbial prince of some kind has left her with something of a violent allergic reaction to anything resembling gallantry or chivalry, for lack of a better metaphor.
This time around, Prudence has recently suffered a severe financial setback and has found herself stranded in New York City. Given her innate dislike of asking for or accepting help from anyone, she's sort of stuck in a dead end job and nowhere to turn.
the optional bit
Prudence would certainly not think very highly of her tale's prince, though she'd do her very best to hide it via politeness through clenched teeth. The same would probably go for her Fairy Godmother, who she would see as an enabler. She hasn't given very much thought to her "step-family," however, and it might be interesting if she got to be friends with maybe one of the stepsisters before each discovered the other's tale.