#masculine traits ( but taken in the context that jack is antithetical to the values of mainstream society & struggles against them too )

[emcads]

okay i know i joke about esmeralda being this icon of femininity that teaches the other characters how to do their makeup or how to achieve the current fashions but something that just. hits different. about esmeralda and her connection with beauty/femininity is that it’s completely manufactured and generated: makeup is painted and removed, clothes are woven and sewn into garments,  it isn’t a natural beauty or a beauty of purity but one that is created out of her own action  (although she shares a lot of these generative, traditionally feminine symbols with Amenirdis like clothing, contrast this with Amenirdis’ natural state being the one of beauty and her illusory state being one of ugliness) in fact Esmeralda is specifically referenced as unnatural and unholy during her fight with Bainbridge: 

“Impossible! No woman could captain a vessel. That would be unnatural, a violation of the laws of God and man. The…the Almighty would never permit it.”

granted he’s fairly drunk but there’s a line he crosses when he learns the captain is a female: it’s no longer an earthly issue of legal property rights or the physical altercation or even sailor superstition, instead his attacks are moral/spiritual and invoking God.  he’s right in that Esmeralda is not a natural woman, existing in a “pure” state of womanhood or trying to portray that state falsely: she crossdresses, she wears makeup, she is indulgent and violent and lascivious. she is beautiful but she is the furthest thing from the eighteenth century ideal of the white, docile, English beauty;  Jack thinks of her only as a lady but we know whatever class Esmeralda has is not due to her by birthright from Spain, with an indigenous mother she does not have the “pure” bloodlines of European class and the benefits that go with that. ( if she had them, it was at Don Rafael’s efforts, and her parents’ murders/the burning of his estate demonstrate colonial society’s resistance to that deviation )  her nobility as perceived by Jack is thus something contrived and manufactured outside of right of blood, law, or society.  ( but more than an equal to theirs, thus exposing their own standards as contrived, but I digress ). she’s placed into a convent but instead of devoting life to god / abstinence / purity, she chooses masculinity: crossdressing, having sex with men, wielding a sword (read: the phallic symbol) and taking life rather than creating it. and yet she maintains sex appeal for men and unquestionable femininity: 

“Jack began kissing her hands, short-nailed and strong from work, but they were well-tended and feminine. He could never have mistaken them for a man’s hands.”

in her hands –– which are the agents of creation and generation –– there’s masculine behavior (wielding a sword, tending ropes at sea) matched with feminine shape and behavior (managing her appearance, softness in care to self ). without going too much into it I think what I’m starting to get at is the Eve/Lilith dichotomy, and while Esmeralda absolutely does top Jack and see herself as more than equal to men I’m more interested in Lilith’s pursuit: 

“The angels left God and pursued Lilith, whom they overtook in the midst of the sea, in the mighty waters wherein the Egyptians were destined to drown. They told her God's word, but she did not wish to return. The angels said, 'We shall drown you in the sea.’“

the sea is something feminine that gives life, to sailors it gives death. to Jack the sea means freedom and rebirth;  to Esmeralda the sea has only ever meant blood, conquest, revenge, and death. 

#// long post #i need to read up more on lilith before i start spouting more bullshit but thoughts are Forming in my brain about shipwreck cove as eden #( literally a city of plenty and based in life-giving water; safe and unseen to the outside world ) #and esmeralda as she's shown in shipwreck as eve whereas esmeralda post shipwreck after she's gained her captaincy as lilith #jack drinks his respect women juice so he always sees her as beautiful and amazing no matter what / he's impressed with her captaincy & more #masculine traits ( but taken in the context that jack is antithetical to the values of mainstream society & struggles against them too ) #also in terms of lilith topping see bainbridge not letting himself be ''plundered'' by a woman or metaphorically ''topped'' by one #so much there. no much juicy content in a potc prequel novel. in the r rated crispin cut esme probably tops jack. #but we are forced to wonder #✘; IN A WORLD WITHOUT GOLD，WE MIGHT HAVE BEEN HEROES ( headcanon ) #how the fuck did i start at ''esme is a beauty influencer lol'' and end up at ''esme is lilith'' #goddamn academia brain fuck off #also i want to be clear that i only briefly mentioned race here because especially in context with amenirdis esmeralda's #race plays a far less significant part in the events of the book than it does to the princess so i feel i should distinguish between #esmeralda being judged as less eurocentrically feminine vs. amenirdis literally being enslaved #with this in mind her race does affect those standards and it certainly impacts her social status & rights; Jack's opinion that she could be #a lady of court is simply not true and if she were she would be rejected #crispin is careful about this but the implication that it was the 'marriage' of her father and mother that caused the uprising of local #white europeans ( NOT the sex or lust but the legal and societal validation ) #it changes her sense of self from what it would have been as illegitimate but she has seen the evidence of the violence the world (europe) #will do. she has the deaths of her parents to reckon with as people who transgressed past those boundaries and she is the manifestation of #the ''crimes'' against spain which would see them murdered for it #anyway i wrote a whole other essay in the tags whoops