It's an academic application and English lit is not a vocational degree, they don't care if you come across as 'sheltered' or if you haven't had a real job before. Lots of people who do masters/phds have never worked a day in their lives (especially in subjects like English where most students are wealthy - most working class undergrad English students don't have the privilege of forking out to do a masters in a subject with so few career prospects).
They care that you have a good undergraduate transcript, letters of recommendation, decent writing skills and potential to succeed. Ruby was more than capable of cobbling together essays made up of other peoples ideas to convince Exeter lecturers to give her firsts, so there's really no reason why she wouldn't also convince Oxford to let her in. Her little side projects she's done over her gap yah are only filler to bulk up her application and for her to show she has an interest.
Would they not be looking at her CV and general work/academic history as an indication of what kind of candidate she is, though? (Genuine question, I have no history with Oxford admissions.) I assume there's a reason they ask for a CV as part of the supporting documents for non-vocational degrees as well, especially if she's likely to be highlighting "work" roles in her personal statement to try to boost her chances.
She also had the benefit of Exeter's well-publicised grade inflation on her side there. If the essays and writing she's shown are any indication of what she'll be offering up as her academic samples and proposal, I'd be shocked if she managed to
bull her way past Oxford admissions with that kind of crap. I'm guessing at post-grad there's much more value placed on original proposals instead of rehashed ideas that have been explored countless times in academic research, which has never been her strong suit, so I'm not optimistic about her chances.
But maybe that's why she's off skiing, to celebrate her acceptance and "accidentally" nudge Martha off a mountain to come home an only child.