Twilight Saga: It Won’t Ruin Girls’ Lives, But I Sure Take Issue With It

09.02.2008 | Author: Kim | Posted in Blather

In the last eleven days I have read 2500 pages of teen vampire drama-romance. What started as an electric devouring of young-adult escapist fantasy ended in a feminist rage. No worries, though; I’m not going to go full-tilt into a feminist rage here.

I’ll start on the escapist-fiction front. Stephenie Meyer can spin a good tale. Reading the four books in her Twilight saga in such rapid succession gave me great respect for her talent as a writer. Given that Twilight was her first novel and that she had little writing experience before she wrote it, it was inevitable that her technique would evolve with each subsequent novel. To my surprise and delight, she added to her initial panache for writing about teenage (any age, really) infatuation quite a prowess for action-adventure. With the unfortunate exception of her protagonist, she developed her characters beautifully. She has a true gift for showing human emotion without gooeyness or its foil, irony.

SPOILER ALERT: I might ruin stuff for you below. Proceed with caution.

Twilight was by far the best in the series. New Moon, its sequel, was fairly mediocre; it didn’t manage to develop the characters (with the exception of werewolf best friend Jacob) nor the universe in any significant way. Eclipse started out slow but built into quite a page turner. And, ah, Breaking Dawn. Quite a news-maker, Breaking Dawn. The first half of the final book is one of the oddest I think I’ve ever read. Kudos to Meyer for letting her imagination run to some truly gruesome places unfettered. Edward chewing his baby out of Bella’s dying body? Gross doesn’t really cut it. Best-friend werewolf Jacob imprinting on the vampire-human hybrid baby? It didn’t even smack of Jerry Springer. Let me be perfectly clear: Some seriously weird shit goes down in the first half of Breaking Dawn.

The second half of the book returns to the style and pacing of the first three installments. It’s as if the film of gore was removed from the lens. I was very happy to learn much more about what it’s like to be a vampire. These are some way cool undead. And that’s about all there is to say about it. The bad guys were bad, but not, like, overwhelmingly eviiil. Which brings me quite nicely to the second front: all the other aspects of these books that drove me absolutely crazy.

First, for an epic saga of teen love in a mythical world, there was a glaring absence of evil that was in any way evil enough. This saga is extraordinarily heavy on good. It adds to the books being so damn easy to read, but it significantly detracts from overall development. In a world where the bad guys are quite clearly the good guys, you need some serious evil to balance it out.

Before I move into only a wee feminist rant, I must explain something about how I usually read fiction. I usually just read it. I have no agenda. I have no bar against which I measure it. I don’t often compare books to other books; I don’t often compare characters to other characters; I often overlook obvious parallels to other literary works (even things as knock-you-over-the-head as biblical allusions). So take that into account when you try to understand what I mean when I say that these books threw me into a feminist RAGE.

Bella Swan is a hysterical, confused, and confusing character. I admire her stubbornness, but never understood where it came from. She behaved as if she knew what the hell she was doing, but then you realize she never really did. She was impulsive but also broody; stubborn but also a doormat. And by god, she had the most impenetrable low self esteem of any teen character I can remember ever encountering.

I ended up hating her as much as I ended up hating Anna Karenina. That’s a lot of loathing.

That’s not a feminist rant, though. Here’s where the feminism comes in.

Bella Swan never believed in herself, and Meyer managed not to make it apparent that the reader is supposed to believe in her anyway. She was a damsel in near-constant distress, and the only ones to ever save her (till the very, very end of the series, at least) were her perfect knights in mythical armour. These men/boys, who had truly admirable abilities to know themselves and to express their emotions, protected her to the point of stifling her very autonomy. And when she would manage to get by them, they’d swoop in and save her from the peril that ensued. She didn’t progress or grow as a character until, wait for it…

… Until she became a mother. And then she became what mothers are apparently supposed to be. Utterly selfless and concerned only with the welfare of her baby; strong only when the baby is threatened; clever, only when it comes to helping the baby. At no point is Bella any of these things when it comes to herself. (Note: I don’t think Bella’s refusal to abort the fetus is anti-feminist. That was her choice. A stupid one, considering it almost killed her, but hers to make all the same.)

And in the end, when she finds her power (a power, note, that she had from the very beginning; one that was always a part of her but she never knew it), when she’s able finally to save the day, it’s because she had to protect everyone else and then afterward she still doesn’t believe she’s anything special.

There’s humble, and then there’s the poor sot who is Bella Swan.

And now to the sex. I have no trouble with the theme of holding off on sex. Not having sex till you’re damn well ready? Good for you. And I absolutely rejoiced in the frank treatment of sex in these books. Bella talks about it quite freely, and with her intended partner, to boot. I do, however, take issue with marriage being in any way a part of that theme. Accordingly, I smirked that it ended up that Bella’s primary motivation to marry was to finally have sex with Edward (despite, oh lovely metaphor, that his undead strength could potentially kill her if he were to lose control in the throes). Major life commitment entered into when fully unsure and uncomfortable: Apparently okay. One bout of potentially deadly intercourse when all dangers are understood: Apparently to be avoided until coerced into marriage.

(Note: I take no issue with the characters of Edward and Jacob, aside from the bits where their true love stifles Bella [and I actually think that's ultimately a problem with Bella's character]. ETA: What I mean here is that it’s a failure of Meyer’s not to have made Bella stand up to these guys. I think the guys would have respected her.)

As a once-disastrous teenager, and as an adult who has worked with teen girls of all sorts, I became quite severely angered that these books might influence teen girls in any way. Either to dream after the perfect man who would solve all their problems, or to expect that becoming a finally beautiful vampire would make their lives easier. It would suck to wake up one day in early adulthood and realize you have to work at relationships and fight for what you want in life.

But at the same time, I must certainly keep in mind that I turned out okay. Teenagers are a tough bunch. On the one hand, they are so vulnerable; so quick to make judgments, so often against themselves; so impressionable. On the other hand, and at the very same time, they are smart, capable, and curious. Will the Twilight series damn them to a life of submissive conservatism? No. But hopefully they have some strong women around to talk to them about the books as they read them. Because it would suck for them to lose even a few weeks to imagining having a life as impotent as Bella Swan’s.

Further Reading

Viewing 18 Comments

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    Thank you for putting into words what has bothered me about the Twilight series. Bella is one-dimensional and not a modern character. What is interesting though, is that in talking to girls in my classes who have read the series, I've discovered that they focus more on the characters of Edward and Jacob. Very few of them actually like Bella or respect her. Teenagers are a tough bunch. They have grown up in a world where their mothers work outside the home and many do it to retain an aspect of their self, to have something that defines them as a human being outside of just being a mother.
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    I haven't read the books but risked spoilerage and read on to see what got you so angry... and I imagine I'd be boiling mad about such a lame character too. (Sounds like Meyer needs to have a long lecture from Joss about writing strong female characters.)

    The no-sex-until marriage rule leading to marriage-so-we-can-have-sex seemed to be a popular plotline on 7th Heaven (which I've seen sporadically and and yet most of the episodes I saw were along this theme). I mean, that whole show was really about how you should wait until you are married to have sex and then showcases all the various ways in which you will have a lousy marriage if you marry to have sex. I'm not exactly sure what the moral of that show was supposed to be but it was all kinds of messed up.

    (hello Disqus comment system - dazzle me!)
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    I just finished Breaking Dawn last night. There was one passage especially that bothered me re: needing to be married before sex, where Bella was having one of her anxious thought rambles, and she thinks, o, how do people do this without the fabulous commitment that I clearly have from Edward? it just seemed so heavy handed!
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    Stephenie Meyer addresses some frequently raised issues with Breaking Dawn on her site. I'm fairly convinced she didn't have an agenda. I think it's just the status quo in her life that led to these issues. It's like she didn't take a step back to examine how she could make her characters and storyline kick ass in an inspiring way. She just accepted them at first pass. It's too bad.
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    Thank you, thank you, thank you.
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    Haha, firstly I just wanted to say that this amused me but in a good way.

    Now, being a teenager myself, it also made me chuckle when you said we're a "tough bunch." It's true, we are, but don't be so quick to think that we're so naive and so impressionable. We can be quite thick-headed and stubborn. I always say that an adult will never understand a teenager, even though they used to be one because once matured, the mind has a completely different way of processing information and such. It's science. But that's not at all what this is about.
    I agree, Meyer did a very poor job as developing Bella as a character. I think this is mostly because Bella was mainly developed in Twilight, and being Meyer's first book she wasn't as experienced or as learned in her writing as in the other books. I'm like you, when I read fiction I just read. I don't look for real deeper meaning, I read to enjoy the story line. In this case, an epic romance. I didn't get a good look at Bella until I read Meyer's rough, unfinished draft of Midnight Sun (which is Twilight, except from Edward's point of view). After reading Twilight for the second time, I began to see what Meyer was subtly trying to tell us about Bella. Everything that Edward simply told us about her in Midnight Sun.
    This is where I start to disagree with you. Bella Swan is a completely selfless person. This is true waayy before she becomes a mother herself. Look at her relationship with her mother, it's as if the two have switched roles, Bella is mom and her mother is daughter. Even tho he is a grown man, she hates leaving Charlie (her Dad) to find dinner for himself. She puts everyone before herself and from a feminist's point of view, I can see how this would be looked down upon but I don't think this is a bad trait for anyone to have. Then, Bella is particularly courageous. If you found out there was a coven of vampires living in your town, wouldn't you be a little scared? (I think everyone wants to say no because who wouldn't want Edward Cullen to fall in love with them=]?) Yes, it would be terrifying. She never seems to feel fear at the right moments and sometimes she makes herself look stupid and reckless but mostly it makes her look strong.
    I'm going to try to wrap this up and still say everything that I want to get in...consequently, I don't think Bella is confused, weak or a bad character to have as a role model. She is in love and most everyone would do anything for the one that they love. She's not confused, she knows exactly what she wants throughout the whole entire saga, Edward, and she fought for him from day one. I found Bella to be a particularly strong individual; I just had to dig a little deeper to find it.

    And then back to us darn teenage girls. All we really need is someone to give us that silly little look, remind us that the book is about VAMPIRES AND WEREWOLVES and that it's never gonna happen no matter how often we fantasize about Jacob Black or Edward Cullen.
    At the end of the day, I adore the Twilight saga because I love to read about the love.
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    You rock.

    I did definitely see those traits in Bella throughout the books
    (unfortunately, as you point out, those were some of the *only* traits Bella
    displays, since she just wasn't developed very well). You're right, I take
    issue with Bella putting everyone ahead of herself all the time.
    Selflessness is certainly an admirable trait, but you could also take the
    perspective that she gave her life, too, and that's just extreme beyond
    reason. (I don't really read it that way, though. [Except for a little.] But
    I do read her decisions to have been hasty and in some cases blindly
    irresponsible. I'm a romantic, so I don't think it's cynicism that makes me
    have the adult perspective that teen love is *first* love—which means that
    other, different, often better loves can come later. Loves that make room
    for other things, like interests outside of the object of that love. It
    might be a very non-adolescent view of things. :) Also, my romanticism is
    far more satisfied when teens are passionate about themselves than when
    they're passionate about someone else.)

    But like I said in the end, we must all give teens more credit than we might
    be inclined to give at first. You prove that point, eh? If I'd read these
    books as a teenager, I likely would have felt the same way. I would have
    loved the story, and Edward and Jacob, and I would have dreamed about them.
    And I likely would have simply replaced Bella with myself in those dreams.
    Which means she would have been a green-eyed, poorly dressed,
    ultra-stubborn, headstrong kid who likely would have forced Edward to wait
    till she was thirty.
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    You know what books-meant-for-younger-readers I really like? The Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett and its sequels Hat Full of Sky and Wintersmith. The central character, Tiffany Aching (who is 9, 11 and 13 as each novel comes out) is smart, strong and capable. She's brave. She's human. It's got good and bad and funny all in one, some scary bits, some comic relief...and sheep! (Sorry, had to throw that bit in, being pro-knitting and all).

    A funny quote, from the Wee Free Men Wikipedia page:

    Miss Tick sniffed. "You could say this advice is priceless," she said. "Are you listening?"
    "Yes," said Tiffany.
    "Good. Now...if you trust in yourself..."
    "Yes?"
    "...and believe in your dreams..."
    "Yes?"
    "...and follow your star..." Miss Tick went on.
    "Yes?"
    "...you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy. Good-bye."
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    That's a fabulous piece of dialog, there. I'm going to check those books
    out!
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    Oh, that was just an easy bit to cut and paste -- there's better. MUCH better. You start to realize how Pratchett could inspire something like the Pratchgan after you've read a few of his books:

    http://woolly-knit-bits.blogspot.com/2008/08/pr...
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    Hey, Kim. In this interview: http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20049578,00.html check out her answer under "Was that because of your religion..." I think a lot of her Mormon ideals shine through Bella's character.

    I think I smirked too when Edward puts his foot down about sex before marriage.
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    after discussing the issue seriously with my friends, we decided that the entire fourth twilight book read like a horrid fanfic. bella is strong in her loving and balancing, but it's true that we don't see her as a role model, except as in dealing with boys who have issues. in terms of edward and jacob as characters, meyer did such a thorough job of ruining the best characters she created that the only choice left to us teen girls is either to ignore the bits we don't like, or go with seth, who is perhaps the only cute supernatural male in the whole book who isn't a big fat jerk or taken.

    in regards to terry pratchett, i liked his books for adults even better. my favorite is Going Postal. the great thing about the series is you can read it in almost any order at all, then go back and read it again. it's nonlinear and therefore you gain something new every time you reread the series.
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    Horrid fanfic, yes!
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    As a true twilight fan i think this is the most insulting article i have ever read.
    There were a few things i didnt like about the books but not as much as i didnt like about this article.
    I think Bella's a great role model and represents a teenage girl perfectly in her decisions and her personality.
    Stephenie Meyer did a great job on the series and i cant wait for her future work.
    And as a teenage girl myself i think we know that theres no one out in the world as perfect as Edward Cullen, hes a fictional character.
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    Teenage girls have lots of pressures to deal with these days beeing seen a as sexual objects by males .I think these books are great in the fact that Bella wasnt the one being pressured into sex she had time to decide if it was really worth it .She did get married to have sex but then again she loved him and probly would have wanted to if it wasnt for the triteness of teenage marrige :D
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    If I let myself get started, I'll go on for ages, so aside from agreeing with Kelly that Breaking Dawn read like horrid fanfic, all I can say is that I hated it. I don't hate the series because of it, but I am also on my way towards forgetting that Breaking Dawn exists. I'm going to drown my sorrows over character betrayals and hideous plot points in something I'm sure I'll like. I'm thinking either a Kelly Link short story collection or The Perks of Being a Wallflower. But from here on out for me, the Twilight series ends at Eclipse.
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    I llllove Twilight!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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    I really enjoyed the saga and felt that some of Bella have been more evolved there were a lot of unasnwered questions. But I did not feel that she was not a strong character or that she was an anti femenist. She is called an old soul in the book. Also, there were many parallels to the classics which influenced her to be a more traditional female character. I dont think that teenagers are as impressionable as people think nor do I feel that they will read a vampire romance and beleive thats how life is.
 

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