“Twilight” Final Thoughts

It’s been almost six weeks since I started this blog project–a little longer than I’d anticipated, but here we are. I came into this project with a fairly reasonable goal: read Twilight, write about what I thought, and attempt to figure out the wide-spanning allure of these novels. I titled my posts “a feminist male college graduate reads ‘Twilight’ not to give the impression of coming into the book with the preconceived notion of what I might find, but rather to illustrate the personal perspective from which I view the text. Did I come in looking for anti-feminist rhetoric? No. And I don’t think I found it either. I don’t believe that Stephenie Meyer is anti-feminist. I don’t even feel comfortable saying that she’s not a feminist. If we look at a text from the realm of narrative theory, it’s sloppy to assume that the implied author and the actual author are in fact the same entity. Just because the book may have a problematic feminist slant, it does not mean that we can automatically attribute that slant completely to the actual human being writing the book. Still, those problems are interesting and worthy of consideration.

So. First issue. Is Twilight anti-feminist? No. I don’t think that it is.

Next. Is Twilight problematic? Now here’s where we get into an iffy territory. The act of reading and interpretation is very much a subjective exercise, and what I get from a book may not be what someone finds there. That said, I had a very hard time connecting with Bella. At the beginning of the novel, she seemed to be a strong, assertive, if socially-awkward young woman, with her own set of likes, dislikes, and proclivities. I think that Meyer got into some trouble when she introduced a male love influence who is, by his very nature, stronger, smarter, and more capable than Bella will ever be. It puts Bella in the position of always needing to be protected in the dangerous world of vampires, and it puts paranoid Edward in the position of always needing to be the protector. Bella loves Edward, so she lets him protect her, and Edward loves Bella, so he feels obligated to protect her. This mutual dependency enhances the already pronounced power dynamic; the way things are right now, Bella and Edward can never be equal. And the only way for them to become physically equal is for Bella to renounce her humanity, which, also, would allow her to live with Edward for the rest of time. Bella’s love for Edward and her desire to be equal to him will eventually force her to give up an essential part of what makes her her.

So, now perhaps the biggest question. Did I like the book?

To that, I can only give a half-hearted shrug. It was okay. The narrative was slow and plodding. It only picked up speed in the final 150 pages, and the climax, while appropriate for the general quality of the story until that point, was unsatisfying and left entirely off stage. The main problem is reader engagement. Bella never engaged me–I never really cared about her, and in the waning pages of the novel I was actually astonished with how unthinking and naive she was. She was an unintelligent protagonist whose characteristics required her to not be directly involved in her own narrative. She was just sort of buffeted around by the whims of vampires. It doesn’t make for engaging reading.

And I’m absolutely dumbfounded that this Edward character could be so attractive to legions of readers. Sure, he’s super-handsome, can run real fast, and has this brooding artist quality about him. But so little of what he does is explained or even believable. Why does he love Bella so much? No idea. The whole forbidden love story never hooked into me because, fundamentally, I didn’t buy it. In the words of my favorite professor of all time, there’s not a lot of there there.

The power of this story is predicated on the idea that I would be experiencing emotions and connections that I simply was not, and whether that was a result of my perspective as a reader or a narrative failing on the part of Stephenie Meyer, it doesn’t really matter. The fact is, I read it, and I didn’t really like it. I think Meyer needed more time for revision and a better editor. Repeated words, throw-away chapters, half-drawn characters, a disregard for the ethics implied in her own story, and a lack of narrative momentum really killed the experience for me. Supernatural YA literature can, and has, done better than this. Most of the time I wished I was reading J.K. Rowling or Neil Gaiman or China Mieville.

But that still doesn’t quite cover it all. There’s a final question. I’ve said that I don’t think Twilight is a good book. But is Twilight a dangerous book? Is this the sort of thing that young, impressionable girls should be reading?

And the answer is: if they want to, let them read. Dangerous books are only dangerous if they go uninterrogated. Part of the power of reading is not only taking ideas from books, but also deciding which ideas to leave there. If people are reading these books for a cheap thrill, a romantic story, and some narrative fun, then, yes, by all means, read your beady little eyes out. But I grow concerned when I see “Stupid Lamb” keychains on backpacks, observe “I Love Boys Who Sparkle” t-shirts on middle-school girls, and hear stories of women actually wanting the men in their lives to be more like Edward Cullen and being dissatisfied when they aren’t. There is a difference between being a fan of something and being obsessed with something, and I worry that for many these books have become the latter. The relationships in the books are taken as doctrine, as the way relationships should be, and that’s dangerous.

In the wrong mind, any book can be a bomb. And the reason I wanted to read this book was to try to begin to understand both sides–the throw-away fun story crowd, and the Twi-freak, Cullen-obsessed crowd. But I’m not sure I do because I didn’t fall into either. For me, the book simply wasn’t much fun. Anytime something interesting popped up, three more annoying or problematic elements popped up as well. I just couldn’t get a foothold in this story world.

Will I read the others in the series? Maybe. They’re all sitting on my ‘yet-to-read’ shelf right now. But, to be honest, I’d really rather not. There are too many good books out there to read anything that I don’t enjoy, and I don’t think I would enjoy the other books. If people are, good for them, but I hope they have the ability and desire to stop and think about why.

And I think I’ll get off my literary soap-box now. Thanks to K for her support and perspectives. Thanks to 86 Rabbit for the spirited rebuttals. And thanks to anyone who read along, whether with unflagging interesting, or with rolling eyes.

Cheers.

-Ben