Twilight

So I've been thinking a lot about sexism, patriarchy, and feminism lately... (What an opening line, right?! Gimme a break. I'm an academic in denial.) And, in a seemingly unrelated and perhaps contradictory vein (just wait), I've been reading a lot of fiction this summer, trying to ease my mind with the joyful nature of written language before the looming school year forces me back into writings' excruciatingly complex, theoretical, and brain-mushing side. On Thursday morning I finished reading Stephenie Meyer's debut novel Twilight which has been on my reading list for a little while now. I tend to find a lot of pleasure in reading young adult fiction, a genre too often highly underrated. Upon completion of my chosen light reading, I have found myself quite conflicted. Why? Sexism, patriarchy, and feminism.

First of all, I think Twilight is a brilliant story. (I'll do my best not to write any spoilers for those who haven't read the book but would like to. Read freely, eager readers, read!) Meyers has written, in Bella Swan and Edward Cullen, rich lead characters, paid exquisite attention to detail, and penned a story that literally raises your pulse and makes your heart ache with exhilaration, anxiety, longing, and general emotional conflict. She has essentially written the eternal love story -- two star-crossed individuals tempted by a forbidden love and thus living out their relationship with the heartbreaking understanding that they are destined to be one another's destruction. While Meyer doesn't focus on it, the story has a deep core of melancholy, impossible desire, and breathtaking sadness. Think along the lines of the most tragic rendition of Romeo and Juliet you've ever seen or read, add vampires and a lot of rain, and you've got Twilight. In a number of ways the story reminds me of several ancient Chinese or Japanese legends, so many of which end tragically and heartbreakingly: a lover drowning him or herself in the sea from sorrow, broken promises that destroy love and goodness, magical transformations that show the heartbreaking true nature of persons -- stories that show utter sadness and sorrow in ways often missing in Western tales. But, I felt it in Twilight.

That said, as I read Twilight, I found myself mentally reliving fantasies of "love" from early adolescence in which I would be in some horrible predicament and my beau would swoop down and rescue me in his big, strong, brave way -- saving the day and protecting me from harm. (Gag me.) Twilight exactly mirrors these depictions of love that rely on ideas of men as brave, strong protectors and women as innocent, meek, mild flowers in need of being taken care of. Stories of utter dependence and domination. (Puke.) Seriously, I've spent the past 15 years redefining my ideas of relationships, intentionally working to counter these lies we've been told about how the perfect love story is lived out. And here it is today, in print, in my hands, presented in beautifully, heartbreakingly devastating prose telling me again these falisies. I want to wilt in the sadness of that recognition.

Just as a recap, the essential story of Edward and Bella's relationship is something like this: Edward's been a vampire for a hundred years or so, but always alone. Then he meets Bella and is fascinated. (Gotta love the "I've roamed the earth for a century and never found anyone who makes me feel like you do" motif. It pulls at the heartstrings of girls and women who never learned better. Do I sound bitter?) On the flip side, in an interview with Entertainment Weekly Meyer said,

Bella is an every girl. She's not a hero, and she doesn't know the difference between Prada and whatever else is out there. She doesn't always have to be cool, or wear the coolest clothes ever. She's normal. And there aren't a lot of girls in literature that are normal.

Being 'normal' and 'everyday' is fine and wonderful (really, I mean it), but if Bella really is 'everyday' and 'normal,' I'm a little scared. While Bella is feisty, quick-witted, and intelligent, she also spends most of the book falling all over Edward, who just happens to like her back. Lucky her. Envision the most "Oh, I love him so much. I can't live without him. I don't know why he likes me. But, he's gorgeous and I would do anything for him" angsty teen image you can drag up. That's Bella. (And, true-to-God, I say that with love. Cuz Lord knows, I love these characters.)

When it comes down to it, I am really concerned about the power dynamics in this whole thing. And when I say "power" I mean a number of things. Yes, physical power. Edward could kill Bella in a second. No questions asked. He could do anything with/to Bella, with or without her consent. Physically, he's got that strength. But, emotionally and psychologically, he controls himself. And we're supposed to love him for it. (And we do.) Bella, on the other hand, what's she got? Undying love. That's about it. She's okay with Edward spying on her at school and watching her while she sleeps and asking her to tell lies to protect their relationship -- because she loves him. But, take that love away, and what do you have? A stalker. Once again, I've gotta say, I love Edward, but seriously, if Bella ever put her foot down -- which she wouldn't -- their whole situation would look so different. So, when I say "power" I'm talking about something much deeper than physical power. I'm talking about that exceedingly fine line between permission and domination. About the role of an individual's will as it interacts with someone else's. We accept Edward's behavior because Bella accepts it, sometimes even welcomes it. Does that make her, or him, wrong-minded? Not necessarily. It's just a reminder of how emotions filter our understanding of the world. Significantly.

So, what am I saying? Um, I think Bella, despite her displays of strength and perseverance, is in a supremely unbalanced relationship which seems to be tied up in the difficult grey spaces surrounding issues of will and domination. Plus, we've got that added layer of the female character as the submissive, household duty fulfilling, "I'll do anything because I love you" role, which mostly sucks cuz we as a society are still fighting, fighting, fighting to offer alternative views of womanhood. If this is the role you choose for yourself, fine, but I want to know that you think you had an option, a true choice, not that your womanhood was defined in this way because it's the only way. Do you see my distinction here? (And on a side note, I also read the whole Uglies series by Scott Westerfeld this summer. It's an excellent series critiquing the consumptive, beauty and fame dominated ideologies of society, and the main character is a strong, take-no-crap girl named Tally who embodies femininity and womanhood very differently than Bella and STILL gets the guy(s). Check it out.)

Now, to Bella's credit, at one point in the book (p. 473-474) she says

I'll be the first to admit that I have no experience with relationships, but it just seems logical... a man and a woman have to be somewhat equal... as in, one of them can't always be swooping in and saving the other one. They have to save each other equally. ... I can't always be Lois Lane. I want to be Superman, too.

So she sees this inequality, this power-differential, and identifies it as a problem for her. But I can't say I'm in love with her solution. (Uh, changing SPECIES for a guy?! Uh...)

Leonard Sax, in an article for The Mercury News in Silicon Valley, talks about the gender roles in the Twilight series this way:

The lead male characters, Edward Cullen and Jacob Black, are muscular and unwaveringly brave, while Bella and the other girls bake cookies, make supper for the men and hold all-female slumber parties. It gets worse for feminists: Bella is regularly threatened with violence in the first three books, and in every instance she is rescued by Edward or Jacob. In the third book she describes herself as "helpless and delicious." ... For more than three decades, political correctness has required that educators and parents pretend that gender doesn't really matter. The results of that policy are upon us: a growing cohort of young men who spend many hours each week playing video games and looking at pornography online, while their sisters and friends dream of gentle werewolves who are content to cuddle with them and dazzling vampires who will protect them from danger. In other words, ignoring gender differences is contributing to a growing gender divide.

So, why am I blathering on about all this? Here's the big reason: I, as a grown-up, trying-to-be-critical-of-the-world-around-me woman, can have this whole little conversation with myself (see above) about the power dynamics in this vampire-human love story. But I'm not the target audience for this book. The book is marketed as a young adult novel and has been supremely popular with the 12-17 year old girl bracket (aka - middle school, high school girls). And it worries me. (Do you wanna see what I'm talking about? Check out this short vid from Twilight's reception at Comic-Con in San Diego. Couple key quotes, in additional to all the adolescent screaming: "She skipped school [to come]..."; "We screamed! It was awesome!"; "Obsessive Cullen Disorder." Sigh...)

Do I think young people should be prevented from reading the book? Absolutely not. If they want to read it, read it. (I'm not into banning books, or restricting who reads what books. I think banning books is bad. And mean.) But, are young people talking about the power dynamics of this love story? I don't know. But I haven't been seeing signs that they are.

Plus, I think the series is about to get way more popular, possibly with a wider audience. Twilight, the movie, is coming out November 21, 2008 (taking the release slot Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince vacated when their release got moved to Summer 2009) and is likely to draw big crowds. Lots of folks say the book/movie franchise is likely to be the next Harry Potter. I don't think it's going to go that far, but it might make a stir. Think about this: The movie cast is led by Kristen Stewart (of Jumper, Into the Wild, Zathura, and Panic Room fame) playing Bella and Robert Pattinson (who's best known for playing Cedric Diggory in two Harry Potter films) playing Edward. Add Catherine Hardwicke as director (Thirteen and The Nativity Story), Melissa Rosenberg as the screenwriter (writer/producer on Dexter, The O.C., writer of Step Up, etc.), and Carter Burwell on the score (No Country for Old Men, Intolerable Cruelty, A Knight's Tale, Being John Malkovich, The Big Lebowski, Fargo, etc. etc.) and WHOA. (And, on a side note, Meyer's stipulation when she signed over rights for the movie was that the film had to be rated no higher than PG-13, which I assume it tied to her desire to support a film she feels comfortable watching as a practicing member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. To read more about how Meyer's Mormon philosophy affected her writing of the Twilight series, check out this article in TimesOnline. The book is brimming with sexual tension and implied violence, but Hardwicke is on board too, so I expect the PG-13 goal will be met.)

Just for fun, here's the film's trailer:


All that said, do I plan to read the other three books in the series? Absolutely. Do I plan to watch the movie? Probably. Does any of that abate my concerns about the messages being reinforced about the roles of men and women in relationships? No. It's just a reminder that issues of feminism, sexism, and patriarchy are crazy complicated. And just like in Meyer's story, sometimes you're tempted by the "evil" but the real question is how you deal with it.

UPDATE: So, I finished New Moon, book two in the series, and I'm disappointed. I keep seeing other people with these little decorative buttons sayings "Bella takes feminism back 100 years." Now I know why. (If you're not into spoilers, stop reading.) The first hundred pages demonstrates very clearly that Bella does not exist as a complete and individual person outside the context of her failed relationship with Edward. Then the next 150 pages describe her apathy towards life and self, her deep emotional imbalance, and her self-destructive tendencies. I can cut a girl some slack for being heartbroken, but the heartbreak Bella lives is a denial of her own worthwhile humanity, and I think it sucks, sends bad messages about women and love, and is frankly annoying. Moving on, I really like Jacob, but think Bella treats him like shit. She's a user and drops him in a second when it suites her. Regardless of her 'remorse' or 'guilt' or whatever, the ease with which she treats her self-proclaimed best friend with such lack of concern or consideration is crap. She's fickle, and once again willing to sacrifice literally EVERYTHING for the love of her man. It makes me grumpy. - 9/10/08

UPDATE: No time like the present for yet another update, eh? So, I watched Twilight the movie the weekend after Thanksgiving, finished Eclipse in early December, and wrapped up Breaking Dawn on New Year's day. (Happy 2009, y'all.) My response? (Spoilers are included, so stop reading if you don't wanna know.) Ho-hum. That's my response: ho-hum.

I guess my summary would be that in the last two books we lose some of the richness that could have been our main characters (Bella, Edward, and Jacob). While the action is rich (and highly compatible with film-making), true emotional depth and complexity gets a bit lost, I think.

Eclipse was essentially an angsty book -- Edward being his overbearing, overprotective self (which got annoying), Jacob being his heartbroken teenage self (which also got annoying), and Bella being endlessly selfish, failing to be decisive about how she deals with others' emotions, and thus hurting everyone more than necessary (also annoying). Though, I must admit, the battle at the end of the book was pretty amazing.

Breaking Dawn was LONG, at 756 pages, and became a series of plot points that really reduced our characters to predictable protagonists. Meyer's writing is compelling, so you are engrossed and keep reading, but I think she betrays her own potential (that sounds harsh in a way I don't really intend it to...) by truly transforming Bella into a Mary Sue. She becomes a vampire and is PERFECT. Lucky her. Our fallible (and thus humanly lovable) Bella is gone. In the end, the story is resolved as a happy ending, ride-off-into-the-sunset series. Worth reading. (And a quick read.) But, a bit disappointing.

The Twilight movie was okay. I took my dad for an "outsider's" perspective, and he liked it. I did too, I think. Nothing amazing, but good. I would say all the reviews (the good and bad) are pretty on par.

Also, there was a very interesting conversation over at Racialicious titled "The Politics of Wizards and Vampires" about the ideological differences between the left-leaning Harry Potter books and the right-leaning Twilight series. (The post was written by the awesome Alisa Valdes-Rodriquez, who I know best from having written the wonderful ChicaLit novel The Dirty Girls Social Club.) While I agree with most of the analysis, I think it's important to be careful not to paint one side or another as 'right' or 'wrong,' because we are talking about deep ideological differences. In the end we will all choose our stances, but it's important to think about the many sides of every story before (and after) we do so. The entry is definitely worth a read, especially for those that have read both series.

Also, Stephenie Meyer has posted an interesting response to some folks' claims that Bella is an anti-feminist heroine. I'm not really interested in discussing it in-depth, but I agree with Meyer that feminism is about choice and I agree that Bella should be free to make whatever choices she wants (to end her mortal life, to get married at 18, to abstain from a life-saving abortion). Rock on, Bella. Do your thing.

My critique is that I think feminism is something bigger. It's about creating free-will choices for everyone -- men and women -- with less social pressure to choose certain paths. Meyer says,

"I never meant for her [Bella's] fictional choices to be a model for anyone else's real life choices. She is a character in a story, nothing more or less. On top of that, this is not even realistic fiction, it's a fantasy with vampires and werewolves, so no one could ever make her exact choices. ... Also, she's in a situation that none of us has ever been in, because she lives in a fantasy world."

The argument that "this is fiction; it doesn't mean anything in real life" doesn't work for me. I believe that all artistic creation and expression is a reflection of our understanding of 'real' life and impacts the ways we live life. Thus, saying the Twilight stories have no impact on the thinking or living of readers is a fallacy.

Is Bella and the whole Twilight saga an anti-feminist set of writings? I don't know. And I don't think the answer matters. The value of the question is in the conversations that emerge around the ideas and the ways those conversations impact our understanding of ourselves, our world, and the place of feminism in it. -1/3/09