Good Girls Tell Lies: Internalized Misogyny in Twilight

TBAT is pleased to present the first Slacktiverse Special

There’s a chance you’ve heard of “Twilight” – Stephenie Meyer’s four-book series on sparkly vampires have won multiple awards including the 2008 British Book Award for “Children’s Book of the Year” and the 2009 Kids’ Choice Award for “Favorite Book”. As of this time last year, the series had sold over 100 million copies worldwide, and has resulted in a series of movie spin-offs. * And if you’re a dedicated book shopper you can also blame the popularity of “Twilight” for the glut of new YA paranormal literature that is now being published by the bucket-load in the hopes that lightning will strike twice.

 

What’s fascinating about this level of popularity is that the plot in “Twilight” is actually fairly simple – the series revolves around a love triangle between an ordinary teenage girl and the two paranormal men who love her: a pale 104-year-old vampire masquerading as a high school teenager and a swarthy Native American werewolf with fiery skin and a fiery temper.

 

There’s very little to be had in “Twilight” besides the love triangle – this isn’t an action-packed series like “The Hunger Games”, it’s not a religious commentary like “His Dark Materials”, and it’s not as concerned with the paranormal elements in the story as is, say, “The Spiderwick Chronicles” or “Sisters of the Moon”. Yet, despite the sparse plot and characterization, “Twilight” continues to be massively popular – the books, movies, and spin-off novellas still sell astonishingly well, even six years after the first run in 2005. The fans aren’t all YA girls, either – demographically speaking, women of all ages are ardent fans of the series (including my 60-year-old mother-in-law), and I myself can claim a teenage step-son who attends the movies with only token protests.

 

Now, I’m particularly fond of literary deconstruction, especially of popular series – I feel that it’s important to take a long look at a phenomenon like “Twilight” and tease apart what the narrative means to us and about us as a society. What’s awkward about deconstructing “Twilight”, though, is that unlike, say, the “Left Behind” series (an example taken completely and totally at random**), there’s not a significant body of readers that claims “Twilight” as a life guide to be followed – if evangelical works like “Left Behind” are seen as proscriptive by their readers, then we can safely say that works like “Twilight” are generally seen as descriptive by their readers. Most readers take “Twilight” as fluff literature only – and may actively resent the implication that by enjoying a popular series, they are somehow participating in something Bad.

 

I’m sympathetic to that viewpoint – a deconstruction of a popular series needn’t be about how the readers are bad for enjoying it. So while I think we have a responsibility to ourselves to look at popular literature as Serious Business and examine what the underlying assumptions and themes in that literature say about society in general, I would never presume to say that enjoying “Twilight” as a series says something about a reader in particular.

 

And having now said that, there’s a lot to be said about the themes within “Twilight”. The series has been accused of racism, as the lovely heroine wavers indecisively between her two suitors: one calm, cool, controlled, and marble-white; the other testy, aggressive, emotional, and dark-skinned. The series has also been accused of sexism, as almost all of the women in the book have very few interests outside the home – women are defined almost completely in terms of the men around them. These issues become even more complex when taking into account Stephenie Meyer’s membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints – LDS doctrine on the place of women*** and non-white peoples**** in the church has historically been complicated, to say the least. All these issues are things that I think can and do deserve to be discussed (and I try to do so to the best of my poor abilities), even if the discussion makes us uncomfortable. Especially if the discussion makes us uncomfortable.

 

However, one issue that stands out to me more than any other issue in “Twilight” is that of deception. That might not seem very important – deception is a respected staple of YA literature because it allows the scrappy protagonists a chance to duck away from prying adult eyes in order to have adventures. And I would be the last person on earth to tell you that deception is some sort of categorical “sin” – I learned a long time ago that it’s rarely worthwhile to anyone for me to say exactly what’s on my mind. Judicious, thoughtful, and minimal use of deception can prevent strife, defuse arguments, and soothe hurt feelings. By contrast, though, excessive deception can utterly wreck people and relationships, and it is this sort of deception that frustrates and fascinates me as I work through “Twilight”.

 

The first few pages of “Twilight” are literally covered with deceptions. The novel opens with protagonist Bella Swan as she prepares to leave her mother in Phoenix, Arizona to move in with her father in Forks, Washington. This move represents a major sacrifice for Bella – she has always made it clear that she hates Forks – but she wants to provide space for her newly remarried mother. What’s astonishing about this actually-not-uncommon situation is the way in which is it utterly characterized by silence, lies, and deception. Bella’s mother knows why Bella is moving, and pleads with her to stay, but it’s clear to both Bella and the reader that she doesn’t really mean it. Bella insists, over and over again, that she wants to go, that the experience will be good for her, but both women know this is a lie. Bella’s father – who has been rung up out of the blue and told to air out Bella’s room – doesn’t have the first clue why his emotionally distant daughter would suddenly want to live in a town she has previously refused to even visit… and he doesn’t feel the desire to ask. To paraphrase one of my previous posts

I find this setup frustrating because neither Bella nor Renee have actually broached the topic in plain English and discussed the situation like adults. What's worse is that Charlie is completely in the dark about Bella's motivations. Charlie doesn't need to be confused about this situation, and if he is to have any kind of meaningful relationship with Bella, he shouldn't be forced into continuing that state of confusion. Charlie's interpretation of Bella's decision will completely color all his interactions with her over the next several months, and thus it's important that he start with the correct interpretation of the situation.

In a healthy family, Bella's sudden and completely uncharacteristic decision to move to a place she openly hates would have triggered an avalanche of discussions within the family from either side: Is she unhappy with school? Does she dislike Phil, or has he hurt her in any way? Has her relationship with her mother become strained as a result of her new marriage? Of course, Bella reassures the reader that none of those things are true, but it's telling that neither of her parents even bother to ask about these things.

This theme of lies and deception doesn’t begin and end as a simple literary device to propel Bella towards the plot as quickly as possible – almost as soon as Bella steps off the plane, she will start lying to her mother, her father, her classmates, and her many, many suitors. From within the preponderance of lies and deceptions, there starts to arise a disturbing trend: the apparent belief within the text that Bella should be doing all this lying.

 

You see, when Bella lies, it’s almost always in order to get what she wants without having to plainly say what she wants. The fact that Bella’s lies are often burdensome and painful to her makes a degree of sense from a characterization perspective – it may not be the best choice to protect your family from difficult truths with pleasant lies, but it’s certainly a realistic choice. However, that reasoning starts to fracture when non-paranormal boys start pursuing Bella and we see her desperately lying to them in repeated and vain attempts to deflect their unwanted attentions rather than plainly and firmly saying, “No.” She has travel plans! She has to stay home and study! She has to wash her hair that weekend!

 

What’s noteworthy about this is that Bella has no reason to lie to these boys. She doesn’t care about their feelings, she’s not friends with them in any meaningful way, and she doesn’t even want to be friends with them – she doesn’t anticipate a single consequence to a plain rejection that she wouldn’t otherwise welcome. Furthermore, she’s well aware that her evasions will clearly not solve the issue, so she additionally works tirelessly to try to shift their attentions onto other classmates. Bella isn’t a matchmaker and doesn’t take any pleasure at all in these machinations – she just wants to be left alone and the only apparent route that she can see towards this goal is to work constantly to “avoid” and/or “fix” the situation without ever once so much as hinting at the truth: that she’s just not that into them.

 

When we see Bella’s lies in this light – as painful and burdensome lies that she feels compelled to tell to near-strangers rather than be honest about her own wants and needs – then all her other lies start to sharply refocus into something disturbing. Maybe Bella doesn’t lie to her parents because she’s a normal girl who doesn’t want them to worry, or because she’s a manipulative girl interested in getting her own way – maybe her lies and silence (as well as her parents’ curious disinterest in talking to her) are indicative of a family environment where “good daughters” don’t express wants beyond what has been planned for them. Maybe Bella doesn’t lie to her paranormal suitors because she fears hurting them or because she’s trying to avoid rejection – maybe she feels shamed into denying that she even has desires and plans. Suddenly, these deceptions aren’t healthy, judicious choices that Bella makes in service to an end-goal – they’re an unhealthy, forced behavior that attempts to somehow reconcile a contradiction between Bella’s internal desires and her “appropriate” external behavior.

 

Stephenie Meyer has dismissed feminist criticism of “Twilight” by saying that the fact that Bella exercises “choice” throughout the novels reflects the foundation of modern feminism*. However, it seems to me that the “feminism” that “Twilight” offers us is a very poor one indeed. The Feminism of Twilight is that you CAN have your choice and follow your dreams – as long as your choice is shrouded in subterfuge.

 

The Feminism of “Twilight” seems to be that you can choose to not date a boy you’re not interested in… but you’d better expend a lot of time and effort into making sure you don’t hurt his feelings with a plain rejection. You can choose a different path from what your parents want for you… but it’s best not to sit down and discuss it with them because that will hurt their fantasy of you as their precious little girl. You can choose to plan ahead for sex, er, vampirism, but you’d better keep those desires and plans to yourself or your boyfriend may think you’re slutty. Choice is great, after all, but you wouldn’t want a reputation as a stuck-up, disobedient, slutty girl… would you?

 

Of course, the major problem with this is that a worldview that gives girls “choice” but expects them to be secretive and ashamed of exercising it isn’t healthy. It’s exhausting for the girls as they constantly work to maintain the perfect appearance of fulfilling the expectations laid on them by their peers, parents, and lovers. Furthermore, it’s dangerous – when you can’t safely own and express your desires, then you also can’t receive valuable feedback and advice. A system that allows “choice” only when it’s accompanied by deception and shame destroys families, ruins relationships, and tears apart girls – and yet it’s this system that I feel “Twilight” encourages for our young women. I don’t blame Stephenie Meyer for this, but I do blame the environment that raised her (and, for that matter, the rest of us) to believe that the only way she can have her cake is if she eats it after all the guests have left.

 

--Ana Mardoll

 
Visit Ana's website to read more of her analysis of the Twilight books
___________________________________________________________

* Source

** I may have mentioned before that I’m a huge fan of Fred Clark’s “Left Behind” deconstructions and those posts were a strong inspiration for my starting a “Twilight” series.

*** Source

**** Source

 

 

The Slacktiverse is a community blog. Content reflects the individual opinions of the contributors. We welcome disagreement in the comment threads, and invite anyone who wishes to present an alternative interpretation of a situation to write and submit a post.

Comments

[anamardoll]

I can't begin to express my pleasure at being able to write a Slacktiverse Special post - thank you to everyone on The Slacktiverse (including the wonderful three-headed TBAT) for this opportunity. :D

I should say that if you're interested in reading more of my "Twilight" posts, here is a topical link to let you bypass all the book reviews and new author interviews and drill straight down to the fun-and-juicy critiques:

http://www.anamardoll.com/search/label/blog%20deconstruction

Thank you again!

[Thalia]

That certainly resonates with me. I have a niece, and I imagine she is growing up much as I did, going through machinations not to hurt people's... no, BOYS' feelings, ... I was fortunate not to have parents like that, but I can extrapolate. If you and I are right, my niece's fannishness makes perfect sense. Bella makes sense to them.

Ugh. That's not pleasant to imagine.

[Adrenalin Tim]

Great post, Ana. Thank you.

I don't have much intelligent to say, but wanted to point you in the direction of a critique of the Evangelical Christian embrace of the Twilight books:

“Why Are You Apologizing for Bleeding?” Confronting the Evangelical Embrace of Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight Saga

[Enoch Root]

I don't know much about Twilight other than it's popular and it seems pretty silly. But I wonder if this emphasis on deception is really intentional, or just sloppy writing on the part of someone who enjoys deception all the time. That is, if you write a story based on the predicate that Monsters Aren't That Bad After All, then having a lying protagonist doesn't seem that far fetched. And given the generally tepid reviews I've heard from friends who bothered to read the things, it seems like the author might not really be in control of whether deception is an intentional character trait or just something to write about.

Also, as a man, I'd like to point out: You can't be a feminist if the only desirable men in your book are monsters.

[Karen, who needs to write a new blog post]

Good post, and welcome Ana! I haven't read "Twilight," but many of my friends have, and your critique resonates with what they've said.

[Mmy]

@Enoch Root: I don't know much about Twilight other than it's popular and it seems pretty silly.

Can I snarkily say that almost anything can be described in a way that makes it sound "silly" and that if you don't know much about it it might be best not to second guess the critique of someone who does.

But I wonder if this emphasis on deception is really intentional, or just sloppy writing on the part of someone who enjoys deception all the time.

Since you haven't "bothered to" read "the things" you don't really have any creds when it comes to commenting on the writing.

I have read Meyer and though she is not one of the great stylists of our time I wouldn't characterize her writing as sloppy. For example, unlike the writers of the Left Behind series she seems to have actually kept track of what she wrote in the previous chapter. Bella is annoying (to me) but her characterization doesn't waiver from chapter to chapter. She is a fully realized person whose virtues and faults do not change from one page to another. Indeed, once one has read the first several chapters of Twilight one has a firm grasp on what Bella is likely to do in a given circumstance.

That is one of the strangely compelling qualities of the book -- that Bella is a fully realized character, albeit the type of fully realized character that someone with Meyer's background and belief systems would create. Bella lies (to herself as much as to anyone) not because Meyer is sloppy but because given Meyer's depiction of her, there is no other way Bella could have responded.

Also, as a man, I'd like to point out: You can't be a feminist if the only desirable men* in your book are monsters.

As a woman I'd like to point out that I don't need a man to tell me how to be a feminist -- and it is fairly simple to be a feminist even if most of the men around you are monsters. Just ask many of the real world feminists who are dealing with real world monsters.

*You do realize, don't you, that not all women spend their lives looking for a "desirable" man?

[Dorid]

This kind of deception on the part of females wishing to find an "eternal love" in supernatural males in young adult lit isn't terribly unique. It seems a natural extension of the teen angst theme "no one understands me". Girls in these books don't act out when they aren't heard like boys do. Instead the become increasingly meek, obedient or self destructive... Ophelia syndrome.

Meyers is capable of some more complex writing, as is evidenced by The Host, so I don't think Bella's seemingly stereotypical angst-filled and rather two dimensional relationships are entirely accidental. I do think, at times, that they may be entirely commercial, appealing to the most shallow longings in young girls.

[Ravanan]

Rhinestones are sparkly and pretty. Vampires are cool. Unless you are David Bowie, combining the two is an abomination.

My theory is that Edward Cullen is actually a Chupacabra. He drinks the blood of livestock, is a stalker by nature, and displays mineral characteristics in sunlight.
Okay, enough bashing on THOSE grounds.

@Enoch I fail to see your reasoning. Why should it matter that much whether the men are human or monsters? Unless you're actually suggesting that they are horrible people (which I won't dispute). Your case then is...better.

Anyways, just thought I'd leave this here: How It Should Have Ended

(not to try to steal any thunder here, but I found copies of Jenkins' Underground Zealot novels, and I'm looking at doing a dissection of them soon; could not find The Brotherhood at library though)

[CZEdwards (who was CSHolocene)]

Great post, Ana, and thank you! You actually just clarified something for me with this line: she just wants to be left alone and the only apparent route that she can see towards this goal is to work constantly to “avoid” and/or “fix” the situation without ever once so much as hinting at the truth

This describes my best friend, though in a somewhat different situation. (Incidentally, said best friend was my introduction to the "Twilight" series, and she is a big "Twilight" fan.) Without getting into details, my friend has a fairly difficult relationship with her parents, one that is defined by deceiving one parent with regards to her (my friend's) feelings, or massive emotional blow-outs with the other parent when said feelings come to light. Not a terribly functional situation, and one that has recently become much worse.

I've been trying to understand my friend's attraction to the whole saga for a couple of years, because friend, in most other aspects, finds much of the saga's subject matter repugnant (i.e. the stalking, the manipulation, the strict gender roles, the chastity -- she's not a big romance reader, either). She's my normal deconstruction partner, so when she couldn't define why she identified with Bella so strongly, nor why she found the lads charming, it astonished both of us. (I find the whole series baffling and repellant.) Now, I'm getting it -- Bella successfully avoids conflict in the same way my friend tries to do. I'm now trying to think of other female protagonists who successfully use this same tactic* and for the most part, coming up blank. But it's not an uncommon real-world strategy, except that in the real world, it usually fails.

I'd like to chalk up Bella's chronic self- and other-deception to poor writing (because it's not like the series lacks sketchy language, two-dimensional characterization and iffy world-building) but I'm afraid it's all too apt since deception and deception by omission are common enough conflict avoidance strategies. I am going to continue to hope that the attraction for younger readers (I'm GenX, my friend is lagging-edge X/bleeding edge Y, so we're out of the target market) is the mystery of a hidden world of somewhat empathetic monsters, the romance of being at the apex of a triangle and the thrill of limerence and unconsummated attraction instead of the other awfulness that I pick up.

* Buffy, occasionally, especially in season six, which works So Very Poorly; Kate in "Lost", with similar iffy results. Even in The Host when Meyers' protagonists deceive each other, it's for good reasons. (Not saying more to avoid being spoilery.) Maybe I'm missing something by being more of an SF&F reader when in leisure...

[lucky7]

Beyond the unhealthiness of caring so much for the fragility of BOYs' feelings, it just plainly doesn't work, it doesn't spare anyone's feelings, just hurt it more, and will only earn resentment for the deceiver. A plain rejection is a solid thing, one can take and move on, deception on the other hand is an amorphous blob that is impossible to handle and shades everything it touches.

[Kitti]

Even disregarding her flagrant abuse of the English language, SMeyer is incapable of good writing for the simple fact that she refuses to acknowledge that her characters are deeply flawed people in fantastically unhealthy relationships. Even her snark is boring. Also, the misogyny isn't hidden.

[ArianaDream]

Great start - I think I'm going to be reading more of your work. I have heard a lot about the Twilight series, including many criticisms of it, but this aspect of deception is one I have NOT heard. An additional problem with telling girls that they should be deceptive and not honest about their feelings - it promotes an unhealthy attitude for men, too. Men are so often told that women never say what they mean, and so men have to play a strange game to try to find out what it is that women really want. Women supposedly play hard to get, and you never know if they're just playing games or what they really mean. This leads men to assume that a woman is lying or being evasive, that when she says "no" she really means "yes", and this leads to not taking a woman's own words seriously, and to not listening to her when she explains her wants, needs, and choices. Ultimately this kind of attitude can even lead to men ignoring or overriding a woman's right to say no - I'm certain this contributes to the vast number of rapes perpetrated in our society. It may seem like an exaggeration, but I really do believe this is true.

[Jenny Islander]

There's a T-shirt for sale over at Riot Nrrd that reads:

TEAM BELLA
GET OUT NOW, GIRL

[Nebris]

Buffy vs Edward: Twilight Remixed

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZwM3GvaTRM

[Jim]

For an interesting take on the Twilight series and Bella in particular, check out Luminosity, a fanfic where Bella is a rationalist. As the author puts it, "A few thousand words in, the plot is unrecognizeable." I dare say rational!Bella is a good bit more psychologically and socially healthy than canon!Bella.

[Brad]

Women supposedly play hard to get, and you never know if they're just playing games or what they really mean. This leads men to assume that a woman is lying or being evasive, that when she says "no" she really means "yes", and this leads to not taking a woman's own words seriously, and to not listening to her when she explains her wants, needs, and choices. Ultimately this kind of attitude can even lead to men ignoring or overriding a woman's right to say no - I'm certain this contributes to the vast number of rapes perpetrated in our society.

A joke from Archie Comics (mid-'60s):

Dilton Doily is lamenting his lack of success in the romance department. Reggie offers to set him straight:

"When a girl says, 'No,' she really means, 'Maybe"; And when she says, 'Maybe,' she really means, 'Yes!' And that's all there is to the Kiss Biz, dig?"

"But the girls I ask don't say, 'Yes,' 'No,' or 'Maybe'; th-they just say, 'Phooey'!" [Exit downcast Dilton as Archie and Reggie collapse in laughter.]

This has been another in a series of Jokes They Couldn't Do Today.

[Ravanan]

@Ariana I'm reminded of my favorite Disney female who was in an otherwise rather lackluster movie. Megara, from Hercules. Specifically the line: "Well you know how men are, they think "No" means "Yes" and "Get lost" means "Take me, I'm yours." " I agree that it probably plays some role, but it probably isn't that significant. A lot of guys (and a disturbing number of women), for instance, seem to think that women in certain styles of clothing are giving their consent by doing so (I'm not trying to victim-blame here, I'm pointing out that a lot of people do...rape culture and whatnot).

[Kitti]

Slightly more on-topic: IIRC, Bella makes a point of mentioning, several times, that she dislikes lying and doesn't do it often, and then only when absolutely necessary. When practically all of her interactions with other characters are marked by dishonesty, I must conclude that there is something not right here. More disturbing to me, though, is how SMeyer sees suicidal!Bella in New Moon; she keeps calling Bella self-sacrificing, but that rings absolutely false. By definition, it only counts as a sacrifice if you actually care about the thing you're giving up. Unless the word "sacrifice" has a different meaning in the Twiverse, which is entirely possible (see also: Meyer/Bella's use of the word "irony"). Being willing to die for someone doesn't really mean much if you want to die anyway.

[Kit Whitfield]

I really enjoyed this!

I have a slightly different read on Bella's deceptiveness, which I'd be interested to hear Ana's view on.

You say earlier on your blog, Ana, that Bella comes across as 'catty and spoiled', both of which I agree with, and it's one of her distinguishing features that she's never actually nice to anybody. She hides herself, but her internal commentary about everybody except Edward is extremely spiteful and contemptuous, and even with Edward, an awful lot of what she says to him is of the eye-rolling sarcastic variety. They do what he says, but most of her conversation with him has a surprisingly confrontational air to it - which is as pervasive, and as unnecessary, as her constant lies.

To me, these combine to convey an impression of superiority. Bella pays a lot of lip-service to her supposed faults, but they're morally neutral things like clumsiness and they never actually cause her any problems; when it comes to how she judges people, she always looks down on them. Even with her father, it's phrases like 'I put my foot down' and 'I couldn't compromise' - the language of authority rather than submission. And despite her supposed insecurity about her looks, she views her attraction to Edward in the manner of a girl who has the right to expect his attention. A truly insecure girl, you'd think, would recognise that she had a crush, assume there's no way he'd ever be interested in the likes of her, sigh and try to hide her feelings so nobody could tease her about them - and especially hide them from him, because if he knew he'd probably laugh at her, right? Bella, on the other hand, is perfectly prepared to demand Edward's attention, even though she knows he's never stooped to pay any attention to the girls she's supposedly friends with.

So I wonder if you might argue that Bella's constant lying is partly an issue of status: she's not about to let lesser mortals know what she's thinking, because that would mean making some kind of connection with them, and connected with anybody less high-status than Edward would sully her. Among its other qualities, Twilight is very, very, very much a book of social aspiration - Edward's in the coolest clique on campus, and being a vampire just makes him even cooler - and one of the things about social climbing is that you don't want 'trash hanging on to your coat-tails', as Margaret Mitchell puts it. Telling people the truth would mean having genuine relationships with them, which would hold her back.

This being a book full of doublethink, there's no reason why it couldn't be about superiority and Good Girlness at the same time. But my take was that Bella had a gloss of appropriate femininity over a ragingly entitled ego.

[Nenya]

Hooray! A Twilight post! The ongoing series is great and everyone should read it immediately.

I should probably admit here that I haven't read more than a few pages of the books (and saw New Moon on DVD), although my sister hated them and my (usually very smart and rational and at least somewhat feminist) favourite cousin quite enjoyed them. So there's that. (I am more disturbed by my early-teen cousin on the other side of the family who was the first person I knew to read them, but that is mostly because she's already in a very chastity-focused environment.)

Anyway, the deception angle is really interesting and, I think, important. I find for myself that while I don't outright lie often, I have a very hard time saying No (as well as saying when I want TO do something that someone else hasn't already brought up as an option). So the whole, "Yeah, I can't, I have to do homework," thing is really familiar. Is this because of my authoritarian childhood? Is this a facet of my personality, to not want to upset others? Is it because I was raised female in a sexist society? It's probably a mixture of all of the above, but I can't say I would recommend a book like this to a young woman, since it just reinforces that same bullshit.

This analysis really does help me understand why someone might identify with Bella, though.

(Besides the bit where I now see her as Joan Jett all the time, and oh God that version of Kristen Stewart is so incredibly gay and super hot, but yeah. Not talking about my celebrity lesbian crushes here or anything.)

[ArianaDream]

@Brad - Ha, exactly. (I wonder if that joke was funnier back then.)

@Ravanan - Oh man, I LOVE Megara. One of my favorites, definitely. I need to get busy and write that review of Hercules for my blog. Come to think of it, it's really kind of awesome that they put into words that very problem and had a strong, female character say it.

[Asha ( EHHH??)]

I have, for awhile, tried to understand why my sister enjoys these books so much- to the point of begging me to read them. I did, and I just couldn't understand the appeal. It was horrendously dull. In the light of this essay I am reminded that she does tend to be a pathological liar. She lies, to herself and to others and has as long as I have known her. I know that another part of her wishes for the perfect romance (like many girls, she thought Romeo and Juliet was the height of romance) and has had some very bad experiences with men. She also seems to be terrified of being alone.

At any rate, I like the analysis because I still DON'T GET IT.

[Kit Whitfield]

I've been reading the article Adrenalin Tim linked with great interest, but the link to the second part of it is broken. If anyone's looking for it, here you go:

Part II: http://theotherjournal.com/2010/10/05/grateful-victimization-joyful-suffering-confronting-the-evangelical-embrace-of-stephenie-meyer%E2%80%99s-twilight-saga-part-ii/

Part III: http://theotherjournal.com/2010/11/17/the-bruises-of-bella-swan-confronting-the-evangelical-embrace-of-stephenie-meyer’s-twilight-saga-part-iii/

[LeRoc]

Forgive me my ignorance (being a man), but I always understood that when a woman gives an evasive answer to the advances of a man, especially a man she doesn't know, this is a form of self protection.

For example, when a man comes up to a woman in a bar offering her a drink, she never knows if she gives him a direct "no" whether he will become agressive or not. It seems to me that giving an evasive answer ("I have to see a friend/I'm going home already/whatever") is safer in this respect.

So I wouldn't always call it deception.

[Kit Whitfield]

I always understood that when a woman gives an evasive answer to the advances of a man, especially a man she doesn't know, this is a form of self protection.

Like men, women are a diverse group of people who may have a variety of different motivations behind the same action. We aren't all the same.

For example, when a man comes up to a woman in a bar offering her a drink, she never knows if she gives him a direct "no" whether he will become agressive or not. It seems to me that giving an evasive answer ("I have to see a friend/I'm going home already/whatever") is safer in this respect.

It's an awful lot more complicated than that. Women aren't just afraid of attack: we're socialised from childhood to avoid hurting anyone's feelings by asserting ourselves too much. Like men, women are punished when they stray from the approved gender role, and equivocal refusals are an integral part of the female role.

In addition, an unclear 'no' is likely to be more dangerous than a clear one. A direct 'no' should deter a decent man, and if a man doesn't respect it, he signals his potential danger in time for the woman to get away. An unclear refusal, however, can be misread as a potential 'yes', leading some men who'd walk away from a straight 'no' to become more aggressive in the hopes of persuading a woman to change her mind.

So no, not really.

So I wouldn't always call it deception.

Seriously - if you're not a woman, it's really not a good idea to make pronouncements on what women are like. There are women in this discussion; ask us if you want to know. You're describing women as if there aren't any women around to hear you, even when the author of the article and several posters are identifiably female. This is very rude. Please reconsider this.

[ArianaDream]

Huh, I've never heard of the idea of not saying a clear no in order to prevent someone from becoming aggressive. I don't do the bar scene, but if I did, I'd feel pretty comfortable saying a very polite and genuine, "Oh, that's sweet of you to offer, but no thank you." Hopefully this is also pretty clear. If a man got aggressive for any reason after this, at least I'd be in a public place, and would be able to tell from his behavior if I'd have to be particularly careful on my way to my car later. (Although I'm always very careful on my way to my car at night. Being a woman pretty much means ALWAYS thinking about your safety and your surroundings, never heading for your car without your keys at the ready (and palmed in such a way that you can scratch an attacker's face with them), and probably making sure you have a trusted escort of some type, too.

Anyway, points for at least realizing that women often do things for the sake of caution and safety, purely because we are women and sometimes that's just what we have to do. Although I've never heard of a woman being reluctant to give a clear no because of her own safety - quite the opposite. Making your boundaries and wishes very clear is a basic part of keeping yourself safe and preserving those boundaries.

[Ruby]

Ravanan: (not to try to steal any thunder here, but I found copies of Jenkins' Underground Zealot novels, and I'm looking at doing a dissection of them soon; could not find The Brotherhood at library though)

Got it covered. :D

http://heathencritique.wordpress.com/category/soon/

[Ruby]

@Ravanan--I'm not sure The Brotherhood is part of Underground Zealot series anyway, which is Soon, Silenced, and Shadowed. I think The Brotherhood is part of Jenkins' new Precinct 11 series.

[Mmy]

@Kitti: SMeyer is incapable of good writing for the simple fact that she refuses to acknowledge that her characters are deeply flawed people in fantastically unhealthy relationships

The fact that a writer (in your words) "refuses to acknowledge" some aspect of her characters that you think unhealthy does not may her "incapable of good writing" unless your definition of *good* means "agrees with me about what people should and should not be like and uses an anvil to hit readers on and about the head with that opinion."

Shakespeare, by that definition, is clearly not a good writer.

[Ruby, on the go]

@LeRoc--Actually, if I gave a guy an unequivical No in a public place, I would be very surprised if he became aggressive. Men aren't socialized to be aggressive to women in public any more than women are socialized to give firm denials. So being "evasive" is not "self-protection" for me.

[MadGastronomer, who is very tired]

Just a suggestion: Men, you might want to be particularly careful about what you say about women in this thread. Don't make generalizations about us, don't tell us how to be feminists, don't talk about things you don't know about. Do engage, do talk, do ask about things you don't understand. But do watch your privilege.

Topics like this seem to bring guys out of the woodwork to mansplain these things to us poor wimminfolk.

[anamardoll]

I'm so glad several posters have brought up "The Host" - I read that book after I read "Twilight" and was shocked and surprised to find that I un-ironically thought it was quite good. I spent a few weeks puzzling over this - at first I thought Stephenie Meyer had maybe had a great deal of editing help, or had taken some "Twilight" criticisms to heart, bu the more I analyzed it, I kept finding the same themes in "The Host" as I did in "Twilight" - it's just that those themes didn't bother me anymore in "The Host".

The reason for this, I realized, is that the setting in "The Host" is completely different than in "Twilight". In "The Host", the main character is quite literally a Prisoner Of War in a quiet literally hostile environment. She's beaten and abused, and if she doesn't go along 100% with every little thing her captors want, she quite literally will be killed on the spot.

With that change of setting, it makes sense for the main character to deceive if it will mean her survival. It makes sense for her to be submissive to the "love interests" and acquiesce to their wishes with only token protests. It makes sense that she's carried around like a sack of potatoes all the time (Meyer is very fond of her female protagonists being carried around) because between the beatings and the fact that her captors don't want her able to escape, she's not allowed to walk on her own very much to begin with.

It was only after seeing how the themes make sense in a situation of captivity, that I started to feel that maybe Bella was in a situation of captivity too - and I just couldn't see the cage. Of course, it seems to me that Bella could "get out now" at any time, but it's interesting that she frequently dismisses college and doesn't seem to have any ambition towards a career or higher education. One almost starts to suspect that she hasn't been raised to value these things, or to think that they're attainable for her.

---

But then there's this, and I'm thrilled you brought it up, Kit:

To me, these combine to convey an impression of superiority. Bella pays a lot of lip-service to her supposed faults, but they're morally neutral things like clumsiness and they never actually cause her any problems; when it comes to how she judges people, she always looks down on them. Even with her father, it's phrases like 'I put my foot down' and 'I couldn't compromise' - the language of authority rather than submission.

You're absolutely right - Bella's internal voice is *incredibly* snotty and judgmental - and it's one of the hardest things about analyzing "Twilight", because everyone seems to have these internal contradictions. Even while Bella is yearning after Edward and literally doing everything he tells her to do, she's snarking at him and stomping his foot and generally acting like a brat. And even while Bella is publicly living by Charlie's rules (while smuggling her boyfriend up to her room nightly) and cooking and cleaning and doing his laundry for him, she's internally thinking how out of touch Charlie is and passing judgment on him.

So you end up with this weird combination of a woman who is ultimately submissive (except when she's privately not, which is still submission of a kind) and yet seems to think that she's better than everyone around her, including the men she submits to.

The only thing I can compare this to is my own religious upbringing. I know in retrospect that I was incredibly submissive to the rules - I literally thought rules laid down by my parents and church *couldn't* be broken, and it never occurred to me to even try. Nevertheless, I certainly felt superior to a good many people, including the people making the rules - I felt superior to the rule-makers because I saw that the rules were often nonsensical, but I'm sure I felt superior to the rule-breakers as well because I had been obedient and they had not.

As you say, the internalization of all this isn't mutually exclusive, and it just goes to show how screwed up a sexist society can make you - but the fascinating thing is that it *does* make it very hard to sympathize with Bella at times because her thoughts can be so toxic.

Charlie is a fascinating flip side to this. On the one hand, he seems to have gotten a really raw deal. His wife ran out on him and for the past three years the only way he's been able to see his daughter is to shell out something like $10,000 on California vacations. Despite his endless willingness to please, his daughter seems to completely despise him, and the only pictures he has of her are impersonal school pictures that I imagine look down on him with radiating disapproval. SAD!

On the other hand, though, Charlie is emotionally distant, perpetually lies to Bella, tries to control her to a disturbing degree, seems obsessed with her sexuality, and is a generally crappy father. He seems relieved to "let" Bella take over all the cooking, cleaning, laundry, and housework despite the fact that supposedly he's been doing all that for 16+ years, and you'd think he'd be okay with it by now. He interrogates her about her boyfriends and unhooks her battery leads at night because he's *convinced* she's the type of girl who will sneak out at night (despite there being no evidence of that whatsoever). Most damning of all, he buys her a car (nice!) without asking her opinions (um...) and then tries repeatedly to lie about the age of the car so that she'll be more impressed (bad!).

It's a puzzlement trying to sort out characters who can be sympathetic and yet fundamentally toxic at the same time. o.O

[anamardoll]

LeRoc,

Others have answered your questions better than I will, but I did wonder - as you did - if maybe Bella's deceptions to her high school suitors were some attempt at self protection. However, in the text she seems pretty clearly unafraid of the boys and doesn't consider rejecting them to be a threat to her physical safety. That's what I was trying to convey when I said, "she doesn’t anticipate a single consequence to a plain rejection that she wouldn’t otherwise welcome," since I knew that not everyone had read the series recently. :)

The question itself ("Is she lying to protect herself?") is not a bad question, and I would not consider deception-for-protection to be a bad thing, but unfortunately it's more complicated for that. Women aren't really trained to be evasive to prevent being hurt because as a strategy it doesn't work - violent men are violent regardless of evasion or straight answers. Victim blaming is used to cover up that fact: when the man gets violent after a clear "no", it's her fault for being so rude; when the man gets violent after an evasive answer, it's her fault for not being upfront and honest.

Of course, many women are trained to be evasive (which is what I'm seeing in Bella's character), but it is almost always conveyed by a heavy layer of "good girls are polite" socialization that is about so much more than just "don't be direct or you might get hurt". Indeed, the latter would in some ways be more healthy framing because at least then it's about "do X behavior to be safe" as opposed to "do X behavior because you need to be constantly aware of and responsible for other people's feelings". The former, while bad advice, at least acknowledges that you deserve to be safe; the latter does not.

[Mmy]

@anamardoll: It was only after seeing how the themes make sense in a situation of captivity, that I started to feel that maybe Bella was in a situation of captivity too - and I just couldn't see the cage. Of course, it seems to me that Bella could "get out now" at any time, but it's interesting that she frequently dismisses college and doesn't seem to have any ambition towards a career or higher education. One almost starts to suspect that she hasn't been raised to value these things, or to think that they're attainable for her.

Wow -- that is a good way of thinking about it. Bella cannot acknowledge even to herself that she actually is in a cage yet at the same time she must be aware of it at some level since her behaviour (and even her attitudes) are those of someone who is in a cage and must conduct herself accordingly.

On a fascinatingly meta level one might wonder if Meyer herself was using her ability to write* to escape from her own cage.**

* For those who enjoy scoffing at Meyer's writing ability I challenge you to write a better book. Writing is one of those things that everyone likes to criticize even though most of us have yet to demonstrate we are any better at writing than the authors we criticize.***

** Not psychoanalyzing Meyer. Everyone in our society is in one way or another in cage.

*** Anyone who has had to read several thousand undergraduate essays can tell you just large the gap is between "willingness to criticize" and "ability to write well."

[Mmy]

WARNING!!! Completely OT posting.

It is official, the Canadian government has fallen. The Conservatives lost a no confidence vote last night and Harper paid the requisite visit to the Governor General today (Saturday morning).

As of now the campaigning has begun and Canadians will go to the polls on May 2.

For Americans who are used to the pace of their elections -- that is May 2 THIS YEAR. Six weeks and two days from today.

Now, we can return to regular commenting and I can pass my time over the next 6 weeks getting annoyed at either

a) the lack of American coverage of the election in the country to the north

or

b)the misinformation in the American coverage of the election in the country to the north.

[Sixwing, who is interested in this (and also wants to avoid an argument with a Tea-partier relative about it)]

Off topic reply:
I did find some US coverage of the Canadian vote of no confidence. This quote is getting a lot of exercise:

"The Liberal members over there claimed to have found that the government has done something wrong," Baird said. "What they aren't telling Canadians is that this was an opposition-stacked committee who used the tyranny of the majority to get the predetermined outcome they wanted."

Things I find interesting:
- The phrase "tyrrany of the majority" is not often used here in my region of the US, as it is often seen as a complaint about democracy (?) rather than a valid political phenomenon. Thus, it's interesting to see a minority government which, from most of what I've seen here online, has been running the show for quite a while, use it to complain about being expected to share the spotlight. Of course, US (and BBC) coverage of Canadian events tends to not be great, and I don't tend to follow it closely either, so it's probable that I am missing information that would make that a bit less strange.

- I have found only passing mention that the opposition parties had a problem with something budgetary (costs not explained? Or was it that costs of military things weren't explained? Or possibly that the Conservative party didn't share its budget at all? I've seen all three.) So there's confusion there, on my part.

I don't have the time to really get into CBC and dig this morning, but I'll be doing so later on, to see if I can tease out what is going on without the US or British biases involved.

[Sixwing, who is interested in this (and also wants to avoid an argument with a Tea-partier relative about it)]

Whoa. I think I broke blockquote.

No? Good.

[Kit Whitfield]

Even while Bella is yearning after Edward and literally doing everything he tells her to do, she's snarking at him and stomping his foot and generally acting like a brat.

Yes, that is interesting, isn't it? Their conversation is remarkably unromantic; most of the time it's more like an argument than the language of love.

I've got two theories about that. They may conflict with each other, but then I suspect it's the internal tensions that make the book so appealing to such a wide variety of readers...

The first is that it's a heavy case of 'Guess Culture'. This is a term first proposed on Metafilter, and you can read the whole post here:

http://ask.metafilter.com/55153/Whats-the-middle-ground-between-FU-and-Welcome#830421.

The basic concept is that in some cultures or families, 'it's OK to ask for anything at all, but you gotta realize you might get no for an answer. This is Ask Culture.' On the other hand, 'In Guess Culture, you avoid putting a request into words unless you're pretty sure the answer will be yes. Guess Culture depends on a tight net of shared expectations. A key skill is putting out delicate feelers. If you do this with enough subtlety, you won't even have to make the request directly; you'll get an offer. Even then, the offer may be genuine or pro forma; it takes yet more skill and delicacy to discern whether you should accept.'

You might argue that Bella is afflicted with such a case of Guess Culture that not only does her wellbeing depend on people making decisions for her; she has to make a show of refusing them in order not to look greedy. It's the fantasy of getting exactly what you want without having to articulate it, even to yourself, and no matter how you act.

The other theory is that it's a form of sadomasochism. I've gone into fairly prolix detail about that in the past -

http://kitwhitfield.blogspot.com/2009/08/innocent-libertinism.html

- but the basic idea is that Bella's behaviour towards Edward is ambivalently provocative. She enjoys being controlled, and hence constantly goads him into reassuring displays of dominance.

These two things, as I said, are not incompatible - nor are they incompatible with your (extremely interesting) points about a religious upbringing. Twilight is kind of the ultimate 'all things to all girls' book.

[Ruby, on the go]

@mmy--I've never been a fan of the "If you don't like it, write a better book," school of criticism-of-criticism. Many people are capable of discerning good writing from bad without having been published. To me, that idea smacks way too strongly of the "You cannot criticize the wars unless you served. Did you serve?? WELL, DID YOU, COMMIE???" Response that happens every time a liberal comments on foreign policy.

[Kit Whitfield]

I think it's legitimate to criticise someone's writing ability without being able to write yourself. I can't write good poetry, but I know bad poetry when I see it.

On the other hand, 'So and so can't write' isn't a very interesting criticism because it's just a flat assertion that shuts down nuance and detail. It isn't particularly interesting even if a good writer says it.

It's also unlikely to be completely correct, at least when it comes to Meyer: Meyer is a writer who can be infelicitous in her phrasing, unbalanced in her plotting and questionable in her views of human nature, but you don't sell that many million books unless you're good at some aspects of writing. She's good at conveying the absolute, single-minded, relentless nature of adolescent love. She's good at writing fantasies that resonate with other women. She's good at holding the reader's attention, or at least, holding many readers' attention. I personally didn't enjoy the first book, which is the only one I've read, because all the other stuff got in the way of the fantasy and page-turning elements, but I think dismissing any successful writer as 'unable to write' is simplistic and inaccurate.

I also think there's a kind of innocence to Meyer's writing. Bella herself is far from innocent - she's manipulative, secretive and self-centred - but it has a raw, unfiltered quality that has a certain intimacy. It's worth recalling that Meyer didn't set out to be a multi-million-selling cult author: she just did what every writer does, which is wrote a book that appealed to her imagination and then sent it off hopefully to a publisher. That she's such a hit is not her fault.

I think there are criticisms you can make of the books' portrayals of human interaction (and of their execution, but in a way, the infelicities are so straightforward that there's a limited amount of interest to say about them), but I don't think she should be written off. There are more interesting things to say about her.

[Mmy]

@Ruby: -I've never been a fan of the "If you don't like it, write a better book," school of criticism-of-criticism. Many people are capable of discerning good writing from bad without having been published. To me, that idea smacks way too strongly of the "You cannot criticize the wars unless you served.

Fair argument Ruby. I was thinking of people who criticize using a specific language -- that of accusing the writer of being "lazy", "sloppy" or other words that denote lack of effort. That the very same people who make such arguments then regularly turn in writing that is execrable always made me want to ask the person involved why he turned in something that indicated that he was a lazy student with sloppy writing habits.

The thing that angers me is the easy assumption that if the speaker/critic bothered to write a book it would of course be a magnificent piece of writing. Rather like Lady Catherine de Bourgh discussing playing music in Pride and Prejudice

Of music! Then pray speak aloud. It is of all subjects my delight. I must have my share in the conversation, if you are speaking of music. There are few people in England, I suppose, who have more true enjoyment of music than myself, or a better natural taste. If I had ever learnt, I should have been a great proficient. And so would Anne, if her health had allowed her to apply. I am confident that she would have performed delightfully.

My other pet peeve is to denounce as "bad writing" anything the reader does not like. I have heard students denounce Shakespeare, Homer, Austen, Wharton, James, Melville, Orwell and the female Brontës among others as bad writers since they (the critic) thought it stupid to "worry about whom to marry", "believe Zeus and gods like that", "be depressing" and "worry so much about stupid social values."

There are a lot of books I don't "get" (I have written elsewhere about my struggles with Middlemarch) and a lot of writers whose skill I recognize but whose works I find either emotionally or intellectually unappealing. I think it is important for people to be able to make a distinction between "doesn't work for me" and "she's a bad writer."

I think (?hope?) that having the experience of other people critiquing one's own work would give people a better understanding of the difference between technically bad and "doesn't work for me."

[Coleslaw]

It's a puzzlement trying to sort out characters who can be sympathetic and yet fundamentally toxic at the same time.

That's called "family life".

[Lunch Meat]

Markreads.net does a good job of analyzing the technical flaws of Meyers' writing, like her word usage, sense of pacing, use of foreshadowing, telling-without-showing, and character assassination of Jacob. She may be a good writer, but I think it's fair to say her skills are not showcased in the twilight series.

[redcrow]

Mmy, I agree with Ruby here. "Don't criticise unless you can do better" is one of the things that makes me twitch. It's not about "bawwww, they're taking away my right to point and laugh!" I, like Ruby, have my own set of (not triggering for me, but unpleasant) associations this idea brings up for me, and those are not some hypothetical examples but things that real people really say/write to/about those who disagree with them. Yes, some of those things were addressed to me. So it's hard for me to be unbiased (or even biased the other way around: "Yay, I'm going to quote Mmy to anyone who will say bad things about my stories!").

[redcrow]

Oh, I typed too long, I see you addressed it already.

[Jenny Islander]

Oh, drat, I forgot the setup. See, if you haven't bumped into the million and one examples of this, official Twilight merchandise includes clothes, bags, etc., marked either TEAM JACOB or TEAM EDWARD, for who Bella should end up having weirdly written married sexytimes with. TEAM BELLA (get out now, girl) makes a hell of a lot more sense to me.

[Thalia]

Mmy, you're right, I have no idea what you are talking about (goes to look up my ex-pat canadian friends to help me decipher it).

@Kit: Guess culture? There's a phrase for the way my family behaves? Now I know why I've had such a hard time establishing "Ask Culture" for myself.

[BringTheNoise]

As of now the campaigning has begun and Canadians will go to the polls on May 2.

Three days before the UK referendum on the Alternative Vote system, and elections to the Scottish Parliament, Welsh Assembly and Northern Irish Assembly, incidentally. Trying to steal our thunder, Harper? ;-)

[Ruby]

Mmy: Fair argument Ruby. I was thinking of people who criticize using a specific language -- that of accusing the writer of being "lazy", "sloppy" or other words that denote lack of effort. That the very same people who make such arguments then regularly turn in writing that is execrable always made me want to ask the person involved why he turned in something that indicated that he was a lazy student with sloppy writing habits.

The thing that angers me is the easy assumption that if the speaker/critic bothered to write a book it would of course be a magnificent piece of writing. Rather like Lady Catherine de Bourgh discussing playing music in Pride and Prejudice

I love that bit with Lady Catherine. :D

It rather depends on what exactly the critic is saying, no? When I criticize Soon or Babylon Rising, I am not saying I could write a better novel. (And I say this as someone who has been published, albeit in nonfiction.) But just as it's unfair to say that someone must serve in the military before criticizing a war, it is unfair to say that any critic of literature must first write a popular novel. We have certainly never demanded that of Fred as he deconstructs the LB series.

That said, it may well be unfair to call a writer "lazy" or "sloppy" rather than making more pointed (and less personal) arguments. But that problem will still not be solved by the critic becoming a bestselling novelist.

[Kit Whitfield]

it may well be unfair to call a writer "lazy" or "sloppy" rather than making more pointed (and less personal) arguments

I think it also presumes a level of knowledge of the writer's thought processes that we generally don't have. What looks like lazy writing might just be the best a hard-working writer could produce, or a slip that happened to get missed, nobody being perfect. There may be works egregious enough in their internal contradictions and failure to make sense that are exceptions, but on the whole I think that 'lazy' or 'sloppy' are guesses masquerading as knowledge, which is seldom wise.