Bella Swan: Human Heroine or Pathetic Wallowing Weakling?

Yeah… your debunking failed. To me, Bella’s still the biggest Mary-Sue in history, Edward’s the most pathetic kind of vampire I’ve come across in all the vampire books I’ve read, and it still reads like bad fan fic. So thibbit!

I love when people make the Mary-Sue comment because it’s somewhat ignorant. A Mary-Sue character is most typically defined an ideal version of the author’s own self or the perfect, ideal choice for the main character of a work of fiction. First of all, even if Bella was an idealized version of Stephenie Meyers, and facets of her personality WERE taken from Stephenie’s own life (she’s the first to admit that), what the hell does that matter? Is a character based off the author somehow NOT three dimensional, or worth less in some way? And as for being an ideal choice – uh…it’s a romance. Isn’t that the point of love? To find your ideal mate? You see, the term Mary-Sue is better left to fanfiction…where idealized characters pop up for the fanfic authors to imagine themselves in their favorite fictional character’s arms, regardless of the believability of such a pairing, based on the character the ORIGINAL author created. This is not a term that can or should be applied to the ORIGINAL fictional character.

And as for Edward being a pathetic vampire – I suppose, if one goes into a story with a rubric of what a vampire SHOULD be, then one might be disappointed. Personally, I don’t like reading the same stories with the exact same characters over and over again, but that’s just me.

And bad fanfic is only bad fanfic if it doesn’t capture the original voice of the characters or feeling of the story – so uh, that leaves one to wonder…what do you feel the original story of Twilight was?

Okay, I completely disagree. Once again you’ve got an admirably well-voiced argument but I maintain my stance as an anti here.

How is Edward’s interest in her any different from the interest of the other residents of Forks at first, for one thing? All he knows about her is that she smells good and he can’t read her thoughts. That’s as superficial as liking her for being the mysterious new girl. And it still doesn’t compensate for the amount of whining she does – I’m not saying that her internal monologue should be bereft of complaint. That would be boring. But she complains about things that are not, in and of themselves, bad. And she thinks of perfectly nice people in completely derogatory terms.

I think Bella is a Mary-Sue not because of her own character, but because of the way that other characters act around her. Sooner or later, she would loose that ‘new girl’ buzz and then, if the kids of Forks were as superficial and unwelcome as she judged them to be, they’d stop spending time with her or inviting her to go places. But they don’t. Characters reactions to her behavior is rarely realistic.

You think she’s strong because she moves to Forks for her mother. I think she’s a wuss because she’s moving to a place that she *knows*, to be with a father who is genuinely a nice guy, and who goes to great lengths to try and help her feel welcome, and all she can do is whine for the first half of the book.

Bella, in my opinion, is a terrible heroine because her world ends and begins with Edward. I think that’s a bad example to set for young girls, even in a romance story, where the pre-occupation with romance is to be expected. Whenever Edward tells her to do something, even if she defies him, she acts as if she is breaking a ‘rule’ – she never becomes indignant at his attempts to control her, or at least, she never aims any indignation towards his character. She doesn’t criticize Edward, but rather places him on a god-like pedastal and forgives him all of his crimes.

Even when she learns that he’s killed people, it doesn’t bother her in the slightest. It sends a message that, when you love a man, you never think any wrong of him. And that’s unrealistic and untrue.

As for her own personality, I think Bella’s self-obsessed. Like most teenagers. But unlike most teenagers, she never suffers any consequences for her actions, and never has to confront the idea that she and her current obsession are not the center of the universe. Yes, she went to Forks for her mother, but that singular act of self-sacrifice is so harped upon by her internal thoughts that it becomes moot. When you give someone a gift, you undo a piece of it if you’re constantly thinking about what it cost you.

I’m not responding to the majority of that because – well, I don’t want to. We see different things in the same story, and that’s understandable, though I simply can’t understand how your THOUGHTS (unvoiced to anyone but yourself) can undo a good deed.

Edward’s attraction is different because he fell in love with her AFTER talking to her. Her answers fascinated him, and the more she spoke, the more he knew her, the more he loved her. Yes, her scent caught his attention (to say the least) and her silent mind made him curious, but he fell in love with HER.

Bella’s world begins and ends with Edward because that is what this story is about. I mean, if they had gone into tangents about what other things she’s interested in…well, it just wouldn’t have fit. Have we missed that she is immortal now – and immortals have endless times for hobbies and school. Edward is what’s happening now…you know, the time period of the books? When you watch Die Hard do you think, by that token, that John McClain lives to fight terrorists? I’m pretty sure he had a life before and he had a life in between all those movies – it’s just those are the points we saw him at.

And with the exception of Angela and Mike, her friends do lose interest in her, particularly after she breaks down in New Moon. You’ll notice Mike and Angela (and by extension, Ben) are the only friends of hers who are mentioned throughout the rest of the series. But after she has chosen Edward, you’ll also notice that there’s no more talk about how popular her table is, or how many boys are falling over her.

Bella actually TELLS Edward that he’s not the center of the universe. Her own universe, that’s another story, but she goes to his family on the issue of becoming a vampire because the decision now affects all the Cullens and not just Edward and Bella. She also spends quite a bit of time worrying and guilty about the fact that the target on HER head (placed there by her and Edward’s insistence on being together, if you want to look at it that way) is going to end up killing one of the Cullens, the wolves, her parents or her friends. All Bella DOES is think about how a situation, aimed at her, is affecting everyone else. Even in Twilight was she worried about herself? Hell no! She was insane with worry that James and Victoria would kill one of the Cullens. She herself went to James to die willingly to save her mother, BEGGING Edward in her letter not to avenge her. That seems pretty unselfish – and very brave – to me.

Lol, I guess I wanted to respond to more than I thought, so I’m going to stop now.

Lol, I can see we’re never going to see eye to eye on this. I don’t think she’s an awful and irredeemable person, I just think she’s a lousy role-model. I mean, as far as her life outside of Edward goes, she doesn’t even have any hobbies. Occasionally, she reads. That’s about it. What do *you* do with your time? What does anyone? Even though she cooks for Charlie, she doesn’t seem to have any real interest in the culinary arts. She’s not a social butterfly, she doesn’t paint or draw, she doesn’t camp, hike, or hang out at the mall… it would be one thing if she had nothing to do because she wasn’t familiar with Forks, but anytime she thinks about what she misses from home it’s always sunshine and her mom (and occasionally the prison-like qualities of her former school) which implies that she’s always kind of done nothing. Like her whole world was just waiting for Edward to walk into it. Which *might* be romantic, in my opinion, if he introduced her to other facets of the world (and in a small way he does, like his music) but for the most part he just introduces her to, well, Edward.

And I will point out that the side-characters start to dwindle away not because they loose interest, but because Bella does. And it certainly takes longer than it ought to, in my opinion. But, I don’t think this is something you and I would ever come to an agreement on – which just see it from two completely different angles.

Twilight is a total and complete failure. That pile of wasted paper doesn’t deserve to even be called a book. They killed all those trees, wasted the time of movie makers, and distorted the minds of billions of teens worldwide. Edward is a fucking sparking vampire with an icy, rock hard body. They made it rock hard so you can’t hear the hollow echo inside of his skull. Bella is a helpless twit who thinks she the luckiest girl on earth to have such a “lover.” Bella cannot decide for herself and when she does, she makes the stupidest choices possible. The youngest of the twitards, the 12-year-old kids, you must pity them because their young minds have been molded by such a catastrophe.

I pity the twaniacs ( twilight maniacs…) Their minds are being washed into thinking that such stupid fiction is good.
There is much better fiction.
The only reason people acually read this crap, is because its “popular” and that “its soo good”.
READ SOME FRICKING EDGAR ALLEN POE…he is a good writer.
heck, ANYONE is better than Stefinie whats-her-face

What I find funniest about some of these comments is that people are attacking the book and saying it is poorly written or whatever when Kristina never argued the quality of the writing. Or even claimed that this was the best piece of fiction out there.

Kristina and I have had a number of conversations about this alone. The Twilight books are NOT well written, that’s not the draw. I think the draw is the characters, you either love or hate the characters. And those who learn to love them want to keep reading about them.

I would never consider any of the Twilight books an epic piece of fiction, but they are enjoyable stories. And I will agree that a number of people are reading Twilight and the rest of the series based on hype. But that’s with anything, the more press and attention a book gets the more people are going to read it.

I’ve read about 10 books a month, on average, since I was 12. I’m 26 now. I’ve read MANY books at a much better quality of writing. It’s one of the reasons I struggled with WHY I loved this series as much as I did.. That doesn’t stop me from being able to appreciate the beauty of the romance…and regardless of the naysayers, I love the characters. I think they’re gorgeous, unique and have a great amount of depth.

Oh, a side note regarding Bitowurd’s last post. Bella has about as many interests as every teenager. Her love of books and music are something she SHARES with Edward, not something he introduced her to. You forget that most of the things that make people interesting, interests that are really developed and deepened, usually happen more towards adulthood. Bella isn’t there yet.

Edward has more interests because he’s had more time. For the entirety of the Twilight series – Bella isn’t looking towards the future as if she’s going to be human. She’s living every moment as if she will get her forever with Edward. That’s what she’s invested in, that’s what she’s working towards. Normally, she’d be thinking about her FINITE future, but Bella is not a normal teenager. She doesn’t want that normal life, and therefor, spending time building up her interests would be a completely useless part of the story. As an author, I know more about my characters than I will ever put on the page. Stephenie is no different. You should visit her site, or read some of the Q and A’s she does. There are only so many things you can put on a page.

Think about what Bella says when Edward worries about the things she’ll miss. “I’ll get to those.” She has no intention of just curling up in his arms, statues forever. Stephenie creates an interesting image of an immortal world. All of the Cullen “kids” have numerous degrees. They all have hobbies as well. Edward has his music, his thirst for knowledge and a vague mechanical interest. Rosalie loves tinkering with cars. She and Alice also love fashion. Esme loves restoration and architecture. Jasper also has a thirst for knowledge – he has the most degrees. Emmett loves any kind of competition. What will Bella find to occupy eternity? How should we know? It’s one of hundreds of untold stories.

EPIC FAIL!
good job on saying abusive relationships are ok and that Bellas constant whining is normal.

90% of the book is repeating the same worthless crap.

fuck twilight
it sucks
you suck

good day.

Remember, girls: If you first boyfriend dumps you, then it’s perfectly okay to go comatose. It’s a sign of True Love!

http://twilightsucks.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=twilight&action=display&thread=220&page=5#9485

Good day.

I’m pretty open minded so I can see your side considering, (And I’ll admit it) I’m a ex-twihard of the nonviolent sort myself.

I was able to relate to Bella up until the “greasy chess nerd” comment came in. I coudl relate when she was dreading her day of school, awkward about her father but I can’t relate to someone when they’re friendly to me on my first day of school and I just call them ugly. That’s really rude to me. She seems to really hate Forks and everyone there. So why did she go there? That”s the question Edward asks. And she comes back with, “Because my mother wanted to travel.”

That was another sign going off in my head. Let’s think this over:
1. She’s selfless.
2. Everyone loves her when she first came to town.
3. She claims she’s ugly yet describes herself as slender with ivory skin. Most girls who think they’re ugly don’t use those adjectives to describe how they look.
4. She doesn’t lose anything in the end, things work out. She doesn’t lose her family, her friends, she gets a baby, she gets forever with her husband in a quaint cottage with an unlimited supply of money.

“Mary Sue, sometimes shortened simply to Sue, is a pejorative term used to describe a fictional character who plays a major role in the plot and is particularly characterized by overly idealized and hackneyed mannerisms, lacking noteworthy flaws, and primarily functioning as wish-fulfillment fantasies for their authors and/or readers. Perhaps the single underlying feature of all characters described as “Mary Sues” is that they are too ostentatious for the audience’s taste, or that the author seems to favor the character too highly. The author may seem to push how exceptional and wonderful the “Mary Sue” character is on his or her audience, sometimes leading the audience to dislike or even resent the character fairly quickly; such a character could be described as an “author’s pet”.”

That’s why I make the Mary-Sue comment. It sounds too much like it. Not to mention she’s basically a self-insert of the author, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self_insert) both of which are traits of most fanfiction authors.

I can’t really think of anything more to say and I’ll await your reply.

Sorry, just noticed this response.

1) She never describes herself as ugly, ever. Just ordinary (which is true, even Edward says that at first until he become fascinated with her and then can’t help but find her beautiful – I can identify with this…many of the boys I’ve had crushes on look ordinary until I see them in a new light, and they become beautiful). She cannot, in her human form, add up to Edward. Edward is, and always will be, 100x more beautiful than ANY human. Slender is not equivalent to beauty. She mentions that she’s slender but soft somehow – not athletic. Obviously, Bella has preconceived notions about what beauty is (you notice she considers blond to be preferable – an opinion I don’t share, but she continuously mentions it about Rosalie and is doubly insecure about Tanya when Edward mentions she’s a blond) Which leads me to my second point

Mary-Sue, by your definition, is an IDEAL character. Bella is extraordinarily flawed. She is insecure, she doesn’t always make the right choices (in fact, when it comes to Jacob, she makes the utterly WRONG choices). I don’t find her remotely ostentatious. Considering the crap the poor girl gets for being too whiny, I’d say she’s less than ideal to a lot of people. And honestly, expecting authors not to project themselves into their characters is not realistic. I am an author, let me tell you, in everything I write there is something of myself – or something I wish I could be. That’s just the way it is. It doesn’t take away from the experience for me.

As for Bella’s comment about chess club Eric – this seems to me less rude as it is realistic. First off – she does not describe HIM as greasy, she describes his hair as greasy – fact (so to speak). And she never calls him a nerd. I would say this is the author giving you more of an idea of Edward’s competition as it were, and set the tone of a high school more accurately. Mike and Tyler are a bit more attractive and sought after than Eric – all a normal high school drama. Do you know the concept of a cabbage? Essentially, it’s a tool, used mostly in television and movies, when a character observes, tells or is told something somewhat out of character for the express purpose of letting the audience in on something we would otherwise not know. In this case – it’s merely setting. After all, Stephenie’s characters are hardly high school caricatures (thank god), so she has to give us the scoop on the “normal” high schoolers somehow to make the story realistic.

Oh, another aside. Twilight is one of the very few works of fiction in which happily ever after works for me. It’s not as if they didn’t go through hell to get their happily ever after! But typically I tend to favor a more realistic bit of fiction – things rarely end happily ever after, though there is usually SOME happiness to be found, but certainly not the complete ray of sunshine Bella ends up with.

I don’t think that Twilight is…particularly deep, but that doesn’t mean it’s not good. And honestly, if they hadn’t gotten their happily ever after, in THIS case, I would not have been happy. As it is, it warms my heart, each and every time I read it.

@Luna – It’s an honest and entirely valid reaction. Healthy? Well, perhaps not, but it’s not like she’s the first one to go over board when she loses her first love.

Additionally, it should be considered that, AGAIN, her love for Edward is not possible in the real world. It is much deeper and much stronger than anything we will ever come across – in other words, it is FICTIONAL. So her response, in my opinion, was rational for the world she exists in.

But again – most any response is a LOGICAL response. We’d all like to think we are better than to crumble when someone leaves us, but you know as well as I do that this is not always the case. If it has never happened to you – if you have never been affected by the loss of love to the point where you curl up (by the way, she curled up for a WEEK…hardly an unjustifiable amount of time) and just HURT -well then cool for you, but I doubt very much that you’ve never seen it happen to someone else. I know I have. Many times over.

Depression is not an indicator of true love by any means. It is simply a reaction. Which is to say that it’s not the author’s intent to say “see, look Bella gets depressed OBVIOUSLY she loves Edward” … No, she took an honest look at the character she created and said, okay, she lost this love…how does BELLA react. And this was the result. Which I find completely comprehensible. /shrug.

Okay.
I have so many problems with this character it’s not even funny.
Bella is … flat, empty and totally undeserving of what she is given. Which would be fine, interesting even as long as she went through some journey that changes her and makes her a better person. This in fact does not happen. Instead she gets steadily worse until I had to stop reading Breaking Dawn as I was busy fighting fictional homicidal urges.

Also Bella is in fact the epitomy of a Mary Sue. A character who comes in, has everyone fall in love with her, has no real flaws (in the author’s or the other character’s eyes) and then has everything (and I mean everything) go perfectly for her.

Where was the sacrifice Bella has to make to have her eternity with Edward? Oh well she’ll have to be a bloodthirsty killer, give up her parents and friends and the ability to have children…oh wait. Actually, to be fair to the readers we’ll just combine all the bad alternate BD fics on ff.net and see what we get.
Then we’ll build up all this suspense only to have it end in the biggest case of ‘Deus Ex Machina’ I’ve ever read.

Okay, rant finished. Now let’s move on to a rebuttal.
You say she never calls herself ugly, which is infact true, but she’s a (extraordinarily whiny) female teenager so of course her self-image is dead wrong. Fact: All single men in this book fall in love with her = Mary-Sue

You say that Bella is very flawed. Which is also true, I’ll vouch for Bella being a silly, whiny idiot who makes bad choices anyday. The problem is SM meant for her to be intelligent, beautiful, selfless, loving blade blah. Which makes her a Mary-Sue and all the more annoying because she’s not really any of those things.

It hurts me that you think it’s reasonable to be comatose and whine about a hole in my chest for months (curling up in a ball for a week is unjustifiable) when love is lost. Guess what, women who have lives outside of romantic love don’t do that. Bella doesn’t but SM makes that seem romantic and that’s not a good message for our girls.

Which brings me to my next point.
“Bella has about as many interests as every teenager. Her love of books and music are something she SHARES with Edward, not something he introduced her to. You forget that most of the things that make people interesting, interests that are really developed and deepened, usually happen more towards adulthood. Bella isn’t there yet.”

You have just said that almost every teenager has the following amount of interests:
-They occasionally listen to music but mostly just to muse about how great their boyfriend is.
-They read books but only to find comparisons between the great loves of literature and their boyfriends (which just brings to light the author’s lack of originality when it comes to plot in New Moon)
-They think about how horrible they are
-They think about how great their boyfriends are
-…. *tumbleweeds blowing*…. that’s it.

Ummm. No.
I’m a fourteen year old with a deep love of music (an actual love not an excuse to find out how great Eddie is…again), and interest in history, literature, political affairs… the world and I don’t know anyone who doesn’t have the same interest in the outside world. Teenagers have minds, we have curiosity and to say that we don’t have interests till adulthood is just dumb.

That’s my 10 cents.

Regards
Rose

@ Rose

Calm down hon. Jesus. If you want to hate a fictional character it is your right to do so of course. Maybe you can answer a question for me…how on EARTH do you get to Breaking Dawn with a character you obviously can’t stand? I mean, when I don’t like the narrator of a book I stop reading.

Alright, first of all, you call Bella a Mary-Sue and go on to define a Mary-Sue as a character with no flaws, then go on to say that Bella HAS flaws. Which is it? Alright, so you further explain that Bella has no flaws to OTHERS.

This is just plain untrue. Mike calls Bella cruel in so many words because of the way she treats Jacob. Jacob tells her she’s mean. Edward calls her stubborn and, at times, irrational. These three boys are the only boys whose crushes on her went beyond the superficial attraction they originally felt.

The boy’s initial reaction is not only believable but realistic. I’ve seen it happen. More to the point, it happened to Stephenie. She took that bit of Bella’s life from her life. On her Twilight FAQ page she comments, “In high school, I was a mousy, A-track wall-flower. I had a lot of incredible girlfriends, but I wasn’t much sought after by the Y chromosomes, if you know what I mean. Then I went to college in Provo, Utah. Let me tell you, my stock went through the roof. See, beauty is a lot more subjective than you might think.”

It’s not very difficult to imagine – in a city where you know everyone and have known everyone since you were born – that a new addition would be a little more interesting then the girls you played with in the sandbox.

No one ever said that Twilight was deep. In fact, I think I very specifically said the exact opposite. Yes, Bella gets everything in the end. Which is fine, for Twilight. Twilight is a beautiful fantasy, and a happily ever after was required for such a story. Traditionally, I’m much more intrigued by the realistically ever after stories – but not when it comes to Twilight. I considered what a disappointment it was when it didn’t come to a fight in the end, but then I agreed with Stephenie’s thinking on this. If there had been a fight, some of the Cullens would have died. Unlike the Harry Potter series, in which the deaths were sad but added to the impact of the book rather than detracted from it, any of the Cullens dying would have made the book end on a note that I simply wouldn’t have been satisfied with. AGAIN, this is not normal for me – I adore sad endings. For Chrissakes, I love movies like Quills and Fight Club etc! But Twilight was never meant to be anything but pure fantasy – fluff. Enjoyable fluff, with characters that far outshine any you’ll see in normal romance novels – but fluff nonetheless.

Stephenie meant her character to be intelligent – she is, the only one who ever calls her beautiful is Edward and he is understandably biased. Certainly, she is pretty, but not drop dead gorgeous. Her worrying about her looks is mostly restricted to thinking of herself by Edward’s side, and it is only realistic that she think this way. Think of it this way – Rosalie, when she was human, was the most beautiful person she knew. She disliked the Cullens because they were ALL more beautiful than she was (a marker of a vampire). If Rosalie – who KNOWS beyond a shadow of a doubt that she is most gorgeous person on the planet – took a hit to her self-esteem when looking at Edward, Carlisle and Esme, how do you think more normal people like Bella would react? Come on, it’s only natural.

She IS selfless. With the exception of what she did with Jacob (which was a very human reaction), name one situation in which she was selfish. Fact – she went to live in a place she hated so her mother could have the life she wanted. Fact – on numerous occasions she did things she felt less than enthusiastic about for the sake of her friendships. She didn’t want to go to the beach. She didn’t want to go to Port Angeles. She didn’t want to hurt Mike’s feelings or see Jessica hurt by Mike’s attention to her. Seriously, would a selfish person even CARE? Fact – most of her irrational decisions are based on the fact that what she hates the most is the fact that her vampire family and her werewolf friends constantly put themselves in danger for HER. She can’t stand that any of them might be hurt for her. Gladly she would sacrifice herself before any of them even see danger. Selfless. There is no other word for it. Be underwhelmed if you please, I’m not asking you to be impressed, but it is what it is.

Honey, I’m going to say this as gently as I can and please, please don’t think I mean this offensively, because I don’t. Bella’s reaction is totally and utterly realistic. You are 14. Probably, you have glimpsed pain, but you have no idea the depths of it. And you most certainly don’t understand depression in the slightest. In fact, I hope you never get the chance to know that pain because, believe me, it’s horrible. One of the reasons I admired Stephenie’s writing – she gets the utter devastation that is depression to a T. The fog of it. The lasting pain. The wish that – when you’re recovering, when you’re getting stronger, that you could go back to the haze because the haze doesn’t hurt as much. I’ve been there honey, I lived it. And I’m not weak. You want to know what set it off? None of your business, but take it from me, on a basic level it was a lot more “pathetic” than losing love. Certainly, Bella could have handled it better – she could have blown it off, but how realistic is that? Not very. You have a lot of life to live, and your heart will be broken many a time, by boys, work, life, etc. I hope that you are strong enough to not let any of those things bend you, but you may not always be. Remember – some people handle break ups better – and some people commit suicide. Either way, they are honest responses. You call Bella a Mary-Sue for being too ideal – it seems to me that this reaction, this very HUMAN reaction, should be proof positive that Bella is a realistic character and no Mary-Sue.

Again – the author of any work of fiction knows MUCH more about their character then they will ever put to page. This is for the simple reason of plot. Sure – she could have gone on about Bella’s interests, hobbies and past times – but why? Where in the story would that have fit in? Bla, bla, bla newborn vampire, oh and also, let me explain to you how I feel about the situation in Iran. Come on – the books are long enough as it is.

The reason that Bella’s life seems to be about Edward is because – for the duration of these novels – it IS. Does that mean she doesn’t have any other interests? Hell no, it just means we aren’t privy to that. I’m going to use the same example, see if it sets in this time, do you think that John Mcclain of the Die Hard series has no interests outside of foiling terrorists plots? Course not, but his hobbies and interests are just not relevant to the story.

And why do you feel the need to put words in my mouth because you feel slighted? I apologize, teenagers are not impressive to me. They weren’t when I was a teenager and they aren’t now. Adults are much more interesting. I’m sure you have a great amount of interests, likes and dislikes, just like Bella does. I’m also sure that if I knew you now and if I knew you 10 years from now, I would probably find the you in 10 years much more interesting.

Bella loved music before Edward came along – again, that and a love of books is a passion they share, not that she has BECAUSE of him. I never said that teenagers don’t have interests. I said that their interests don’t become involved and deepened (ie: interesting) until adulthood.

I’m not sure where you get the idea that Bella only reads books to find a comparison to her boyfriend. Bella loved Romeo and Juliet before Edward came along, she says she even had a thing for Romeo (and bah – WHY. I can’t stand Romeo and Juliet). She draws parallels to that story and her story – which I suppose you can see it as unoriginal…but then again Romeo and Juliet wasn’t an original story either. I’ve said it before and will continue to restate – there is no original story anymore. The Greeks did it all. It’s all a matter of presentation at this point. And Wuthering Heights Bella was also enjoying without Edward’s influence. In fact, he teases her that she’s always reading it! As any literary nut will tell you, when you read and love books you draw parallels to your own life constantly. You’re a music-phile…don’t you do this with lyrics? I know I do.

haha, oh my god! yeah….bella-sucks dick, but very pretty.
edward-yeah all you obssessive fans! you’ll never get with him so you can quit screaming oh my god edward.
this has nothing to with this post.
why doesn’t bella just commit suicide already.
so everyone can live in peace of this fanatic stupid ass cunt bullshit of edward bella bella jacob. yeah no one gives a flying fuck about any of these cunts.

Obviously no one gives a fuck about them so much that you took time out of your day to do some kind of search which landed you here.

I’d say thanks for commenting, but I’m a little unsure as to what the point was?

well I have no idea…..
lol
i just…wanted to tell everyone who is obssessed with them or whatever what i think…no one ever listens to me anyways…
and all of the obssessive fans are so annoying:p

How badly it is written:
Stephanie Meyer has obviously just dreamt up the storyline and ran to her computer. Not to mention she was just an average Mormon housewife/soccer mom with NO writing experience whatsoever.
1. Her excessive use of adverbs:
It’s ok to write “He whispered, teasingly” or “She asked, seductively”, but not on EVERY F*CKING LINE. They hardly talk. They always murmur, gasp or breathe. Hasn’t she ever heard of ‘said’? I think she should just put the thesaurus back in the bookcase.
2. She tries too hard to sound intelligent:
Hasn’t she ever heard the rule: “Stories should never be used to show-off your large vocabulary or grammatical skills”? Most of the time, her sentences do not even make any sense. I can’t think of any example at the moment, although I looked some up on the internet. Apparently, on one site, the reviewer mentioned a line ‘Edward sat sinuously’. Look up sinuous, people. And you’ll see.
Another thing is, she just HAS to show-off at how she reads great texts such as ‘Romeo and Juliet’, ‘Wuthering Heights’, ‘King Lear’, etc. She even makes Bella read and recite lines directly from the f*cking book!! OMFG, lady. We get it. You read those books. (I don’t actually think so, but shhhh).
3. Please, for goodness sake, Meyer. Be SIMPLE.
By simple, I mean have a straight story line, and make the book centre around one conflict. Why on earth is everything so second-handed? The only action that goes on (James, Victoria, Laurent coming) is so f*cking complicated. Like, I think she faints and then she has the story told to her or some sh*t like that. I don’t remember, something like that….
4. Useless bits of fluff
Seriously, how many sentences did I have to skip while reading that damned book? I don’t care at how Edwards hair is perfectly gelled, or how Edward’s body is perfectly toned. Or even how his eyes appear dark and mystifying and how his skin shines like he is a glittering fairy, and how its so cold yet pale and oh-so-seductive. F*ck, man. That’s enough to turn Chuck Norris gay. I just wanted SMeyer to get the hell off fantasy island. Which is what I will explain in the next point.
The actual content/morals:
Ok, this book is addressed to young people. Which is extremely terrifying. I have heard of even 30 year-olds, (some ‘feminists’), and my friend who “hates men” and never want to get married, DAZZLED BY EDWARD. Like, wtf? And all for wrong reasons. Very, very wrong.
1. Bella:
Ohhh, how can I even begin to explain Bella. I think I’ll start with her as a canon mary-sue. If you would look at all the traits of what makes up a Mary-Sue, you will see that Bella matches each and every one perfectly. Her name, for example meaning “beautiful swan”, her attractiveness- edward tells her all the boys fantasize about her, and how basically EVERY SINGLE GUY in the book wants her. Her intelligence- how advanced she is in bio, how she’s getting A’s and topping the class (when her eddie isn’t there). Her strength- even through being flung across the room, falling out windows, almost crushed by a van, being beaten – practically raped- and how she is CONSTANTLY IN DANGER….. she never ever ever gets hurt. Sure, she goes to the hospital, but its nothing serious. She even has enough strength to go to the f*cking prom. Everything revolves around her. Ok, I know what you’re thinking, she IS the main character, and it IS in first person… but come on. Everyone wants her. It’s like the only reason the other characters even exist is because they have to love/protect/save her. She’s “special”. Everyone in Forks love her, the werewolves love her, the vampires love her. For f*cking sake, who doesn’t love her? Even the f*cking trackers love her (they want her, obviously). The internet describes a mary-sue to be a character created by the author, because the author wishes to be the character, and places themselves in the characters’ shoes. If you read all the interviews/blogs, etc. belonging to SMeyer, you see that she wishes to be Bella. That she is undeniably “in love with Edward from day one”. No wonder Bella is so damn f*cking blank! Talk about FanFic…
The fact that she gets… EVERYTHING SHE EVER WANTED. I remember reading in the second or third book, that she had to face many trials and give up a lot, not to mention the ‘ultimate sacrifice’. I’m sorry, but what sacrifice??
a) She didn’t want to be that 14 yr old vamp girl who cant control herself and kill someone. PROB SOLVED, her new superpower took care of that.
b) Choose between Jacob and Ed. PROB SOLVED, she got them both.
c) Didn’t want to be that kind of girl who gets married at 18 and knocked up. PROB SOLVED, no-one cares. In fact, they support her (WTF)
d) Oh, I won’t bother. But you get the idea.
More of her will be described at the points below. Tehe.
2. Their “love”:
Ok, this is addressed to teens like I said before, which is horrifying. Being a teen myself, I know how we.. well… have new viewings (and priorities) on love.
Anyways, I wonder about why they actually love each other. I can tell you in about one line. He’s sexy and she’s yummy.
Ahh, the shallowness of SMeyer uncovers itself.
Anywho, when I read Midnight Sun, I found out how Edward got around to loving Bella. Apparently, Alice saw a vision of them together. He was like “omg! Me love a human who tastes good?? No way, ho!!!” But then… *somehow* it just turned around and at school he was just like “I love you” in his mind. I was like, WTF WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN.
And, of course, we know why Bella loves Edward. All the ‘useless bits of fluff (point 4)’ tells us.
But the fact of the matter is, their love is extremely unhealthy. I don’t mean the whole ‘eddie’s gunna have a full stomach tonight’. I mean the fact that Edward controls her life. (Yet again, how can you not control bella. She can’t stand up for herself). We can all see how Edward is the ‘perfect boyfriend’. He kidnaps you on your birthday, tells you who to hang out with, captures all your time, makes him irresistible then leaves you, and even bargains with Jacob how much sex he can give you. Ahh.
And then it got me thinking… if Edward wasn’t a vampire, would Bella still stick around? No.
3. Too…damn…complicated…
Ok, so we have chapters upon chapters of the history of some vampires, of the introduction of hundreds of other, useless characters and not to mention the ‘Volturi’. Oh, and even the cullen family disappear. Where’s Rosalie? Emmett? Holy sh*t! Where’s E…E…oh, I forgot her name.
4. Ruining vampires forever.
I guess the whole ‘Count Dracula’ legend may as well have disintegrated since the release of Twilight. Let’s recap what we should think of vampires:
a) Stakes
b) Fangs
c) Bat
d) Garlic
e) Coffins, cobwebs and capes
f) HUMAN BLOOD FOR CRYING OUT LOUD
SMeyer decided this wasn’t sexy enough. She destroyed all this in the matter of a paragraph. I don’t remember it, but it’s in the movie: the scene where she goes to his house, and she’s like ‘do you sleep in a coffin?’ ‘Myth. I don’t sleep’ among with others. It may as well have been ‘garlic? Myth.’ ‘Stake? Myth.’ ‘Drink human blood? Myth.’ ‘Vampire? Myth’.
5. The morals.
No-one needs to wonder what goes on in SMeyer’s head. A bottomless pit of nothingness and void.
As mentioned, they’re “love” and Bella’s “Mary-sueness” is more than enough. But, no, it doesn’t stop there.
Bella (well, SMeyer) wants to be a vampire. Apparently, she thinks humans are too weak, boring, ugly and useless.
The answer to ALL life problems = Become a vampire.
After all, if you’re a vampire, you are smart, beautiful, eternally young, rich, and perfect.
WOW, Stephanie! That’s great for a teenage girls’ self-esteem.

Oh dang, here we go.

“1. Her excessive use of adverbs”

You’re criticizing that she uses descriptive words rather than said? And this makes her a bad writer?

Really?

As a writer, I hate the word said. It’s not descriptive enough. How did they say it? However, I would never call a writer who used the word said bad for using that word instead of describing the way the text was…said. Why? Because it’s a style choice. It doesn’t make it right or wrong, bad or good, it’s just preference.

“2. She tries too hard to sound intelligent:”

Look, I don’t want to be rude but I’m going to go ahead and LOL pretty hard about this one.

One of the things that makes the Twilight books so accessible is that they’re easy to read. Ironically, this is also something that makes even fans say Stephenie is a bad writer. Showing off her vocabulary? I mean, really were there any big words in these four books – because I didn’t see them.

Ok, let’s take your example. Sinuous – 3. characterized by a series of graceful curving motions: a sinuous dance.

In other words, as Edward sat, his body curved gracefully – his movement like a dance. It’s just calling to attention that his every movement is graceful. Description.

And as for “showing off” what she reads… if you’re an avid reader, like Bella is, you would understand this is how we think. Real life situations are often compared to books. Real life emotions often summed up in quotes. It is an aspect of Bella’s personality – and something very important that she and Edward both share. I mean, it’s part of what makes them interesting, their discussion and separate analysis on books.

And Stephenie Meyer graduated with a degree in English….I guarantee you she has, in fact, read those EXTREMELY FEW books she mentioned.

“3. Please, for goodness sake, Meyer. Be SIMPLE.”

So, she’s a bad writer for being too complex? Hmm. Life rarely has a simple, straightforward storyline…why should books?

“4. Useless bits of fluff”

Again – a preference and style choice, not at all indicative of good (or bad) writing. A lot of us actually appreciate the description as it helps us be “in the moment” – one of the things that makes the Twilight books so fantastic is that it sucks you so completely into them you can see, hear, feel – even taste to an extent, what Bella is talking about.

Bella – Mmmkay, let’s see if this argument actually makes it through this time.

The boys – First of all, Eric, Mike and Tyler DO NOT constitute all the boys in Forks. Lol. Secondly, they are not in love with her, they are intrigued by her. They are high school boys in a TINY town. As a new comer, she is automatically the center of attention. And, while never being described by anyone (but Edward – who is understandably biased) as anything more than pretty, she is obviously attractive enough that the single guys are – interested. This kind of thing happens all the time, and in fact happened to Stephenie Meyer herself. She wrote this based off REALITY. She herself went from being nothing much to look at in Phoenix Arizona to a MUCH smaller population in Utah. As she puts it “my stock went through the roof.” Ask anyone who has moved – if you move to a small town where EVERYONE has known EVERYONE ELSE since they were in first grade – the new girl is … NEWS.

Bella’s grades. Uh, yea – she’s a good student. So what? A lot of people are. But they only ever talk about her being good in biology. She talks several times in New Moon and Eclipse about struggling with Math. Eric Yorkie was valedictorian (over the Cullen kids – interesting) and if you listen carefully enough, she says in New Moon how Jessica Stanley has better grades than she does.

Yea…. Amazing Mary Sue with all your dang flaws. How dare you Bella Swan, how dare you?

WHAT DO YOU MEAN SHE NEVER GETS HURT? No big deal? She spent WEEKS in the hospital in the first book. She was injured to the point where she needed help showering (remember, that’s why Charlie loves Alice).

Alright, let’s remember her injuries – “You have a broken leg, four broken ribs, some cracks in your skull, bruises covering every inch of your skin and you lost a lot of blood.”

Yea, surely no big deal.

The prom was, if I’m doing my calculations correctly, about a month and a half after the accident. So you’re upset because she wasn’t horribly maimed?

Uh…ok.

As for everyone in Forks loving her – not even close. The only people who are her real friends are Angela and Mike. Jessica’s interest in her is related directly to how much attention she gets at her side. Lauren never likes her. Eric and Tyler lose interest after the first book.

The wolves – um, no. Again not all of them like her. They protect her because uh hey, there’s a VAMPIRE after her. And they exist why? That’s right, to protect people from vampires. While Quil and Embry are fine with her, the only wolves who actually genuinely like her are Jacob and Seth.

As for the vampires – let me break it down easily for you. Edward loves Bella. Edward’s love for Bella has brought him to life and made him happier than they have seen him in EIGHTY YEARS. If for that ALONE, of course his family is going to love her.

Besides, even on that count you’re forgetting Rosalie. Rosalie dislikes Bella even after she’s accepted her. They build a bridge during Breaking Dawn, but their connection is not strong at all.

The nomads – the nomads, like all the other vampires, do not understand the Cullens. At all. Vampires think of themselves as above humans – I mean, we’re their food for chrissakes. Imagine someone interacting with cows and chickens as though they were equals. Bella has a strong scent across the board so of course James is attracted to it. Like, yummy, they brought in a cake for desert. But then the family, and Edward specifically, acts to defend her. She’s not their food – she’s WITH them. PART of them.

No, James didn’t want HER. He made it quite clear that Edward had pissed him off and now he was playing a game…drawing Edward out into what he assumed would be a battle royal – fun.

Yea, one of the things I LOVE about Stephenie Meyer is how much she loves her characters. She talks about Bella in the same fashion by the way. These characters are her babies.

Incidentally, identifying with ones own main character does NOT make one a bad writer. Lol. To me it’s irrelevant. What on earth could it matter? OH NO – a writer loves their characters?! GASP…surely not.

Bella is far from blank, but as I wrote an entire blog post about it, I’ll digress for the moment.

The fact the book ends happily ever after is a problem for you? It’s not like Bella didn’t have to suffer and bleed to get what she wanted.

a) Bella’s control wasn’t a super power, it was a result of her preparation…and if you want to look at the DEEPER themes of the books, it’s one of the best parts. Bella was never anything but an average human. She’s an amazing vampire. In other words – she was fated for this life. It’s a story arch and theme that was built from the very first book and took FOUR FUCKING BOOKS to complete. Yea….don’t dismiss it so casually.

b) It was never a choice. It was always Edward. What she didn’t want was to hurt either of them. She hurt them both. A LOT. And their pain, in turn, hurt her. And shaped her. The whole arc with Jacob was what MADE giving up her humanity a sacrifice. Yea – ideally she wouldn’t have had to give up being human to be with Edward, but she did…and she didn’t realize what that meant until after she knew she loved Jacob.

c) By “they” I’m going to assume you mean her parents support her decision. 1) Charlie doesn’t. But what’s he going to do about it? He could toss her out on her ass, be all pissy and angry and say “NAY I FORBID IT!” …. and being an adult, I guarantee you that Bella would have done it anyway. Obviously, Charlie wishes she would wait, but you can wish in one hand and crap in the other and see which fills up first. He simply does the best with what he’s given. (LOL)

As for her mother – her mother is flighty. She’s used to Bella parenting herself. What – she’s suddenly going to start acting all parental and telling her what to do? Right. Out of character.

Yea – Bella doesn’t want to be “that girl.” She isn’t. The whole argument about that has more to do with the argument of humanity vs immortality. Bella is giving her life UP. She is not “that girl”. Her circumstances, as she herself comes to realize, are completely different.

“2. Their “love”: ”

Wow – ok. You missed something. Like, you missed a LOT. Like, oh, idk, the ENTIRE FIRST BOOK. Lol.

Why does Edward love Bella – it ain’t because she smells good sweetie. Take a look at the books again. Edward DISTINCTLY falls in love with Bella. He comes back, and he talks to her (remember, at this point he is not in love -shows no signs of being in love). During this FIRST conversation he becomes more and more intrigued with her. He finds out – she’s selfless (she left Phoenix, a city she loved, to live in Forks – a town she loathes, for her mother’s sake), he learns she is strong (she obviously doesn’t like when he observes her pain), he learns that she’s observant.

In other words, just from the first conversation you can see how Edward starts to fall for HER. Not for her body, or her smell, or her looks. In fact, if you read Midnight Sun (available on Stephenie’s website), you will find that when he first sees her he finds her – ordinary. It’s only after he falls in love with her that he looks back and can’t understand how he ever thought that way.

Which is what it’s like when you fall in love with a person for who they are instead of just their looks.

You wanna know who falls for her for her looks – before meeting her, before even talking to her – Mike Newton. THAT is not “love”. Obviously.

And if you don’t think that Edward falls in love with her, I want you to point out one line, one SINGLE LINE, where it’s obvious he’s in lust instead of in love. Try to. It won’t work.

Now Bella. Yea, the boy is inhumanly beautiful. So sorry that Bella observed that first. But she’s far from the Jessica Stanley type that’s all “OMG /swoon” She’s curious about him and his strange family. Who wouldn’t be. And then the way he GLARES at her in Biology for no reason. Come on, you’re a teen. Tell me it wouldn’t be in your head.

Then the dude disappears. And then, just as suddenly, he’s back and doesn’t hate you anymore. Yea, more than a little confusing. Now read the conversation in biology again. This boy is trying to get to know HER. He’s asking questions that are beyond just polite conversation. His observations are spot on and telling. He’s interested in her life.

And then there are the strange things – his eyes changing color, his cold skin – the way he knows your nickname without being told. Hmm, very curious.

So Bella being drawn into things with him is far from just “OMG HE’S SO HOT.” Add to that her absolute reluctance to start down that whole path (she’s irritated with herself for wanting to see him again several times) and your argument holds literally no water. Bella doesn’t actually fall in love with him until after they start talking. In other words, she gets to know HIM first, and falls in love with him in that process.

Again – dare you to pick out even a single line where she’s obviously in love and it’s all about the body. I’ll let Bella defend herself –

“I love him. Not because he’s beautiful or because he’s rich! I’d much rather he weren’t either one. It would even out the gap between us just a little bit — because he’d still be the most loving and unselfish and brilliant and decent person I’ve ever met. Of course I love him. How hard is that to understand?”

OMG with the Edward being controlling thing. ::rolls eyes:: Right.

“He kidnaps you on your birthday” – Ok, sweetheart let’s have a little discussion about things you don’t want to do and things you’re being FORCED to do. Forcing would be him dragging her out, kicking and screaming. On the contrary, what happens on her birthday is this – she doesn’t want to celebrate (for totally irrational reasons, but let’s not get into that right now). However, it is very important to he and his family that they get to celebrate her. Hence, Bella acquiesces. It’s a compromise. It’s something you do in ANY relationship and it is not about control.

Think about your friends. Have you ever done something or gone somewhere that you didn’t want to go for the sake of someone else? I had a friend who wanted to go to a party but didn’t want to go alone. Now, this friend was painfully shy – so the fact she was interested in this party alone was enough for me to give in and let her drag me there with her. I did it for her. I did NOT want to be there.

But that doesn’t mean she forced me. :-p

“tells you who to hang out with” – Um…basically the ONLY time he does this is with Jacob. And even then that doesn’t last very long. I’ll tell you what I told everyone else who tried this argument on me – Edward is NOT perfect. He is new to this whole boyfriend/girlfriend thing and he is learning – just like every other actually 17 year old boy. Edward is a fast learner. When he figures out it is wrong to keep Bella away from Jacob, he apologizes and then he NEVER DOES IT AGAIN.

Yea, very unhealthy – a couple who learns from their mistakes. ::nod nod::

Captures all your time – Um, that was totally her choice. If she had wanted to go hang out with Angela or Mike, or even wanted to just have some time for herself he would have given it to her without argument. Don’t fool yourself, Edward is totally and completely whipped.

Makes him irresistible and then leaves you – how very devious of Edward!!! Surely it was his diabolical plot to make her fall in love with him just so he could smash her heart into a bazillion pieces.

Right.

It’s called plot my dear. Edward and Bella DO belong together. There’s no doubt about that. But what happens that keeps them apart – whether it’s outside forces or Edward thinking he’s doing the right thing – is what makes it a book. I mean…if he hadn’t done what he did – there wouldn’t be a whole lot of point to New Moon now would there?

“Bargains with Jacob how much sex he can give you.” WHAT?! I can’t even begin to understand where you got this. Can you give me a direct example…like, from the books?

On what do you base the thought that if Edward wasn’t a vampire, Bella wouldn’t stick around? Bella loving Edward has nothing to do with the fact he is not human…. Again, you’re going to need to give me some proof here.

3. Huh? What? I don’t understand what you’re asking. Her name is Esme, by the way. What do you mean where is she? Or Emmett. Or Rosalie? Give me a chapter and I’ll tell you where they are. It’s not hard, they never disappear.

So, you don’t like the additional story lines. Well, ok. Again, this is not a detriment to Stephenie’s writing, it’s a preference. And again I will tell you – life doesn’t have a simple story line, why should fiction?

4. Oh, CHRIST, how much do I fucking hate this argument. ::deep breath:: Ok. A couple things.
1) Vampires are not real, they are FICTION. Fiction means they are 100% made up. There is no such thing as a real vampire, ergo you cannot say that Stephenie doesn’t know what a vampire looks like.

Like seriously – how fucking boring can you get. So, every time you have a vampire story it HAS to follow these set expectations? Gag me. I’ve disliked other vampire stories because they’re so damn ridiculous to me – fangs and wood and being burned by the sun. How wusstastic can you get?

But alright, let’s say for arguments sake that all vampires should be the same. Why is Dracula the rule? It’s not like he was the first vampire. Vampire mythology exists across almost all of time through 100′s of different cultures and NONE of them are the same. I mean, some of them don’t even drink blood.

Please give me a LOGICAL argument on why we SHOULD think of vampires as contained to the 6 traits you’ve laid out. Logical – not just because Dracula said so.

What Stephenie did was what made the books great to me. She made her own creation – her own version of vampires while EXPLAINING where ALL OTHER VAMPIRE MYTHS come from. To me, that makes it more “real” and believable. For instance, being burned by the sun – it never made sense to me. Why? There was never a logical explanation for it in any vampire story I’d read previously. But then Stephenie comes along and offers the explanation that they aren’t actually burned by the sun, this is just a myth that arose because they did not allow themselves to be seen in direct sunlight by human eyes.

See – that makes logical sense. That’s exactly how myths come about – trying to explain something that isn’t understood. Ergo, what Stephenie did, for me, was make vampires more real. Which allowed me to enjoy her stories more – because I could thoroughly imagine that this world she created existed.

Prefer Dracula if you want. He’s not for me. But you also won’t see me dismissing him because he’s not what a vampire SHOULD be.

“No-one needs to wonder what goes on in SMeyer’s head. A bottomless pit of nothingness and void.”

I’m gonna go ahead and giggle at this seeing as how many times you mentioned her complicated story lines.

Bella wants to be a vampire – why? No, not because she thinks humans are any of the things you mentioned. She wants to be a vampire because she is making a choice – her human life or Edward. She cannot, realistically, have both.

Bella values human life – or else she would not think twice about giving up her “weak, ugly, useless, boring” mother and father. Instead this is part of her decision that tortures her. And life as a vampire is not something she wishes on her father as evidenced by how angry she gets at Jacob for apparently condemning him.

Again, I’m going to ask you to provide proof that Bella things humans are all those things. Because, and keep in mind I’ve read each of these books at LEAST 8 times (New Moon, for the record, is the one I’ve only read 8 times), at no point to I ever hear these snide thoughts from Bella.

Rather, Stephenie spends TWO BOOKS of the entire series, New Moon and Eclipse, essentially bringing Bella and humanity to the forefront. She never makes it an easy choice for Bella. It’s a very hard choice. At no point does Bella ever say she wants to be a vampire for any other reason than staying with Edward forever. In fact, she dreads a lot that will come with it – the newborn years, the constant thirst.

Again, I’ll let Bella defend herself.

“Edward, there’s no point to forever without you. I wouldn’t want one day without you.”

There’s never any point where Stephenie writes about human life as being worthless. So if you took a hit to your self esteem because Bella made the choice to give up her humanity for life as a vampire – well I’m sorry, that’s just not Stephenie’s fault.

A few facts about me.

I’m 27, I’m a feminist. I am not in love with Edward and I think that Bella Swan is one of the most powerful female characters in all of literature. Edward himself is an amazing character, but I’ll agree with him that Bella is much, much stronger than he is.

If given the choice between being a vampire or a human, I would be a human. Hands down. However, becoming a vampire is the right thing for Bella. I was happy for her, even though I missed her human form.

“You’re criticizing that she uses descriptive words rather than said? And this makes her a bad writer?”
No, if you would READ what I actally wrote, it’s ok to use descriptive words.. SPARINGLY. It’s a rule in creative writing! You can’t possible write it in basically everything they do, it’s just way too overboard. Her whole life can’t be so damn melodramatic, even with dozens of vampires and werewolves/shapeshifters(again, wtf) living in it.

“Showing off her vocabulary? I mean, really were there any big words in these four books – because I didn’t see them.”
How old are you? 27. How old is the intended audience? That’s right. Teenagers.

“In other words, as Edward sat, his body curved gracefully – his movement like a dance.”
I cannot understand how such graceful curves like a dance could be introduced in an act of sitting. How can you sit… like a dance? Unless your twelve metres tall and trying to sit on a stool… I dont see how that can work. Let’s look at the art of sitting. You stand. You bend as you sink. Your ass hits the chair. Now, I won’t go into a description of dance, but I know full-well that no dance could be as simple/basic as… bending. How a dance could be made up of someone sitting is beyond me.

“Real life situations are often compared to books. Real life emotions often summed up in quotes.”
Yes, I understand what you mean, although what confuses me is that SMeyer badmouths about the books she said she’d read. That they aren’t as perfect as Ed & Bel’s love. She calls buttercup stupid, and that all she has is her ‘prettifulness’, and that Romeo and Juliet were complete idiots (look it up if you don’t believe me).

“And Stephenie Meyer graduated with a degree in English….I guarantee you she has, in fact, read those EXTREMELY FEW books she mentioned.”
Yes, I have. Why? Because everyone HAS to read it and study/analyse it in their high school years. Think about it.

“So, she’s a bad writer for being too complex? Hmm. Life rarely has a simple, straightforward storyline…why should books?”
If you read what I wrote, you’d see that I meant a lot of the interesting/action events of her book are told to Bella (because she gets knocked out (woo! Hero!!)) secondhand. There is hardly a timeline. Like, there’s 4…then 5… then 4… then suddenly 9 then 1. You know? A lot of the stuff is re-told, and then it becomes a mess. I found myself skipping. And, for you, being such an ‘educated, experienced, feminist writer of age 26′ may not find it difficult, but young teenagers who haven’t picked up a real book in their life.. yeah.

“A lot of us actually appreciate the description as it helps us be “in the moment” – one of the things that makes the Twilight books so fantastic is that it sucks you so completely into them you can see, hear, feel – even taste to an extent, what Bella is talking about.”
By “a lot of us”, you mean you, of course. Now, I definitely love imagery, etc. but it comes to the point where it just becomes.. ridiculous. Such thesaurusrape just become.. well… Edward must be God himself.

The boys – First of all, Eric, Mike and Tyler DO NOT constitute all the boys in Forks. Lol. Secondly, they are not in love with her, they are intrigued by her. They are high school boys in a TINY town. As a new comer, she is automatically the center of attention. And, while never being described by anyone (but Edward – who is understandably biased) as anything more than pretty, she is obviously attractive enough that the single guys are – interested.”
“This kind of thing happens all the time, and in fact happened to Stephenie Meyer herself. She wrote this based off REALITY. She herself went from being nothing much to look at in Phoenix Arizona to a MUCH smaller population in Utah.”
THUS proving my point: “Mary-Sue”.

“Bella’s grades. Uh, yea – she’s a good student. So what? A lot of people are.”
Are you so extremely ignorant that you think a lot of people are good students? She’s getting A’s. NOT a lot of people get A’s.

Eric Yorkie was valedictorian (over the Cullen kids – interesting) and if you listen carefully enough, she says in New Moon how Jessica Stanley has better grades than she does.

“Alright, let’s remember her injuries – “You have a broken leg, four broken ribs, some cracks in your skull, bruises covering every inch of your skin and you lost a lot of blood.”
These injuries… are not bad. WAIT before you go and type angry, angry letters and start capsraping, I mean not bad as in.. like, the way SMeyer presented it. Yeah, physically, it’s bad. But she presents it as.. hmm.. how do I say it.. like, a ‘trophy – a medal to show how she’s been through so much but has endured it so strongly’. You get what i”m saying? Everything which is bad is presented by Meyer as good. Controlling, stalking, wimping, being a doormat, etc. Bella would have been such a great heroine if Edward didn’t come along and melt her brain with his shining skin.

“The prom was, if I’m doing my calculations correctly, about a month and a half after the accident.” So you’re upset because she wasn’t horribly maimed?
Firstly, i didn’t mean she would be so ‘horriblly maimed’ enough to be in a wheelchair. She came to the prom with bandages and all, and even though she was hurt… she still looked stunning in her dress. M..a..r..y..

“As for everyone in Forks loving her – not even close. The only people who are her real friends are Angela and Mike. Jessica’s interest in her is related directly to how much attention she gets at her side. Lauren never likes her. Eric and Tyler lose their interest after the first book.”
Yes, of course it’s a bad thing, but once again, presented by Meyer… it’s completely JUSTIFIED. I.e. it wasn’t her fault.
Jessica apparently liked her (like u said) for her own benefit, but it’s because – as SMeyer presents it – Jessica is a bitch. Kristin is “the victim”. Lauren doesn’t – why? Because Lauren is naturally.. a bitch. (Oh! And Jealous! Bonus!). Kristin is, once again.. the poor, poor “victim”. *Sad face*
Tyler and Eric… they don’t start to lose interest. They start to lose their position in the book. And besides, they are – as SMeyer puts it – a minority.. just ordinary teenagers. After all, they can’t at all compare with her werewolf lover and team of hott vampires.

“Besides, even on that count you’re forgetting Rosalie. Rosalie dislikes Bella even after she’s accepted her. They build a bridge during Breaking Dawn, but their connection is not strong at all.”
I mentioned Rosalie. Anyways, i guess I’ll mention her again. As SMeyer puts it – Rosalie is the bad one here. She’s the “bitch” and is jealous. *Shrugs* =/

“Incidentally, identifying with ones own main character does NOT make one a bad writer…a writer loves their characters?! GASP…surely not.”
Please read properly. I never said it made her a bad writer. I said that
1) She does NOT – I repeat, NOT – like Bella. She made Bella an empty shell for HER to fit into her shoes. She intended to write twilight for herself. She didn’t want to forget that dream because (Straigt from her website), she thought edward was hot hot hot.
2) She always talks about how she loves loves loves Eddie because… the same reasons Bella – SM – does.

“Bella is far from blank, but as I wrote an entire blog post about it, I’ll digress for the moment.”
Then you better delete it. Because SM said so herself she is. Oops. D:

“The fact the book ends happily ever after is a problem for you? It’s not like Bella didn’t have to suffer and bleed to get what she wanted.”
I already expressed my point about the last sentence previously. Also, no, it’s not the fact that the book ends happily that annoys me. It’s the fact that she made all these promises such as an ultimate sacrifice, etc, but never fulfilled them. Also, the ending was far from happy. It was sickeningly, unrealisticly… perfect. I won’t go too deep into that. She did NOT deserve it, sorry to say. From page one, SM insisted that she was “selfless” (stating it herself, rofl), although it was left unfulfilled. Yeah, she made regular trips to the hospital. Wow. With such cover-ups like “falling out the window” or “down the stairs” (and with a COP believing it, by the way), it wouldn’t be gruesome. To have that sickeningly happy ending.. I’d spend many years in torture.
a) Bella’s control wasn’t a super power, it was a result of her preparation…and if you want to look at the DEEPER themes of the books, it’s one of the best parts. Bella was never anything but an average human. She’s an amazing vampire. In other words – she was fated for this life. It’s a story arch and theme that was built from the very first book and took FOUR FUCKING BOOKS to complete. Yea….don’t dismiss it so casually.

b) It was never a choice. It was always Edward. What she didn’t want was to hurt either of them. She hurt them both. A LOT. And their pain, in turn, hurt her. And shaped her. The whole arc with Jacob was what MADE giving up her humanity a sacrifice. Yea – ideally she wouldn’t have had to give up being human to be with Edward, but she did…and she didn’t realize what that meant until after she knew she loved Jacob.

c) By “they” I’m going to assume you mean her parents support her decision. 1) Charlie doesn’t. But what’s he going to do about it? He could toss her out on her ass, be all pissy and angry and say “NAY I FORBID IT!” …. and being an adult, I guarantee you that Bella would have done it anyway. Obviously, Charlie wishes she would wait, but you can wish in one hand and crap in the other and see which fills up first. He simply does the best with what he’s given. (LOL)

As for her mother – her mother is flighty. She’s used to Bella parenting herself. What – she’s suddenly going to start acting all parental and telling her what to do? Right. Out of character.

Yea – Bella doesn’t want to be “that girl.” She isn’t. The whole argument about that has more to do with the argument of humanity vs immortality. Bella is giving her life UP. She is not “that girl”. Her circumstances, as she herself comes to realize, are completely different.

“2. Their “love”: ”

Wow – ok. You missed something. Like, you missed a LOT. Like, oh, idk, the ENTIRE FIRST BOOK. Lol.

Why does Edward love Bella – it ain’t because she smells good sweetie. Take a look at the books again. Edward DISTINCTLY falls in love with Bella. He comes back, and he talks to her (remember, at this point he is not in love -shows no signs of being in love). During this FIRST conversation he becomes more and more intrigued with her. He finds out – she’s selfless (she left Phoenix, a city she loved, to live in Forks – a town she loathes, for her mother’s sake), he learns she is strong (she obviously doesn’t like when he observes her pain), he learns that she’s observant.

In other words, just from the first conversation you can see how Edward starts to fall for HER. Not for her body, or her smell, or her looks. In fact, if you read Midnight Sun (available on Stephenie’s website), you will find that when he first sees her he finds her – ordinary. It’s only after he falls in love with her that he looks back and can’t understand how he ever thought that way.

Which is what it’s like when you fall in love with a person for who they are instead of just their looks.

You wanna know who falls for her for her looks – before meeting her, before even talking to her – Mike Newton. THAT is not “love”. Obviously.

And if you don’t think that Edward falls in love with her, I want you to point out one line, one SINGLE LINE, where it’s obvious he’s in lust instead of in love. Try to. It won’t work.

Now Bella. Yea, the boy is inhumanly beautiful. So sorry that Bella observed that first. But she’s far from the Jessica Stanley type that’s all “OMG /swoon” She’s curious about him and his strange family. Who wouldn’t be. And then the way he GLARES at her in Biology for no reason. Come on, you’re a teen. Tell me it wouldn’t be in your head.

Then the dude disappears. And then, just as suddenly, he’s back and doesn’t hate you anymore. Yea, more than a little confusing. Now read the conversation in biology again. This boy is trying to get to know HER. He’s asking questions that are beyond just polite conversation. His observations are spot on and telling. He’s interested in her life.

And then there are the strange things – his eyes changing color, his cold skin – the way he knows your nickname without being told. Hmm, very curious.

So Bella being drawn into things with him is far from just “OMG HE’S SO HOT.” Add to that her absolute reluctance to start down that whole path (she’s irritated with herself for wanting to see him again several times) and your argument holds literally no water. Bella doesn’t actually fall in love with him until after they start talking. In other words, she gets to know HIM first, and falls in love with him in that process.

Again – dare you to pick out even a single line where she’s obviously in love and it’s all about the body. I’ll let Bella defend herself –

“I love him. Not because he’s beautiful or because he’s rich! I’d much rather he weren’t either one. It would even out the gap between us just a little bit — because he’d still be the most loving and unselfish and brilliant and decent person I’ve ever met. Of course I love him. How hard is that to understand?”

OMG with the Edward being controlling thing. ::rolls eyes:: Right.

“He kidnaps you on your birthday” – Ok, sweetheart let’s have a little discussion about things you don’t want to do and things you’re being FORCED to do. Forcing would be him dragging her out, kicking and screaming. On the contrary, what happens on her birthday is this – she doesn’t want to celebrate (for totally irrational reasons, but let’s not get into that right now). However, it is very important to he and his family that they get to celebrate her. Hence, Bella acquiesces. It’s a compromise. It’s something you do in ANY relationship and it is not about control.

Think about your friends. Have you ever done something or gone somewhere that you didn’t want to go for the sake of someone else? I had a friend who wanted to go to a party but didn’t want to go alone. Now, this friend was painfully shy – so the fact she was interested in this party alone was enough for me to give in and let her drag me there with her. I did it for her. I did NOT want to be there.

But that doesn’t mean she forced me. :-p

“tells you who to hang out with” – Um…basically the ONLY time he does this is with Jacob. And even then that doesn’t last very long. I’ll tell you what I told everyone else who tried this argument on me – Edward is NOT perfect. He is new to this whole boyfriend/girlfriend thing and he is learning – just like every other actually 17 year old boy. Edward is a fast learner. When he figures out it is wrong to keep Bella away from Jacob, he apologizes and then he NEVER DOES IT AGAIN.

Yea, very unhealthy – a couple who learns from their mistakes. ::nod nod::

Captures all your time – Um, that was totally her choice. If she had wanted to go hang out with Angela or Mike, or even wanted to just have some time for herself he would have given it to her without argument. Don’t fool yourself, Edward is totally and completely whipped.

Makes him irresistible and then leaves you – how very devious of Edward!!! Surely it was his diabolical plot to make her fall in love with him just so he could smash her heart into a bazillion pieces.

Right.

It’s called plot my dear. Edward and Bella DO belong together. There’s no doubt about that. But what happens that keeps them apart – whether it’s outside forces or Edward thinking he’s doing the right thing – is what makes it a book. I mean…if he hadn’t done what he did – there wouldn’t be a whole lot of point to New Moon now would there?

“Bargains with Jacob how much sex he can give you.” WHAT?! I can’t even begin to understand where you got this. Can you give me a direct example…like, from the books?

On what do you base the thought that if Edward wasn’t a vampire, Bella wouldn’t stick around? Bella loving Edward has nothing to do with the fact he is not human…. Again, you’re going to need to give me some proof here.

3. Huh? What? I don’t understand what you’re asking. Her name is Esme, by the way. What do you mean where is she? Or Emmett. Or Rosalie? Give me a chapter and I’ll tell you where they are. It’s not hard, they never disappear.

So, you don’t like the additional story lines. Well, ok. Again, this is not a detriment to Stephenie’s writing, it’s a preference. And again I will tell you – life doesn’t have a simple story line, why should fiction?

4. Oh, CHRIST, how much do I fucking hate this argument. ::deep breath:: Ok. A couple things.
1) Vampires are not real, they are FICTION. Fiction means they are 100% made up. There is no such thing as a real vampire, ergo you cannot say that Stephenie doesn’t know what a vampire looks like.

Like seriously – how fucking boring can you get. So, every time you have a vampire story it HAS to follow these set expectations? Gag me. I’ve disliked other vampire stories because they’re so damn ridiculous to me – fangs and wood and being burned by the sun. How wusstastic can you get?

But alright, let’s say for arguments sake that all vampires should be the same. Why is Dracula the rule? It’s not like he was the first vampire. Vampire mythology exists across almost all of time through 100’s of different cultures and NONE of them are the same. I mean, some of them don’t even drink blood.

Please give me a LOGICAL argument on why we SHOULD think of vampires as contained to the 6 traits you’ve laid out. Logical – not just because Dracula said so.

What Stephenie did was what made the books great to me. She made her own creation – her own version of vampires while EXPLAINING where ALL OTHER VAMPIRE MYTHS come from. To me, that makes it more “real” and believable. For instance, being burned by the sun – it never made sense to me. Why? There was never a logical explanation for it in any vampire story I’d read previously. But then Stephenie comes along and offers the explanation that they aren’t actually burned by the sun, this is just a myth that arose because they did not allow themselves to be seen in direct sunlight by human eyes.

See – that makes logical sense. That’s exactly how myths come about – trying to explain something that isn’t understood. Ergo, what Stephenie did, for me, was make vampires more real. Which allowed me to enjoy her stories more – because I could thoroughly imagine that this world she created existed.

Prefer Dracula if you want. He’s not for me. But you also won’t see me dismissing him because he’s not what a vampire SHOULD be.

“No-one needs to wonder what goes on in SMeyer’s head. A bottomless pit of nothingness and void.”

I’m gonna go ahead and giggle at this seeing as how many times you mentioned her complicated story lines.

“Bella values human life – or else she would not think twice about giving up her “weak, ugly, useless, boring” mother and father.”
Wtf, I never said anything about her mother and father. She didn’t give anything up.

“Instead this is part of her decision that tortures her. And life as a vampire is not something she wishes on her father as evidenced by how angry she gets at Jacob for apparently condemning him.

“Again, I’m going to ask you to provide proof that Bella things humans are all those things.”
Obviously, Bella didn’t just plainly think like that. A.K.A No “Humans are so weak,” Bella thought.
There are just so many hints. One, (I mentioned this below), in the car she wanted to be a vampire to be strong. Two, Edward always saves her. NOW, I know that she is against vampires (which, presented by meyer, is impossible to fight against), she could at least have done something. Her dad IS a cop, after all. Which leads to another thing… how can Edward get bella pregnant.. if he doesn’t have any bodily fluids? Also, what happens when bella’s on her period? Anyways, three, all the beautiful people – I mean vampires – are the… how do I say it… Good, Godlike, Majestic, Perfect, Charming, Fast, Daring, Mysterious, Oh-So-Gorgeous, Envies… the main characters. (Face it, they are the mains NOT Bella. SMeyer said herself that she purposely made Bella flat so that the reader can easily put themselbves in her shoes. So much for your “Storng, heroic main character”), and the NORMAL people are…well…. they DO dissappear.
“She never makes it an easy choice for Bella. It’s a very hard choice.”
*Wags finger*. Actually, throughout the TWO BOOKS, Bella constantly begs and wants to become a vampire, it was only Edward who forbade her. Even the whole family wanted her to be- they offered to turn her, for crying out loud. The only person who opposed was Rosalie. But, of course, SMeyer only made her oppose because she was “jealoussss”
“At no point does Bella ever say she wants to be a vampire for any other reason than staying with Edward forever.”
Yes. When Edward left her (lol), Bella saw Sam and she said she wanted to whack at him or something. Then she thought the “horrifying” thought that she Wanted To Be Strong – Wanted To Be A Vampire.
“In fact, she dreads a lot that will come with it – the newborn years, the constant thirst.”
Yes, of course, as any sane human would. That seems to be the only points, though. But guess what? It all works out !!!! Hooray for Sue! I mean, Swan.

“Again, I’ll let Bella defend herself. “Edward, there’s no point to forever without you. I wouldn’t want one day without you.””
That proves her weakness.

“There’s never any point where Stephenie writes about human life as being worthless.”
SMeyer said herself in an interview she was ‘Anti-Human’. Look it up.
” So if you took a hit to your self esteem because Bella made the choice to give up her humanity for life as a vampire – well I’m sorry, that’s just not Stephenie’s fault.”
No, not my self-esteem. Countless of hormonal teenagers, who will absorb this. Have you heard of twitards who need angery management issues?

“I’m 27, I’m a feminist.”
Not a very good one.

” I am not in love with Edward and I think that Bella Swan is one of the most powerful female characters in all of literature.”
ALL LITERATURE?!?! *Facepalms*
” Edward himself is an amazing character, but I’ll agree with him that Bella is much, much stronger than he is.”
Apparently, SMeyer does not agree. Neither does Bella.

OOPS, SORRY, I FORGOT TO DO THE MIDDLE SECTION.

I like you kid. You got spunk. Don’t back down easily. Awesome, let’s get to it. ::cracks knuckles::

“It’s a rule in creative writing!”

Mmmkay, there are no rules in creative writing. There are suggestions. Nothing works for everyone. Some authors do well with some forms of writing where other authors don’t.

Now you say that EVERY sentence has a descriptive word and that’s “melodramatic”. Well, how often in life do people just say things – no inflection, no emotion? Think about your life and your friends and your conversations – is there ever a time when you can’t describe how they are speaking? So, if it adds to the imagery, why not?

But that being said, I find that Stephenie doesn’t use descriptive words for every sentence. She actually does something I’ve never been able to do. She leaves the quote with NO WORDS AFTER AT ALL (by the way, excuse the caps, you might notice there’s no italicize – they’re not yelling, they’re emphasis). If you look across almost every page she does this.

Let me give you some advice – lose the rigidity. If you go into any work of fiction with a set parameter of what you’re expecting to see you’ll never fully enjoy the literary experience. Books are amazing. I mean, you’ll like some styles and you’ll loathe some styles, but you should always try to be open minded. No rules.

And to quote a Rob Pattinson movie, “no limits”

Oh Salvador, how I love thee. Anyway, moving on.

“How old is the intended audience? That’s right. Teenagers.”

Hmm – first of all, if you read Stephenie Meyer’s site, as you claim to do, you will note that she mentions several times she didn’t write her book for any audience in particular. It’s not her fault that the company who published the books marketed it as YA (I wish to high hell they hadn’t – so many people discount these books offhand just BECAUSE they’re YA)

And I was reading books with MUCH more complicated words at 12, let alone 15,16,17. Sorry hon, saying that teenagers shouldn’t have a vocabulary that they can read these books without a dictionary is not an excuse -it’s a damn shame.

And don’t think I’m picking on teens. Most people my age don’t have my vocabulary. It’s a shame to me, but it is what it is.

“How a dance could be made up of someone sitting is beyond me.”

Sigh – how do I explain this to you? It’s just prose hon. I mean, have you seen Ever After? Little Cinderella remarks to her father that the way her step-sisters ate was “like a dance.” -In other words, this so ordinary act eating (or sitting, in Edward’s case) was so graceful (and inhuman) that it caught Bella’s attention. If Stephenie had just said “He sat in the chair” it leaves the mind open to interpretation . Likely you would picture him just plopping in a chair. Not Edward! Again, it’s all about imagery, not showing off.

“SMeyer badmouths about the books she said she’d read.”

Stephenie is allowed to have an opinion, even a negative one, about the books we all consider classics. Let me tell you – I don’t like all the classics.

But at no point did I ever hear her (Or Bella or Edward) say that these classics are less perfect than their own love. They really don’t discuss their love in relation to the other stories. They see strains of their situation or their characters in these characters, but no – you really can’t compare their love. Love cannot be compared. Why would you want to? Edward and Bella are not Heathcliffe and Cathy, or Romeo and Juliet. They are Edward and Bella.

PS – Romeo and Juliet are COMPLETE idiot kids. You can quote me on that. Shakesphere wrote them as such. I mean, it’s right in the play. Romeo is a horn-dog teenage kid and Juliet is a naive teenage kid. They are…typical teenagers. Dramatic, angsty and wanting to get between the sheets. There’s nothing wrong with it, but it is what it is.

However, you say “look it up.” Look what up – Stephenie Meyer never said those things. All Edward ever said was that Romeo is fickle (true – ask your English teacher ) and that he destroyed his own happiness. That’s certainly one interpretation.

“Yes, I have. Why?”

Um – I was talking about Stephenie, not you. You insinuated that Stephenie did not read the books she referenced in her stories. I was simply stating – uh yea, she did. Lol.

“but young teenagers who haven’t picked up a real book in their life.. yeah.”

I know a lot of teenagers who love these books. They didn’t have any trouble with it. Which is not saying anything except that you didn’t enjoy Stephenie’s writing style and therefore didn’t get into it enough to understand it. That’s fine. However, I would not critisize a writer for you not understanding their book – that’s simply not their responsibility. You can’t please everyone.

“By “a lot of us”, you mean you, of course”

No – I mean a lot of us. As in Twilighters. You have to figure, there’s a reason these books have the following they do. I’m a member of the Twilight community. And it’s a HUGE community. We have many discussions. That’s what I’m talking about when I talk about “us”.

“Edward must be God himself.”

Huh? Believe me man, if you think this is overboard you’re going to hate A LOT of books. Twilight is very, very, VERY simple.

“THUS proving my point: “Mary-Sue”.”

Alright, so what you’re saying is situations that happen in real life happening to a book character = Mary-Sue?

Well, Jesus almost every character is a Mary-Sue by those standards.

“NOT a lot of people get A’s.”

Yes, a lot of people get A’s. I was in High school not THAT long ago – I do remember how long the Principal’s list was. No, not EVERYONE gets A’s but it isn’t exactly rare. My point being is that Bella is an above average but not PHENOMENAL student. She gets A’s and B’s. I mean, even if she was a straight A student (which, again, she isn’t) I don’t get the point of calling her a bad character because of it. She’s bookish.

“Everything which is bad is presented by Meyer as good. Controlling, stalking, wimping, being a doormat,”

First of all – I don’t think Stephenie portrayed Bella’s injuries as trophies. They just were what they were. I mean, she did survive them. But they are just facts – like she couldn’t NOT mention them, ignore their existence.

As to the above quoted comment – how are any of these things portrayed as good. The few times Edward acts controlling (and they are SO few, seriously) he is told by other characters AND BELLA HERSELF that he is being irrational and in each and every case, he backs down. The stalking is portrayed as more fortuitous than anything else. He was able to prevent her rape and murder because of it. Stephenie did not write Edward as perfect – he really, really isn’t (which is what makes him such a great characters).

Please point out to me exactly where this wimping and being a doormat is. I’m curious to see what I missed!

“She came to the prom with bandages and all, and even though she was hurt… she still looked stunning in her dress. M..a..r..y..”

She looked stunning in her dress…to Edward (and Jacob who had a school boy crush on her at that point). We’ve already gone over how Edward is quite biased. Besides, looking good at the prom does not make one a Mary-Sue (good god how I hate that fucking term).

“Yes, of course it’s a bad thing, but once again, presented by Meyer… it’s completely JUSTIFIED”

Oy vey I have such problems with this whole paragraph of yours. Where to begin?

Ok – first of all. What do you mean it’s a bad thing? To who? Bella never loses sleep over the people who are on the Anti-Bella team. She’s not oh-so-sad when Jessica abandons their friendship. So let’s take this one by one.

Jessica – At no point does Stephenie ever label Jessica a bitch. Honestly, Jessica never even ACTS like a bitch. Yea, she’s never really interested in being Bella’s true friend but that’s true of a lot of relationships you’ll have in life. It happens.

And when Jessica “turns off” on Bella it is not portrayed as Jessica’s fault. In fact, Bella specifically notes HER OWN complete lack of interest in anyone after New Moon. And later with Mike she hopes that he will forgive HER for her abhorrent behavior. Jessica goes out with Bella and Bella acts like a COMPLETE lunatic – prompting Jessica to be irritated with her. Yea, at no point are Jessica’s actions “bad”, they are realistic.

Lauren – Lauren is a bitch. lol. Plain and simple. She’s a nasty person. I mean, I’m assuming you’re in High School – and I remember High School – there were a lot of these people around. Hell, as an adult, I see it even MORE. I mean, no matter who you are you are going to know people who are bitches and assholes – that doesn’t mean that they’re bad people or anything, just that they are that way to YOU. So Bella’s world has a bitch in it – again this makes her world more REALISTIC than anything.

At no point does Stephenie Meyer label BELLA (Not Kristen) as the “victim”. I mean, Lauren is habitually nasty but Bella just ignores it – hardly victimized. Like she gives a fuck what Lauren thinks about her. Lol.

How does Stephenie put the normal teenage boys as the minority? Emmett and Jasper are both 20 and Edward is the only teenage boy at Forks High School who ISN’T human. I’m confused.

Rosalie – Rosalie is a bitch but no more than Edward is an asshole (and he is). She has a rough edge but there’s nothing wrong with that. At no point does Stephenie portray Rosalie’s harshness as just plain old “she’s a bitch”. In fact, Bella often struggles to understand it – she never feels victimized by it (Ie “OH EDWARD, why is Rosalie so Mean to me boo hoo hoo).

In Twilight Rosalie is portrayed as being worried about her family and jealous of the fact that Bella is human. Bella, being the WONDERFUL character she is, puts herself in Rosalie’s shoes and understands. In fact, Bella wonders towards many times if Rosalie is mad at her for putting her husband in danger. Bella identifies with Rosalie tremendously. She knows what she is. As far as Rosalie is concerned, here she was, living peacefully with her vampire family with no trouble – no trackers, no volturi, no werewolves, no newborns threatening them….and all of a sudden this insignificant human girl comes in and fucks everything up. No wonder Rosalie is peeved!

And then, to top it all off, Rosalie is the one Cullen who TRULY resents being made into a vampire. She would do ANYTHING to be human. But she was not given a choice. She was raped to death and saved – both against her will. And here is Bella – young, healthy, with this tremendous gift of a human life there in front of her – and she throws it all away.

Yea, Rosalie’s attitude is far from dismissed as “just a bitch”.

“She does NOT – I repeat, NOT – like Bella.”

Where are you getting this. I want direct quotes and believe me, I’ve read every single word on her website. She says several times that Bella is RELATABLE. Relatable is not the same as blank and unlikable. She means that Bella is, obviously, human. She’s a human amidst this FANTASTIC creatures. We may love Edward, but we can’t RELATE to him because we are not immortal, 108 years old, strong, fast, bla, bla, bla. That’s just something you and I will NEVER experience. However, Bella is human – just by that virtue we can relate to her.

Stephenie commented about Bella losing that relatability in Breaking Dawn by saying “So I was happy for her but we just weren’t as close as we had been before. ”

Does that sound like someone who dislikes her character?

No, Stephenie LOVES Bella. I mean, the reason she named her Bella was because that was the name she would have given her own daughter (she had all sons).

So yea, I’m afraid you’re going to need to provide me a direct quote before I believe that Stephenie said anything you’re talking about. I think you’ve misconstrued a few statements quite badly.

“Because SM said so herself she is. Oops. D:”

Again – prove it. I mean, I’m literally looking RIGHT at her site as I type. You can see I’ve copied and pasted not only from her site but from transcripts of Q and A’s she did in conferences as well as directly with the Twilight Lexicon.

Proof. Let’s rumble.

“It’s the fact that she made all these promises such as an ultimate sacrifice, etc, but never fulfilled them.”

Where did she make this promise of the “ultimate” sacrifice??? I must have missed that chapter. The ULTIMATE sacrifice would have been giving up Edward (as Edward tried to do for her – what Edward did was the ULTIMATE sacrifice, sacrificing the one thing he could not live without – her – misguided as he was for that, it didn’t make it LESS of a sacrifice).

No, Stephenie never promised that. Obviously, Bella had to sacrifice something very important to get her ULTIMATE desire. She sacrificed her life. I think you’re putting way too small of an importance on her human life.

Now, Bella was naive about it at first. She was certain she was ready to give up her life at the end of Twilight, but, as evidenced in Eclipse when she kind of freaked out about it, she was NOT ready.

“From page one, SM insisted that she was “selfless””

When did BELLA say she was selfless? Lol, I think Edward makes this observation about her – and she is.

“and with a COP believing it, by the way”

Um – Charlie 1) Was not actually IN Phoenix to see it himself. and 2) Would have no reason not to believe this when the doctors in Phoenix and Dr. Cullen (who he trusts implicitly) tell him.

“To have that sickeningly happy ending.. I’d spend many years in torture.”

You and I obviously have different versions of happiness. Lol. Honey – they’re vampires. You can’t have ANY part of their life and that INCLUDES the happily ever after.

Besides, it’s implied that they will have challenges down the line. The Volturi will eventually lick their wounds and come after them. /shrug. Let them be happy! That’s the great thing about books – escapism. We can never have that happily ever after (and PS – I wouldn’t, personally, want it), but it sure is nice to read about.

“Wtf, I never said anything about her mother and father. She didn’t give anything up.”

No, you inferred. Check this out. You said that Bella believes that all humans are weak, ugly, useless and boring. Bella’s parents humans. Ergo – Bella’s parents are weak, ugly, useless and boring.

She gave up her mother completely. Both she and Charlie make it clear that they will not tell Renee anything. Sure, Bella indicates she will call her soon, but the will eventually have to fake her own death. Renee can’t handle the truth. Therefore – she will never see her mother again.

And her father is mortal. She will lose him eventually, even if she gets to keep him for the time being.

“There are just so many hints.”

Ok, both the “hints” you provided have nothing to do with anything except to say that humans are weaker than vampires. Like – duh? That’s not saying humans are weak, or bad because they are weaker than vampires. Bella wants to be as strong as Edward is BECAUSE her life is threatened by these super strong, mythical monsters that she can do NOTHING about. Bella is a human trying to exist in a mythical world. It’s just not possible – hence why her change HAD to happen.

And wtf is a cop got to do with anything? He’s a cop, so what? That doesn’t give him mystical anti-vampire powers. He’s still a human who has 0 chance against a vampire. ZERO. This is what is meant by Bella being selfless – she does EVERYTHING in her power to keep her mortal family and friends FAR, FAR away from the mythical world she has found herself in. In other words, she protects the humans – she doesn’t detest them.

“how can Edward get bella pregnant.. if he doesn’t have any bodily fluids?”

He does have bodily fluids, they’re just not the same. Here…let me let Stephenie explain (since you read her site so thoroughly )

It’s kinda long, so I’m just going to link it: http://stepheniemeyer.com/bd_faq.html

“what happens when bella’s on her period?”

Stephenie has addressed this as well but since I can’t find it and I REALLY need to get back to work, I’ll summarize. Essentially, the blood is different. It’s “dead” blood, so to speak, and therefore not as appetizing. Yes, it makes it a little harder, but only just.

Yes, Edward can always tell but he’s too much of a gentleman to talk about it and Bella is too embarrassed to ask.

“So much for your “Storng, heroic main character”

Being able to identify with a character doesn’t make them less strong or heroic. Bella is an extremely strong character. Stronger than most people I know.

“*Wags finger*.”

Oh you. You got me there.

Oh, wait, no you didn’t. I already addressed both points you mention here. First of all, Bella KNOWS what she wants, but she doesn’t quite understand at first what exactly she’s giving up. I mean she doesn’t really FEEL it until Eclipse – when the night is literally upon her. She misses her Graduation deadline by her own choice. She and Carlisle had a deal. Carlisle would have changed her that night if it was what she wanted, but when it came right down to it Bella was scared. She needed more time. She needed to figure things out. She realized there was at least one human experience she wanted to have before she gave up her humanity.

It was NEVER an easy choice. Bella, being the complex and wonderful character she is, was simply naive about it at first.

And even then she was always aware that there were consequences. In Twilight, Edward dissuades her by mentioning Charlie. Obviously she wasn’t ready to deal with that aspect – hurting and leaving her father. In New Moon her desperation at getting older is clouding a lot of her judgment on the issue. Either way, it’s not exactly something she didn’t agonize over.

And Rosalie opposes because she KNOWS Bella is being naive. Think of it as if you told your mother you were running away to be the wife of a circus freak tomorrow – would she be a bitch if she opposed you? Hell no! She’d just be looking out for your best interest.

“Then she thought the “horrifying” thought that she Wanted To Be Strong – Wanted To Be A Vampire.”

Well, of course if vampires are TRUE in your world, you’d have these thoughts. I mean, just by relation to the Twilight world I have these thoughts. Last night I was in Spanish class and I thought, g’damn I wish I was a vampire so I could just have this photographic memory thing going down. Does that mean I WANT to be a vampire?

Hell. No. I’d never want it. Even for Edward.

Bella is horrified at the thought because it was, at one time, a possibility for her – and something she not only desperately wanted but planned for. In other words, that thought was horrible to her because it unleashed a WORLD of pain that she has been trying to keep locked up.

Think about it. In New Moon you have a Bella who knows vampires exist….but she thinks Edward doesn’t want her. She could do what Edward mentions in Midnight Sun other people have done – seek out someone to change her. But she doesn’t want immortality if Edward is not around.

“But guess what? It all works out !”

Again – you’re criticizing a book for having a happy ending, and TOTALLY missing out on the epic arch of fate Stephenie has carved out. Bella belongs in the vampire world. That’s what makes it a happy ending.

“That proves her weakness.”

…. Huh? You argue that Bella would have wanted to be a vampire without Edward – and yet when I point out to you that she doesn’t, you call her weak?

Interesting.

“SMeyer said herself in an interview she was ‘Anti-Human’. Look it up.”

She didn’t say it in an interview, she said it on her website. I’m well aware of this quote, thanks. It’s called hyperbole hon. Basically, she’s explaining her writing is not about weakness in WOMEN but weakness in humans… which is true, we are weak in that way – physically. Human life is fragile.

It doesn’t mean that Stephenie despises human life – far from it. If you actually had seen and read interviews with her she often muses that it’s not a choice she would personally make. She wouldn’t give up her human life.

“Have you heard of twitards who need angery management issues?”

Yes – also normal people. Not for nothing honey but teenagers are a hot mess. It’s not your fault – it’s part of growing up. But it’s not Stephenie Meyer’s fault either. She didn’t do anything to your teen friends. And if any of them had even a shred of sense they’d know the difference between fiction and real life. My parents made sure I knew when I was like 4.

“Not a very good one.”

Coming from you honey, you’ll forgive me if that remark has no bearing. You do realize that a feminist simply means that you believe that women are EQUAL to men. It’s about equal opportunity and equal choice darling – nothing else.

“ALL LITERATURE?!?! *Facepalms*”

This from the teen who has admitted to having read very few books?

A little background – I’ve been reading since, well, I could. My LIFETIME average is about 5 books – A MONTH. And that down from several years ago only because I work and go to school full time.

I am not trying to be snotty about this (and admittedly, failing a lot), but I’d say of the two of us – the one of us who has read more probably has a LITTLE bit better insight and analysis into this kind of thing.

I’m just saying.

Why, who do YOU think is the strongest female character in literature? (PS – I didn’t say she was THE strongest character in all literature, I said she was one of them. Def. top 5…of what I’ve read. And I haven’t read everything, but as previously stated, I have read an awful lot).

“Apparently, SMeyer does not agree. Neither does Bella.”

Stephenie wrote the books – which means she wrote Edward. Which means she wrote Edward’s opinion of Bella.

I just don’t understand where you’re basing this opinion on what Stephenie thinks of her own character. I’ll opt for actual proof. The words straight from Stephenie’s mouth…or website.

“For Bella, it was what she really wanted for her life, and it wasn’t a phase she was going to grow out of. So I don’t have issues with her choice. She’s a strong person who goes after what she wants with persistence and determination.”

As for Bella not agreeing – Bella and Edward are very alike in that they don’t think of themselves as as good as they are. This is called being humble, for one. Additionally, and another mark of a well rounded, three dimensional character, Bella is slightly self-concious. Look me in the eye (not literally) and tell me that you think you’re the most perfect person out there. I mean, I really hope to god that you can’t because that’d make you an insufferable ass. :-p It just makes her real, that’s all.

Hmm. Are you crazy?
bella is not strong. She constantly needs a man to help her out of the shit that she constantly puts herself into. She’s always complaining, “forks is my own personal hell”, etc, bitch, get the fuck over yourself. She treats people like shit because they’re not physically attractive.
How the hell is she a good role model? Seriously.
Yes it does put feminism back about 100 years. None of the female characters are remotely strong compared to characters from other books. This is a common arguement, but HERMIONE GRANGER.
She stands up for herself, she has a personality, she is smart, and she isn’t afraid to tell people off once in a while.
Bella, in comparison, whines, is the stereotypcal 40′s housewife, aspires to get married and have sex with the hottest guy in school who treats her like shit, doesn’t speak up for herself, and forgives Edward for every horrible thing he does immediately.
Ugh.
Edward isn’t the example of the “perfect boyfriend”. If you want a boyfriend like him, go become penpals with a guy from your local prison who will gladly break into your house and watch you sleep.
Edward is abusive. In case you didn’t know, physical abuse isn’t the only type of abuse. There can also be emotional, verbal, mental and more. Edward manipulates Bella into marriage by promising sex and turning her into someone more like him.
None of the characters have personalities, and overall, the series is completely horrible.

Bella is still a weakling. She basically falls into a half-year coma because her boyfriend (whom they’ve only been together for 2 months) dumps her. Then she has to leech on to some other guy and even starts doing reckless stunts and trying to kill hersel just to hear HALLUCINATIONS.

If that’s not a weak, lil’ wimp–then PLEASE remind me what t is.

And seriously, the fact she can’t do ANYTHING by herself and ALWAYS has to have someone sweep her off her feet is practically PATHETIC. Seriously, she barely even fights back–a REAL person who wanted to survive would bite, kick, and scream (even if the enemy is a hell lot stronger).

Arguement fail

Two word: Midnight sun . just read it….it’s creepy…fucking creepy to be in Eddie head( at least, his tendancies to be a stalker are confirmed- he call himself so)

On Bella… hmm. I don’t hate her THAT much. She’s just an annoying brat . It make me laugh when meyers said Bella had it rough in her life…I beg to differ.

If she a mary sue? Everyone here have their own definition, so here’s mine
1- Everyone love her. And want to her. If not, they’re just jealous harpies( poor Leah, Rosalie and Jessica)
By meyer admition, the prof of biology had a crush on Bella. wow, creepy. Still searching for the interview she said that though…Tyler( confirmed), Mike( confirmed), the prof, Jacob,( hell yes) Eric( not so, I give you that one) and otherr unnamed guys
Oh! Remember the ones that went after Bella in the dark alley? They were wanted rapists, the leader, at least. it’s confirmed again.Sues tend to attract a lot of rapists after all!

2- By own edward admission, “the whole town has been waiting for her”- Midnight sun
don’t forget the guy happily scanned all the mind around. He know what he’s talking about!

3- Bella is just that Special

“I continued to stare into her eyes, feeling that I’d finally gotten my first real glimpse into her soul. I saw in that one word where she ranked herself among her own priorities. Unlike most humans, her own needs were far down the list.
She was selfless.”

It could be argued that Edward is quite biased since he’s madly in love…
oh wait. He DECIDED to be in love instead of eating her. Like Alice forsaw it. Yup. Alice told him so. She saw herself friend with bella after all!( this bother me actually.. I thought Alice ability was linked to people decisions in present…)

“It was clear as glass in her head: Alice, smiling, with her icy white arm around the girl’s warm, fragile shoulders. And Bella was smiling too, her arm around Alice’s waist.’- Midnight sun

4- she’s a self-insert ( now, self-insert arent necessairly bad as long as they’re not the main character, -well in my opinion- )
here’s a decripstion of our heroin:
“…very fair-skinned, with long, straight, dark brown hair and chocolate brown eyes. Her face is heart-shaped—a wide forehead with a widow’s peak, large, wide-spaced eyes, prominent cheekbones, and then a thin nose and a narrow jaw with a pointed chin. Her lips are a little out of proportion, a bit too full for her jaw line. Her eyebrows are darker than her hair and more straight than they are arched. She’s five foot four inches tall, slender but not at all muscular, and weighs about 115 pounds. She has stubby fingernails because she has a nervous habit of biting them.”

Stepheniemeyer.com. and http://das-mervin.livejournal.com/166403.html#cutid1.

compare that description and a picture of Smeyers. The “too full lips” is a clasical “flaw’ suposed to diminish the Mary Sue beauty…when she’s not suposed to look perfect

Oh well, I’m done this series is chick lit anyway. It’s okay to have a guilty pleisure you did pretty well on your article .Even if I do not agree with most your points, It’s nice to have sane fan around, sane fan that can actualy debate ^^. forgive me for the faults, english is not my speciality.

You make an, interesting argument but I still think Edward Cullens is one of the worst examples of a model boyfriend I’ve ever seen. He’s constantly making decisions for her, from taking her places HE wants to go, dragging her against her will early on, even going so far as to steal her car engine to make sure she couldn’t go against his will, and chose for her to be a vampire while she was unconscious.
He also puts her down quite a bit in the series, threatens her, and managed to bruise her body while having sex with her unconscious body, and did I mention the midnight sleep watching? I don’t care who considers it true love, many people like me consider that a form of abuse and stalking, it’s very rare that he actually considers Bella’s desires.
You can say “Oh, he was looking out for her” all you want but, if he cared, he’d atleast consider her feelings. I found Jacob to be far better a person, atleast until Meyer felt the need to go all pedo on him….

You are a complete idiot. Bella is an anti-feminist character, who has taken us back to 1950s values of women. She is a terrible role model for young girls, who think they have to have a boyfriend to be worth something. And Edward is so overprotective and demanding of Bella, why should girls do as they’re told. Maybe it’s you who needs to find out what feminism is. Please do a little research: Women have liberation and power in a relationship, they don’t need a man to save them and tell them what to do.

Hey, Kristin. (Or Kristen). (Omg, Kristen Stewart, is that you? Hehe, Jks. She hates Bella.)

Ok, I have exams to study for, so I’ll just leave it to other people to rebuttle). Enjoy.

http://www.twilightsucks.com/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=10158

1. Bella is weak. Not only is she weak, but she doesn’t even have the brain cells or survival instincts to make up for that weakness. You say she’s strong for uprooting herself? She was whining the whole time when it was her own choice to do so from the get go. If she hated it that much, she didn’t have to go to Forks. And when it comes to her so-called “irritation” with some of his antics, those hardly last long. She whines, he tells her to stop being silly, and she proceeds to swoon and go along with him anyway. How is that strong? Strong is standing by one’s principles. Strong is telling him “no” and not changing that just because he flashes some skin. Strong is NOT trying to cause self-harm to hear a voice in one’s head. Bella’s constant having to be rescued is not just a sign of weakness, but of her outright stupidity. She wouldn’t have needed to be saved if she hadn’t wandered off alone in an unfamiliar area at night. Or if she hadn’t confronted a supposed kidnapper without preparing any sort of weapon, plan, or backup, OR making a few calls to ensure that the person he claimed to take was in fact kidnapped and possibly avoid the whole mess altogether. Or if she hadn’t jumped off that cliff and tried to let herself drown so she could hear Edward’s voice telling her what her common sense has been screaming at her all along. With the sheer number of incredibly stupid acts she commits, I’m honestly surprised she didn’t bite the bullet in the first book and spare us two sequels, a bad fanfic in book form, and a retcon.

2. Bella is a whiny little twit. Not just in that she’s popular when she doesn’t want to be, but in that she doesn’t appreciate anything good that happens to her. Charlie gets her a vehicle–she whines. Guys offer to help her–she disses them both and proceeds to whine. She survives almost being crushed by a van–she whines. Her birthday–she whines. Shopping and spending time with friends–whines. Saved from evil vampires–still whining.

Actually, when I look at it, Bella seems to have some major mental disorders that would explain her attitude. Narcissism, histrionic, schizophrenia, bipolar…the girl has issues. And if Bella is supposed to be Meyer’s self-insert…well, it would explain a lot, now wouldn’t it?

BELLA IS A MARY-SUE, JUST DEAL WITH IT. SHE’S LIKE ”OH MY EDWARD, MY SPARKLY GOD, SAVE ME” AND SHE ACTS LIKE WHINY LITTLE BRAT CAUSE SHE IS. I MEAN SHE WHINES BECAUSE SHE MOVES TO FORKS, SHE WHINES BECAUSE HER SCHOOL MATES AREN’T EMOTARDS LIKE HER, THEN SHE WHINES BECAUSE EDWARD DOESN’T LIKE HER, THEN BECAUSE HE LEFT HER, THEN BECAUSE SHE WANTED TO DIE, THEN BECAUSE SHE WANTED BOTH ED AND JAKE, THEN BECAUSE SHE WANTED TO BE A VAMPIRE ETC. I MEAN THERE’S NO FINISHING OF HER WHINING THROUGH OUT THE BOOKS. SHE’S NOT A HEROINE, SHE’S JUST A STUPID CHICK THAT THINKS ONLY OF HER SELF AND DOESN’T CARE ABOUT OTHERS. HER LONG LIFE DREAM IS TO BECOME A HOUSEWIFE, I MEAN COMMON SHE DOESN’T WANT TO LIVE HER LIFE AND THERE’S NOTHING EXCEPT HER SPARKLY ADONIS, EDWARD. IN OPINION REAL HEROINES ARE BUFFY, THE CHARMED-ONES, SELENE FROM UNDERWORLD, ,SAILOR MOON, CATWOMAN, WONDER WOMAN, XENA, BUT THAT’S MY POINT OF VIEW OF FEMALE HEROINES BUT THAT THING THAT YOU CALL A HEROINE IS JUST A BITCHY DUMSELL.

It just amazes me how Edward can’t be classified as an controlling boyfriend even though there are plenty of times in the text where it is SHOWN, not told where he is being a controlling jerk. Never is it SHOWN where he is being nice. It is only told to us. I’ll give examples of him being a controlling boyfriend after I give a definition to the phrase.

The Top Ten Sides of a Controlling Boyfriend

He’s Always By Your Side

‘If you are in a relationship where it seems that you have no time to yourself, chances are you have a controlling boyfriend. He never wants you to go anywhere without him. There is no more “girls night out” for you and your friends, unless he is with you. Doesn’t sound like a good time.”

While Edward does ‘give’ Bella time to hang out with Angela and Jessica he shouldn’t have to ‘give’ her time to spend with her friends. He never lets her make her own decisions unless someone from his family prevents him from controlling her.

And whenever she is having ‘fun’ with her friends he’s always around the corner with his Volvo to save her from the ‘dirty rapists’ who want to hurt her. (Chapter 8 of Twilight)

Now it takes Alice and Jasper to prevent him from controlling her opinion in the end of Twilight. It takes Emmet and Alice to prevent him from sucking her blood in the beginning of the book. It takes Rosalie to prevent him from forcefully giving her an abortion in Breaking Dawn.

See something wrong with this trend?

You Do What He Likes

“When you do go out, it is to an event that HE chooses. You may not feel like going to a movie, but it is what he wants to do, for example. Also, his turning down an offer to do what you would like is a key sign that he is not flexible. It often leaves the impression that he does not care about your interests. He may, or may not, but he is not supportive either way.”

When Bella is in Port Angeles for the first time and he ‘saves’ her he forces her to go to a restaurant even though she’d been looking for a bookstore. This can pretty much sum up the whole conversation.

“Drink,” he ordered.

I sipped at my soda obediently

She always does what he wants her to do. Forging her signature to go to Dartmouth, the Prom, the Wedding. These are things that she didn’t want but he forced them upon her. Even if it is logical to want some of these things it doesn’t excuse the fact that he forced them onto her. If a child agreed to being abused does that make it right for the abuser to abuse them? No.

You Do Things For Him

“Honey, go pick up some soda for me.” sounds like a genuine request for assistance. If your boyfriend is constantly asking you to run errands, without including you as the benefactor, this is another sign of the need to feel in control. Instead of “…pick up some soda for me.”, the request should be, “We’re out of soda. Can you go pick some up, please?”. Can you see the difference? WE are in need of soda, simply.”

Very honestly I see nothing that he gives Bella in return for ‘all the things’ she does for him. Her life would have been much easier without him returing again and again to give her another dose of the dazzle.

No Manners

“In the previous example, the “please” was left out intentionally. Your boyfriend will not be polite. He will not say “thank you”, “you’re welcome”, “please” or even “excuse me” to you. It is because he is expecting you to comply with his requests. He also feels as if you should be thanking him for allowing you to do things for him.”

Whenever Edward does say please it’s not polite. He doesn’t have manners. He’s not a gentleman. Honestly what sort of gentleman does this to a lady?

“His long hands unexpectedly gripped my waist, and his foot pushed mine off the gas pedal. He pulled me across his lap, wrenching my hands free of the wheel, and suddenly he was in the driver’s seat. The truck
didn’t swerve an inch.”

“We were near the parking lot now. I veered left, toward my truck. Something caught my jacket, yankingme back.

“Where do you think you’re going?” he asked, outraged. He was gripping a fistful of my jacket in one hand.

I was confused. “I’m going home.”

“Didn’t you hear me promise to take you safely home? Do you think I’m going to let you drive in your condition?” His voice was still indignant.

“What condition? And what about my truck?” I complained.

“I’ll have Alice drop it off after school.” He was towing me toward his car now, pulling me by my jacket.It was all I could do to keep from falling backward. He’d probably just drag me along anyway if I did.

“Let go!” I insisted. He ignored me. I staggered along sideways across the wet sidewalk until we reached the Volvo. Then he finally freed me — I stumbled against the passenger door.”

I hope I’m not the only one seeing things wrong with this situation.

Questions, Questions

“When you can finally break through the chains, and find some free time for yourself, be prepared: your controlling boyfriend will interrogate you when you return. Putting himself in a “father figure” position will install more of a sense of control. Treating you like a child that went to the mall, prior to doing her homework, is the kind of humiliation in you he is trying to achieve.”

Does anything need to be said about Edward’s condescending attitude to her all of the time? And the countless probe sessions that he puts her through because he is unable to read her mind.

No Questions, No Answers

“Unlike the aforementioned subject, your boyfriend will come and go as he pleases, without answering to anyone – especially to you. If you try to question his whereabouts or activities, he will become defensive. The subject will immediately transfer from your asking, “where were you?” to his comeback remark about how you nag him too much, or something similar to that effect. He will ignore answering the question, and make you feel guilty for asking it. This is in hope that you will not do it again.”

Edward is always denying her answers or asking a question in return to her questions. He fits the description quite accurately.

He’s Always Right

“In an argument with a controlling personality, it is very difficult for him to accept defeat. The controlling boyfriend will get more defensive, change the subject, or bring up a past occurrence, when he was, indeed, correct, in order to prove his point with the issue at hand. He may not always be right, completely, but he is never wrong.”

YES! Edward is always right no matter what in all of him and Bella’s ‘disagreements’. She always bends to his will like a rubber band.

Can’t Buy Me Love

“Fools gold has been around for centuries. However, a fool AND his gold have special meaning to the controlling boyfriend. He will buy you nice jewelry, take you to expensive restaurants and maybe even offer to pay a debt of yours. He will say it is because he loves you. Not true. He needs to feel superior to you. You now owe him, in his mind. Who is the fool? To him, you are.”

YES! YES! AND YES! Edward is always buying her expensive gifts and giving her needless expensive things that won’t do her any good. She hates having money squandered on her yet he does it anyway and allows his family to do so not realizing that it adds to her inferiority complex.

You’re Worthless

“Belittling your self-confidence can be have very serious consequences. Making you feel as if you are worthless without him, the controlling boyfriend will prey on times that you may be stressed the most. If you have just lost a job, or if you are experiencing normal hormonal reactions, this is the time he will strike. He wants you to feel as if life is not worth living without him. It’s hard to believe, but his confidence level is actually lower than yours.”

Bingo. Do I even need to give an example of all the times Edward says that he can kill her with his big toe? This is not neccesary. It is also wrong for him to tell her to stay away from him and then say that he’ll see her later in class. What sort of thing is that to say to someone?

No Means No

“This is the most upsetting trait that a controlling boyfriend can display. If he forces you to do things, against your will, he is not in love with you. Whether it is going to a baseball game, when you hate outdoor stadiums, or, even more harsh an act, makes you perform sexually against your will, he is NOT in love with you. Not showing you the courtesy to respect your wishes is not a behavior that goes away. This will continue as an abusive relationship, where you will be treated as an object, instead of a person.”

Bullseye! This is the trait that Edward displays the most. Whether it’s forbidding her to see her friends by taking the motor out of her truck or forcing her to eat when she insists that she isn’t hungry. This is controlling behavior and does not need to continue.

1.Attached At The Hip – many controlling boyfriends behaviour is sparked by their inability to trust. Someone who has to control another always needs to be around to watch what they are doing and to ensure that their partner is only having a “good time” when he is around. If you are in a relationship with someone who insists on always being there and not allowing you any time to yourself, then you are a victim of a controlling boyfriend.

2.On His Terms – if your boyfriend is always making plans without including you in the decision making process, then this is a major sign that he has controlling habits. If he is constantly turning down invites and opportunities to attend events that you have interest in and you always seem to be attending events he has interest in, then chances are you have a controlling boyfriend.

3.Interrogation – a controlling boyfriend is a great fan of interrogation. If you do find a moment to yourself, spend some time with the girls or arrive home a little later than expected, prepare to be asked a lot of questions as to where you were, who you were talking to and why you took so much longer than the average person would. Be careful of being in this type of relationship which usually makes you feel humiliated and as if you are in fact in the wrong.

4.Always Right – regardless of the situation or argument, the controlling boyfriend will never admit to being wrong. This is often also linked to breaking the partner down by making them believe that they are always wrong or doing something wrong. When in this type of relationship, the controlling boyfriend will swiftly change the subject to all the things you may do wrong or have done wrong in the past.

5.Confidence Battering – the controlling boyfriend will be well aware of when you are feeling stressed and a little down. He will use this as an opportunity to “save the day” or sometimes even ridicule you or make you feel silly for even believing you could do something successfully on your own. This can range from social situations to work decisions that you may have made. Breaking down ones confidence can have serious and long lasting effects.

6.Snooping – a controlling boyfriend is usually a professional snoop. He can often be found looking through your emails, sneaking a few peaks at your cell phone messages and even reading your mail. This type of behaviour in a relationship shows his need to control and always be in the know, along with a lack of trust.

7.Isolation – when you find yourself in a relationship with a controlling boyfriend, you will find that he will try and isolate you from your family and friends. This will start usually with general disinterest in them to obvious dislike and will sometimes even try to convince you that they do not love you or care for you and are possibly even out to get you.

Those are even more signs for you to decode and bash.

It such come as a red flag for you when Edwards name flashes across the screen whenever you type the phrase ‘controlling boyfriend’ into google.

There is nothing loving about his behavior.

While many say that it’s ok because it’s his first relationship and he doesn’t know how to react that still doesn’t make it ok.

Are all boys controlling in their first relationships? No.

Harry Potter was not abusive to Cho Chang. In fact it could be considered the exact opposite.

Bella has battered woman syndrome and there is no way to say otherwise.

Let’s see some symptoms of an abused woman shall we?

“DENIAL

The woman refuses to admit–even to herself–that she has been beaten or that there is a “problem” in her marriage. She may call each incident an “accident”. She offers excuses for her husband’s violence and each time firmly believes it will never happen again.

GUILT

She now acknowledges there is a problem, but considers herself responsible for it. She “deserves” to be beaten, she feels, because she has defects in her character and is not living up to her husband’s expectations.

ENLIGHTENMENT

The woman no longer assumes responsibility for her husband’s abusive treatment, recognizing that no one “deserves” to be beaten. She is still committed to her marriage, though, and stays with her husband, hoping they can work things out.

RESPONSIBILITY

Accepting the fact that her husband will not, or can not, stop his violent behavior, the battered woman decides she will no longer submit to it and starts a new life.”

There’s one problem with this though. Bella hasn’t moved on to the third stage. And she never will.

Here on some warning signs that Charlie and any other responsible adult should have picked up in their relationship ages before they got married.

“The abused woman:

* shows guilt, ambivalence, and fear over living conditions.
* feels isolated and untrusting of others, even though she may be involved in the community.
* is emotionally and economically dependent.
* has a poor self-concept (this may not have been true BEFORE the relationship).
* has observed other women in her family being abused or may have been abused as a child.
* feels angry, embarrassed, and ashamed.
* is fearful of being insane.
* has learned to feel helpless and feels powerless.
* has unexplained injuries that may go untreated.

The abusive man:

* shows extreme jealousy and wants to keep the woman isolated.
* has an inability to cope with stress and shows a lack of impulse control. (This may not necessarily appear outside the home)
* shows severe mood swings.
* may have a history of abuse in his own family and may have been abusive in courtship.
* presents a history of personal and/or family discord; unemployment, cruelty to animals, abuse of alcohol or other substances, and other unexplained behavior.”

Edward might not be abusive, but if he wasn’t sure that he’d kill her by smacking her around I’m sure he would be. In all actuality he does cause her phyiscal harm on more than one occasion.

Was it neccasary to throw her out of the way before lunging onto Jasper?

Was it necessary to drag her around by her coat into his Volvo?

I won’t even mention Breaking Dawn.

12 Ways To Tell Whether Your Partner
May Turn Into An Abuser

1. Heavy drinking or drug abuse (especially if he uses substances as an excuse for what he does: “The alcohol made me do it.”)

2. Abuse during the courtship period is a guarantee of further abuse that will become more frequent and severe. Don’t marry him with the belief that “I can change him.” You won’t.

3. Morbid jealousy. This may be a bit flattering at first, but will be a curse later on. You will never convince him that you are innocent of his accusations.

4. Past child abuse and/or witness of marital violence. This happens in some cases. Children learn what they live. Boys tend to copy their fathers. Abused children discipline their own children as they were taught. He may be a “violence carrier”.

5. Inability to handle frustration. If he blows up and explodes at small things, and reacts with a tantrum over minor things, he may act out frustration with violence in a marriage. How he deals with anger is the key.

6. A violent temper. This speaks for itself. If you feel fear when he acts out his anger, that fear is a warning signal. Listen to it!
7. Cruelty to animals, abuse and mistreatment of pets, great enjoyment of hunting for the sake of killing animals could help you to face this question: What makes you know he will treat you any differently?

8. Preoccupation with weapons. They are an extension of self. A person is what she/he lives. If he ever “playfully” points a gun at you or ever gestures at you with another weapon, what could happen if he became very angry with you?

9. Mental illness. A person with an unsound mind or without any sense of moral responsibility or guilt may not be in control of his actions. Does he act in ways that you feel are abnormal or strange?

10. A poor self-image; insecurity about his own masculinity. If he feels compulsive about always being “one up” and dominating and he lives out a macho role at all times, you will be subject to his control and possibly treated like one of his possessions. He may feel he has the right to treat you like his property, to do as he pleases.

11. A pattern of blaming others, particularly his wife, for his problems. If he never accepts his faults and responsibilities when things go wrong, be ready to be blamed for everything.

12. Acceptance of violence as an appropriate problem-solving method. Do you want a man who talks out or acts out his anger?

Edward fits more than 6 of these characteristics. Is that the sign of the perfect boyfriend involved in a healthy relationship? No.

I understand that your a brunette and can picture yourself as Bella because others have ‘known what’s best for you’.

But please don’t say that Edward is nice, even when he’s not, and that he is a good boyfriend. He is a controlling boyfriend and these need to be identified so that Generation Y doesn’t end up screwed up by these books. As much as many people like to disagree, Fiction Influences Most Teenagers Lives.

And by saying that a controlling, potentially abusive, boyfriend is a good thing for a teenage girl you are setting many bad examples for teens.

As for your mother the psychologist that supposedly anayzed Bella and Edward’s relationship, maybe you need to check her degree because if she is indeed a good phsychologist why do you claim to have been a recluse in your youth?

Just because Bella accepts it, that doesn’t make it right!

I realize you haven’t responded in months, but there a couple things I’d really like to say. First off, there are actually rules to creative writing and writing in general. If I wrote with her excessive use of descriptive words in a school assignment, my teacher would make me rewrite it completely. The general rule when writing a story is show, don’t tell and be sparing with you words in descriptions, using only a few words that fully convey your meaning as simply as possible.

I also wish to address your extremely condescending tone/attitude to everyone that doesn’t agree with you. It’s ridiculous to say the least. Teenagers can be amazingly insightful and deep. Normal teenagers have a wide variety of things/acctivities that they are interested/participate in. I have read many books, several of which are classics, and I don’t consider Bella to be any of their equals, except maybe Juliet’s. The two of them are actually very similar: they are both completely consumed with their first love. It just happens that Bella’s isn’t forbidden, otherwise their stories would almost be exactly the same.

Well, that’s what I have for now and I ask you to please not insult my intelligence, call me honey or anything similar, and refrain from swearing at me. Thank you.

Seriously, I have to agree with Heather. Obviously Kristina, you have not taken any Creative Writing classes other wise you would know that there are definatly rules to good writing when it comes to creative writing. I’ve taken two classes, one high school, one college level. The rules are drummed into us. Do we need to stick to them? Truth of the matter is, there are times you can break from the rules. But there is a rule in doing so, you need to first know what you are doing. Second, you need to be careful, because breaking from the norm is experimentation, not something for an amature writer, or even beginer to take care of.

The arguement is, on all three, well written. However, I also say, the arguement isn’t at all strong.