I heart boys who sparkle

The prestigious Boston Latin School is a vampire free zone.  At least the headmaster said so today, in a notice to parents, teachers and students. 

It's undeniable that Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series has caused a major sensation.  I've just finished the first book and overall I found it pretty enjoyable, but it's also raised some questions/concerns that I'd like to dwell on for a moment or two.  A virtual Odd Broad book club, if you will...

For starters, why is Bella always being carried about?  Think about it.  Even Alice picks her up!  She is forever being conveyed like a tiny baby.  If it happened only once I probably wouldn't have taken notice, but it happens more than once. 

As for Edward, his smoldering protectiveness is kind of dreamy, but it also suggests a certain helplessness in Bella that I just couldn't get past.  So she's awkward, we get it!  But are we truly expected to accept the fact that she's so clumsy that her own mother would believe she's uncoordinated enough to trip on a staircase and fall through a plate glass window?  (Be more careful walking, honey.)

And then there's the hearts and roses factor.  Before I began reading this book I'd heard it described over and over again as romantic.  I have to say, at first I agreed with this general consensus.  That is, until I didn't.  The irony is, I'm a total romantic!  When I love someone,  I have no qualms about telling them just why I love them, over and over again, at times in teary eyed detail.  (Set the scene...have we been drinking?)  But I suppose I just couldn't get over the fact that our heroine is, after all, a junior in high school; a seventeen year old kid who says things to her boyfriend like: "You are my life.  You're the only thing it would hurt me to lose."  (page 474.)

They haven't even properly made out yet!  Unless we count lightly pressing one's cold lips underneath a jawbone as heavy petting.  (I don't.)

He's a gorgeous, century old vampire who's desperately attracted to her scent and blood.  She's a loner teen who just can't live without him.  Is it socially irresponsible to suggest to young readers that this sort of hyper intense, self-destructive relationship is not only acceptable and appropriate, but a thing to envy and strive for?  While Bella was being carried around all that time I started to wonder, is this child going to take her SAT's?  Where does she want to go to college?

I'm not turning up my nose at young love.  But Bella has such a stereotypically teenage one track mind; I never get the impression she feels any real affection for anything but Edward.  This kid has no passion, no hobbies, no hopes or dreams, save those concerning her boyfriend.  She doesn't play sports, is blase and indifferent towards both parents and school friends.  Life is but a boring chore and she basically white knuckles her way through the day until the moment she can be with Edward again.  At the risk of sounding cynical, I just don't find this very sweet. 

I understand how it feels to love someone so much you'd rather die (or in this case, never die) than be without him.  But I'm certainly not going to write an effing children's book about it!  And I'm not going to turn to my own (hypothetical, nonexistent) seventeen year old daughter and admit, "I used to cry over Daddy!  And wrote bad poetry in my journals about how much I loved and needed him!  And wanted to drop out of my senior year of college to be with him!"  I'll keep that shit to myself.

Bella, five hundred years from now, during a heated domestic argument, do you really think you're not going to lash out at Ed and say, "You asshole, I NEVER should've become immortal for you!"  (And he'll roll his timeless, ageless eyes and say, "There you go again!  Always the f***ing immortality thing!  I TOLD you not to do it!")

And I digress.  When religious circles criticized the Harry Potter books it made me boiling mad.  Apart from the carefully crafted story lines and lovingly developed characters, there was an underlying message that love and goodness would prevail.  JK Rowling's young wizards were noble and brave.  They loved each other, and yet they also had great regard for the world at large.  Harry was too noble to even kill Wormtail, for Christ's sake! 

By comparison, in this first book at least, Bella and Edward mostly only love each other.  It's this sort of single-mindedness that I find most concerning.  Nothing in the Harry Potter series ever led me to believe they were unfit novels for children, and yet many parts of Twilight caused me to take pause.  The heroes in Harry Potter are selfless.  The characters in Twilight are simply self-destructive. 

As I said earlier, I found this story to be entertaining and a lot of fun.  But the feminist in me worries about young people reading it.  Our heroine tells us over and over again that she is not worth saving, and remains passive in everything but her love for her boyfriend.  (Let's face it, the snippets of affection she doles out to her mother and father are afterthoughts, at best.)  And on page 473 she actually says, (when Edward attempts to keep her in the dark, yet again, for her own good), "A man and woman have to be somewhat equal."  Somewhat?  What the?

I'm no child psychologist, and I'm no mother; but if I did have a teenaged daughter I'm not sure I'd be lending her my copy anytime soon.  What do you think?

Comments

[Sissy]

I hear ya chirpin'....it sends a bad message. But it is kind of nice in the beginning.

[Amy]

Ahh, if only the vampire story were alive at BLA! Fortunately this took place at Boston Latin School not the Academy. Our drama is never that exciting. I can't wait to read Twilight this summer!!

[the odd broad]

Damn! I wanted to see that letter! :)

[Kathleen]

I totally agree...not for young minds to read at all. It's an intense, addictive, psychotic love...and for some reason I just can't get enough! And I sort of think I've always been into vampires...which is weird because I don't eat meat! Now you have to watch TrueBlood on HBO... :-)

[thayhurst@lowell.k12.ma.us]

i laughed my A** off at the futurisitc fight they will have. thanks for the comic relief this morning. i can totally see that!!! i am going to start reading the twilight series next week. I was waiting for your review. now i am not so sure i am excited about this. and i def wont let emma or abby EVER read this.

[the odd broad]

Kathleen, I love that you love vampires, even though you don't eat meat! I was gigging up on the T today when I got your comment on my crackberry. I'm going to start on book 2 as soon as my sister gives it to me. I need more of the saga!

Tam, I agree- I don't think this will be one for the girls! But Harry Potter I loved!! Let me know what you think about Twilight!

[Sissy]

It 's awful, but you just have to read them. That's it.

[the odd broad]

I know, I know. I'm starting New Moon tonight. And I can't wait to finally see the movie! Even though I can't stand the way that actress says the word "vampire."

[Jessica]

Really???? The books are not written to make little girls beleive there is a vampure out there willing to die for them...they are books! we read them for enjoyment...did you read Harry Potter cause you really thought that you could become a wizard and run around eating magical chocolate frogs? I think you completly missed the whole point of the Twilight Saga....If you dont think our youth can handel them than we should take away their MTV..which is far more worse...Would you want your daughter growing up thinking that her sixteen birthday party should cost fifty grand or that there is love filled with passion and romance?

[the odd broad]

I don't have a daughter. But if I did, and if she was Bella's age, I'd hope she would care more about getting into college than being a recluse obsessed with a high school boyfriend. But that's just me.