Twilight Vampires and the Return of Courtly Love (Potential Spoiler)

In Angel he has a soul like you said and that's why he feels remorse and doesn't want to kill people or good people anyway. I don't know if Edward has a soul or not. It does sound like his family just don't go around killing people for no reason. I think it is more about the fact that everyone has an "animal"instinct inside them. But, we can choose to react or not to react to that. In a way it does have a spiritual point of view to it. Between the abstinence and the not wanting to hurt people. But, I think this is a good fresh idea especially for the younger generation. Love is built over time and lust is what you immediately feel.

This should keep her busy for awhile! Some she's read, some I've thought of and forgotten about.

She loves biographies and historical fiction. A series that she's LOVED is the Whole Story books. They take classics (Call of the Wild, Around the World in 80 Days, Hounds of Baskervilles) and sprinkle in illustrations, maps, and facts in the margins. So when she read The Call of the Wild, she learned about wolves, Alaska geography and history, and sled dogs. She ate it up.

I recommend them for anyone in the same boat with a reader.

Why had I never thought of Terry Pratchett?!

Rethinking this as I revisit this post, I consider that Edward's state of mind reflects a Christian theme, the human fight against "sinful" nature to honor the holy God who created them. The difference is that humans have souls or so we believe.

I can believe a soul brings conscience and creates angst and that angst is heightened by moralistic teaching, but what if you have no soul, which vampires supposedly do not have because they are the undead? I have not read the Twilight books. Perhaps I should. Maybe the author, Stephenie Meyer, develops within the books that the soul is trapped in the undead body and so vampires retain human conscience and do not become cunning creatures who must act on blood lust. If not, then, well ... whatever. Meyer is making lots of money so why should she care whether her premise makes sense to me?

My daughter, who after seeing the movie decided to read the books and became hooked tells me that Edward debates whether vampires have souls. She believes that if vampires as presented by Meyer and others can choose, then they have souls. She says further that later in the book series Bella becomes a vampire and retains her humanity. So, I suppose Meyer has re-varnished the vampire as we know it completely. (from "Twilight Vampires and the Return of Courtly Love)

Thank you for that bit of information about the author's religious background. It probably does influence her work as our beliefs rest within our subconscious, however it was only in the the last 60 years that the idea of the vampire separate from Christian religion has been re-introduced and only in the last 30 years have unreligious vampires, those immune to the power of the cross, etc., gained more attention.  

In vampire traditions popularized in fiction, vampires in the past have been halted in their tracks by crurcifixes, burned by holy water, and even stripped of their reflections in mirrors as reminders that they lack a soul and are in opposition to God. Their very existence has in the past been likened to a holy abomination that predates Christian traditions and yet has been crystallized as pure evil when cloaked within Christian dogma. (During a period in history of vampire hysteria at least one priest or monk wrote "nonfiction" about how to ward off vampires.)

Vampires are associated with soulless demons, unclean spirits, which is why explorations of a vampire having a soul or not having a soul has become a common theme in some vampire books and movies as today's writers who've created new vampire traditions or perhaps have reclaimed some of the early pagan vampire myths took time to explain why their vampires are different from Dracula, the fictional character by whom all other vampires have been measured in popular culture, however, not the first.  I think it was in the 50s that vampirism without religion appeared in fiction with the "scientific" vampire who becomes so due to an illness or mutation that can be fought in a lab.

Writers, even those who have no religious beliefs, who take the time to research vampire mythology before they write a vampire novel would be hard-pressed to escape the religious, spiritual, superstitious beliefs that tether vampires to the human plane. So, while Meyer may be Mormon, the vampire story having religious connotations is not new.  However, her decision to make her characters nearly celibate is indeed probably a direct result of whatever beliefs she may have about sex before marriage because traditional vampire tales are associated with sexual erotica.

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

One thing I haven't seen anyone mention is the whole issue of religion/souls in the Twilight series. I think a great deal of that (as well as the traditional gender roles and the relative lack of sex for a teen series/movie) must be attributed to the fact that the author is religious. Stephenie Meyer is Mormon...they believe in the soul, staying pure until marriage, pro-life, no drinking, no drugs, traditional gender roles, etc.

I'm not for/against Mormonism. I'm just making a point that the author's religious backgroud probably plays a huge role in the way the books/movies turned out.

My favorite book was Twilight, and the others went downhill from there, but I read them all just to "see what happened" in the end. I don't see Jacob as the only redeeming character...he just seemed to me like an overly-hormonal teenage boy. Every character in the book had gifts and weaknesses, just as we all do. 

*Spoiler Warning*

I won't let my 11 year old daughter read these books either. Not that she can't ever read them, but it's easy to get sucked into the whole series thing, and there are issues in the 4th book (sex, pregnancy, abortion, etc.) that I'm not ready for her to read about or experience yet, so I'm holding the whole set until she's more mature. We're sticking to Harry Potter, Tolkien, Alcott, and Montogomery for now. 

Leighbra, my daughter made the following recommendations: 

The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde (but advises you vet books beyond book 1)
A Girl of the Limberlost by Gene Stratton Porter 
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte (because it's a coming of age story and she's very independent)
Anne of Green Gables series and Emily series by L. M. Montgomery 
The Princess Bride by William Goldman
Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry by Mildred D. Taylor (not college level but a good book that addresses racism)
Un Lun Dun by China Mieville
Faerie Wars by Herbie Brennan 
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series by Douglas Adams
Monkey by Wu Che'Eng-En translated by Arthur Waley
Discworld series by Terry Pratchett
Shannara series (first three trilogies) by Terry Brooks (vet please)

She said she's never read this next suggestion and so you should look vet the series The Uglies and The Pretties by Scott Westerfield. She likes the premise and says they sold well in the bookstore. She'll think about it some more. She said she also read biographies of Phyllis Wheatley, Sojourner Truth, and Harriet Tubman but can't remember the names of the authors. And she loves Charles Dickens.

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

I have trouble reading certain kinds of books as well. I can overcome mediocre writing when the characters resonate with me or what's going on is so strange and foreign that I want to understand it. I was reading a piece of urban lit the other day. It was not well written very well. The writer was breaking nearly every rule of good writing, but the characters were so unlike anybody in my world that I kept reading, and none of them were vampires. 

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

I think she was not only reading early but also had good critical thinking skills. Plus, I probably challenged her thinking as well. I think there's some value in them reading the older books and seeing the gender roles back then juxtaposed to what they see played out in the home and the broader world.

Recognizing the books came from an earlier period, she then saw flesh and blood men and women who adopted old gender roles as old fashioned, belonging to history, and she liked Trixie Belden mysteries. But then Trixie Belden was the leader in those stories. And Lizzy's attitudes in Pride and Prejudice are not exactly "go with the flow of what society wants." The ways in which the Bennet sisters are married off sparks a good discussion of gender roles all by itself. 

However, I also made sure she read books about Sojourner Truth and Harriet Tubman. 

Moving back to Twilight, my daughter's feminist views is what fueled her anger while reading Twilight b/c Bella behaved like such a victim when Edward left. 

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

My parents apparently had the same idea; I grew up reading the Bobsey Twins and then so many of the older classics. One thing I'd recommend is lots of discussion about the very traditional gender roles in those books. I worry about the effect of reading book after book where old-fashioned roles permeate the text. Yes, even in the old girl's adventure novels.

Liz Rizzo ( http://blogher.org/blog/liz-rizzo )

I blog at Everyday Goddess ( http://everydaygoddess.typepad.com/ ).

I can see what you mean. I wouldn't want my 11-year-old reading Twilight. My daughter was a challenge b/c she started reading early and tested post-high school by the time she was in second-grade.  I didn't  try to give her high-school level books though unless I thought she could handle the content.

Consider old classics, the stuff that they were making 10th-grade students read in the 50s for English classes. That's the route I took with my daughter, keeping in mind academic prowess and emotional maturity may not be even, but she was an easy to manage youngster who listened to me. My son, not so much.

The daughter read Pride & Prejudice when she was 11 and again in high school and again in college. She talks about seeing different layers of the book as she grew older. At least Lizzy is not so smitten that she compromises her integrity.

And even though Anne of Green Gables and Avonlea may not be high-school level, she liked those books. 

I may have to ask her what she recalls at 11. I know by 11 she had read some Charles Dickens. I also gave her nofiction that was only a few grades above like biographies. I got her to read books that I figured would not be emotionally traumatic or expose her to too much too soon while also getting in what I figured some good English teacher would eventually assign.  So, I was a fuddy-duddy.

Sassy Monkey may have some suggestions for good books from the present that won't have adult themes but are written well enough to challenge your daughter.  

I have one advantage over you. When my daughter was 11, there was no book series that her age group was clamoring to read more than another and so there was no pressure to be like her peers. She was into horses and so if the book had a horse she'd read it. LOL. It was all about the love affair with the horse. She also liked fantasy novels for young adults, which were more tame back then as well. 

You know what? I'll ask her this question for you because she's now grown but used to work at a bookstore, reads a lot still, and has fielded books for me for her brother when he was younger. They're 10 years apart. He'd take her advice on a book, but not mine. :-)

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

Every teen girl needs to be able to get caught up in the hysteria of SOMETHING.

I just wanted to say that I think it's awesome that you read them when your girls did, so you could sort of test the waters on appropriateness for your youngest. It's hard when the sisters are so excited about something.

Don't worry about it, nothing could be worse than when I was just headed to see the 6th sense, and my date at the time said "I couldn't believe that Bruce Willis was...." and gave me the ending.

That whole movie is wasted, if you know the ending!!!

I certainly wasn't upset at you Nordette, I figured it would happen eventually in the series, and I have no emotional attachment to these books.

I actually can't read them, because I told my daughter she couldn't. Not that she can't EVER read them, but that she can't read them YET.

We made a rule when she was 7 about the books she reads...it's rough finding books for a 2nd grader with a 12th grade reading level. SO many of the books are basically saying "NOTHING else matters beyond having a boyfriend." Books with merit for her have to go beyond -  Girl wants boy, girl chases boy, girl catches boy, world is O-V-E-R, over! when boy leaves girl....

So our rule is, basically, the books have to be about girls (or boys) kicking butt.

When she hits that state of maturity, then whatever. But for right now (she's 11, and most of the girls in her class were reading it last year), there are too many other good books out there in the world. 

In fact, do you have any good recommendations? :D

Kudos to Stephenie Meyer for being such a great success.  I picked up the first Twilight book to read it and did not make it very far.  I am an avid reader and this book definitely struck me as a read for tweens and teens or just an indulgent read by the pool.  It did not tickle my fancy, though if were raging with adolescent hormones and still fantasizing about conflicted men I would have probably been drooling.  www.floridagirlmidwest.blogspot.com ( http://www.floridagirlmidwest.blogspot.com/ )

And almost every day she'd IM me and ask why she was hooked on them when they were so horrible. She'd ask if she had to read the next one. Then she'd start reading the next one and complain that is was horrible and yet she couldn't stop reading it.

I can rant about Twilight (oh can I ever) and yet I still couldn't stop reading it. Just like I won't be able to stop myself from watching the rest of the movies.

Sassymonkey ( http://sassymonkey.ca/ ) and Sassymonkey Reads ( http://sassymonkeyreads.ca/ ).

I read the post. Highly entertaining, and some of it echoes what made my daughter want to pull her hair out. Seriously, I heard scream in her bedroom one day, and then she charged over to mine, ranting. Yet, she remained hooked. Wouldn't all writers like to write at least one story to which people become addicted? 

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

I knew I remembered something about "porn." Guess I mashed it up in my head with one of your Twilight posts. Still, I feel like I've read the term "abstinence porn" before. I've got to shake my brain and remember where.

I think I missed the Twilight troublesome question post and so I'll make a point to read it.  

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

I did recently write about trauma porn ( http://www.blogher.com/teens-and-trauma-porn ), so that may be what you are thinking of.

In regards to Twilight specifically, I wrote a post last year that asked if it was terrific or troublesome ( http://www.blogher.com/twilight-series-terrific-or... ) just before the fourth book came out.

Sassymonkey ( http://sassymonkey.ca/ ) and Sassymonkey Reads ( http://sassymonkeyreads.ca/ ).

I had added that courtly love, however, is about triangle and taboos. It butts against the archetype of the Green Man, the presence of natural desire and the battle against it, and carries with it adulterous lust, hardly a pristine theme in Christian culture.   Meyer doesn't break with the notion of courtly love, in the sense of vampires, until Bella becomes b/c in genuine courtly love that just doesn't happen.

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

I know! Bad me! When we think Twilight we think collectively of the series not just book 1.

<a href="http://www.bigredcouch.com/journal">Home Grown</a>

What I wrote is based on the first book with only a brief reference to future books. But thank you. Now the people who don't like spoilers will mad with you and not me. ;-) LOL

As for what you say, I hope a genuine fan comes along for this debate.  I just posted at my own blog a little on formula fiction ( http://bit.ly/GObOm ).

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

There may be spoilers in my comment - sorry.

I read the books and saw the movie because it's what I do as a mother of t'ween and teen girls. The romance of a vampire lover is an old story. It has been written and rewritten in women's dime store (trashy LOL) romance novels for decades upon decades. Most readers of vampire romance fiction know in the earliest days of the genre abstinance played a huge key in the unfolding of the vampire myth and the rituals of violent vampire sex. Violence, danger and
intrigue - oh my! Meyers addresses this in subsequent books. I will never believe nor be convinced that Twilight was written for a teen audience from its inception.

The other three books seem to have been cranked out in a hurry to capitalize on the success of the first book and really are a struggle to get through and deminished the credibility of the author in my view. I can't see myself willingly reading much of anything she has written unless my girls flip out again and I am forced to read the material. Since the second movie is slated to appear this fall I know I am doomed to be in a movie theater at some point with my girls.

I find nothing courtly in the love triangle set up by Meyer. The romance gets even more tabu by the time the reader makes it through all four books. She touches on some relationships that are bordering on a perverse psyche. I was tempted to make book 4 off limits to my youngest girl but she bored of it easily and has put it down for now.

It was my youngest t'ween who pointed out first to the older girls that Bella was cruel to lead Jacob on and wasn't being faithful to Edward. I listened to them talk about the subject several times since and they conclude Bella is really a "skank". Edward is nearly a century old "skeeze bag" hitting on what should be an
innocent teenage girl. Instead Bella comes off as worldly and experience and on an equal sexual plain with Edward. Jacob is the unsung hero and the character they found most redeeming.

I am so glad they figured that out for themselves.

Thank you and sorry. 

Guess I should have put "spoiler alert" in the title. It didn't occur to me. The tidbit was added in the update.  With all the talk about the books all over the web and in the local Starbucks I didn't ponder that some people still have an expectation to not know plot twists.  It seems as time goes on people who've never read it will know in part what happens the same way most literate people know parts of Pride and Prejudice or that James Bond wins. Twilight's not that old but it is getting old.

Also Knowing that Bella eventually becomes but not knowing why she becomes, for how long she remains in that state, if it happens in the last book or in an earlier book, if she remains in that state for eternity--given that in the changing world of new vampire traditions there have been cases of people unbecoming vampire, that Meyer breaks a number of vampire rules, and that so much of her book is a metaphor for sex, "to bite or not to bite"--I don't think that Bella's becoming is an unexpected plot twist anyore than knowing Harry Potter triumphs.

Twilight is commercial fiction and a variation on traditional boiler plate romance novels. In such books you know that the pair will eventually either have sex or get married or both.

Still I'm sorry if knowing that Bella becomes vampire for a time you will be bored through the rest of the movies, assuming the movies stick to the books' plots.  

Please keep in mind I loved the old TV show Columbo, which was never about who comitted the murder. We knew that in the opening. The fun was in how Columbo figured out the mind, motivation, and method. ;-)

To sum up, Hmm Leighbra, do you really know what you think you know? Mwuahahahaha! *evil laugh* 

But next time I write on a book/movie series I'll put *spoiler* in the title. Hmm. I think I'll do that now so young Twilight fans won't have their lives spoiled and I won't be in danger of going to hell. LOL.

Now that you mention the phrase "abstinence porn," I feel like Sassy Monkey or someone else here at BlogHer may have written on that topic before.  Thank you for the information.  

Now, let me tell you about the part of the book that had my daughter, 28, pulling her hair out and cussing.  ... ;-) 

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

I loved that, Liz. Thank you. :-) 

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

(I hadn't planned to read the books, but I did watch the movie/will probably watch the others......is there some sort of statute of limitations on giving away an event that takes away all of the build up carefully orchestrated by the author for four entire books?

She says further that later in the book series Bella becomes a vampire and retains her humanity.

When is it not a spoiler?)

Anyhow, in the winter 09 issue of Bitch magazine, Christine Seifert calls Twilight "Abstinence Porn." A phrase I thought was hilarious.

She also questions the real strength of yet another book where the moral seems to be: Sex is in the man's control. The only reason it isn't happening is because of the man's strong will power. Us hormone filled lady folk are like cats in heat, and it's the man's job to make sure we stay the course.

It is Edward that says no, making it easier on Bella. How about Bella telling the creepy stalker to kiss off? But I guess that wouldn't make for a very good series, would it?

The article was also the first I had heard (boy am I out of the loop) about a future book by Meyers called The Midnight Sun, which is a retelling of the 1st book, but in Edward's POV. We find that Edward has darker thoughts of cat-in-heat Bella...

From the leaked pages:
"I would not kill her cruely," thinks Edward.

To which Christine Seifert quips...

Always the gentleman, Edward. His icy calculation of how best to kill Bella is horrifying, and it illustrates the disconnect between the two characters.

...

Edward holds all the power, while Bella - and female readers - romanticizes the perfect man who doesn't exist.

I wonder about the appeal of this book, will the girls like it nearly as much? Or will they feel like they've been duped and dumped by ol' Edward? 

Thanks for a great post,  Nordette!

Simply awesome:

http://blip.tv/file/2261825/

Edward is a creepy stalker for sure.

Liz Rizzo ( http://blogher.org/blog/liz-rizzo )

I blog at Everyday Goddess ( http://everydaygoddess.typepad.com/ ).