Fans of Stephenie Meyer’s book series Twilight are really steamy for Edward Cullen, the main male character and a century-old vampire in a angelic 17-year-old body, who sweeps the average, human, teenaged Bella, off her feet in a gripping love story. Edward becomes under the influence of Bella’s sweet smell and by the middle of the first book Edward and Bella are in love and trying hard to keep their pants on. The series has created a new sub-genre of teen romance: abstinence porn, convincing the reader that self-denial is hot. Edward and Bella’s relationship is steamy and sexually charged but unconsummated until the fourth book. Abstinence porn can be seen by some readers as uplifting, and portraying what some might see as a morally sound message to the series young readers, don’t have sex until you’re married, but is Bella actually empowered by waiting?
Teens are obviously still having sex despite the efforts of virginity rings, abstinence pledges, purity balls, and Sarah Palin and before the release of the fourth book we were all asking ourselves will the two finally do it? And if so will the magic and passion be ruined? Of course for those readers who were worried about morals, they got the message they wanted for their kids, and Bella and Edward didn’t do the dirty until their honeymoon. Bella and Edwards honeymoon scene it frightening though, Edward loses control of himself and while making violent love to Bella he manages to cover her entire body in bruises, demolishes the entire headboard, and feathers from the pillows plaster the room. The best part is that Bella loves it and even tried to hide the bruises so Edward won’t feel bad and want to do it again. The abstinence message in the previous books might have been empowering but this scene changes it all. Bella’s desire for eroticism wipes the board clean of all innocence in their relationship seen in the previous books.
In the fourth book Bella’s character is the portrayal of a retro housewife. She finally gets what she wanted, and Edward turns her into a vampire, which is a throwback to the 1950’s female self-sacrifice, by Bella’s need for her human self to die in order to save her child. She turns into your typical teenage mother, which leads the book into adulthood even further. If you think about the traditional portrayal of teenage moms in the media they normally are quite boring, uninvolved in typical teenage activities, and don’t have any interesting hobbies, Bella’s character is portrayed in just that manner, even pre baby. She was never very interesting or engaged and she is not very involved in the world around her other then werewolves and vampires. Her only activity besides lusting over Edward is cooking dinner for her father. She cooks dinner for her father every night, even if she is not hungry herself, and feels guilty when she is either out having a typical teenage experience and cannot, or if she doesn’t feel up to it. Bella’s life is exactly that of our grandmothers, she married her high school sweetheart, waited until marriage to have sex, had a baby immediately after getting married, and used to cook dinner for the man in her life very night. I suppose you get out of having to cook for your husband when he doesn’t eat, maybe there are some perks to marrying a vampire!
Some might believe Bella was empowered by remaining abstinent before marriage, but honestly she had no life. All she did was hang out with Edward, who would see his own family often but mostly spent the majority of his time saving Bella from danger or watching her sleep, creepy.
Bella losing her virginity is what I see as a loss of self-identity. Bella is powerless and made simply into an object of Edward’s desire and thirst. Bella never has much say about her own actions, she is soft, fragile, and breakable, Edward always decides if things are “safe” or not and when he cannot be there to stalk her, he pegs one of his numerous siblings on her until he can return. At times the two do compromise, but it is safe to say that the majority of the time all choices are made by Edward in regards to Bella’s wellbeing. Edward holds the power.
When it comes down to it Bella’s existence is in the hands of a man, he might be a vampire, but he is a man who holds power over her. The Twilight series is most definitely about sex, identity, vulnerability, and the women’s body as an object of desire.
No comments:
Post a Comment