Henceforth, I began reading Twilight the other day, and not without a considerable amount of prejudice, I might add. Everyone who “recommended” the book to me began with a sheepish qualifier as they hesitantly inquired if I’d read them [insert image of person glancing around for unwanted company and staring at shoes]. Excuses ranged from, “I was on a plane to Ghana and had nothing else to read!” to “I was deathly ill with the flu and my sister’s copy was sitting on the coffee table… the only reading material within reach…” and everything in between. I have yet to run into anyone who will cop to reading the books without fully admitting their embarrassment at indulging such a cheesy, guilty pleasure. As such, I had a pretty good idea of what I was getting in to, and was reassured that while they present little more than a quick (if undeniably crack-like in its addictive properties) read that didn’t take any thought at all. Even Twilight devotees fully admit that they aren’t great novels by any means, but they apparently suck you in (no pun intended). I’ve been needing an easy read, so I caved.
I started reading a couple of days ago, and with only a couple of bus rides worth of reading time under my belt, I’m already about 150 pages in. It is indeed, a remarkably quick read and it does suck you in. I have to keep reminding myself that it is aimed at 13-year-olds, however, or I’d be more annoyed and aghast at its quality. Whereas Harry Potter far surpassed the expectations of what a children’s/young adult book usually has to offer, Twilight is barely meeting those expectations period.
First and foremost, my primary quibble is with the first-person narration. It’s generally not my favorite narrative point-of-view and has the potential to fail miserably. In order for a first-person narrative to succeed, the lead character needs to be compelling, interesting, and as far as my list is concerned, clever. Bella Swan doesn’t strike me as swimming in any of those qualities and it makes me question the author’s choice of a 17-year-old narrator. In my experience, 17-year-olds are pretty un-interesting on the whole, so the decision to give the narrative reins to a high school kid is definitely taking a risk. It takes a truly talented author with a very specific purpose to full off first person narration effectively.
If it is integral to the story that the main character’s point of view be the reader’s window to the world, then first-person narration would be the most logical and likely most effective narrative structure. But, yet again, if you’re dealing with a compelling lead character, that’s all fine and dandy. If Holden Caulfield is at the wheel, by all means. Bella Swan is no Holden Caulfield, however, and the first person narration isn’t working as effectively as I would hope. I think it would have served the story’s purpose and untied the hands of the author to large extent to write in third-person limited omniscient, much like Harry Potter. That’s my favorite narrative point of view. It allows for the thoughts and feelings of the main character to the guiding principle of the story and the reader’s interaction with that story, but allows for plot exposition and narrative descriptions to more elegantly intertwine with the main character’s experience. As the novel has progressed, I’ve noticed that the author has decided to ignore the fact that a 17-year-old kid is narrating in the interest of better descriptions and more elaborate explanations. From a critical perspective, it’s both good and bad. It’s a very good thing because I genuinely want to know what’s going on around her and want it delivered eloquently, but it’s a bad thing in that it takes the reader out of the first-person narration. For example, in chapter 6, the terrain is described thusly:
- “The water was dark gray, even in the sunlight, white-capped and heaving to the gray, rocky shore. Islands rose out of the steel harbor waters with sheer cliff sides, reaching to uneven summits, and crowned with austere, soaring firs.”
It’s a fine description for a third-person narrative, but really? 17-year-old Bella? That’s how you’d describe the shore? Uh, sure… It’s not that no character would describe it as such, but the build-up of Bella’s character doesn’t warrant such a description from her point-of view. It was distracting to have that kind of description and then be confronted with “I” in the next paragraph. Oh yeah, Bella is telling the story… I would forget from paragraph to paragraph and it was annoying, even if it did allow for a better assessment of the surroundings than Bella would ever relate. The exposition almost invariably comes across as clunky or out-of-character. Not a good rubric to employ…
Anyway, that said, Stephanie Meyer, in my opinion, has really limited the work by allowing Bella Swan to tell the story in her own words (well, not always her words). I have been vacillating between two theories in this regard. Either Stephanie Meyer recognized that fact that she’s not the most experienced and talented author out there and decided to have a 17-year-old high school student tell the tale so that the quality of the work would match her own narrative abilities, or, Stephanie Meyer is a tremendously skilled writer who has so engrossed herself in the character of a 17-year-old that her characterization is flawless. I think I’m going to go ahead and settle on the former.
Admittedly, I’m only a third of the way through the novel, but this blog post is primarily concerned with my first impressions. Impression #1: Teenagers aren’t clever or interesting and I certainly wouldn’t trust one of them with my narrative. It’s not that Bella Swan is completely unlikable, it’s just that the average, typical 17-year-old doesn’t have the most profound or pronounced point of view. I think the most irritating aspect is that Bella (and the author, as it were) seems to think that she’s clever, when she’s genuinely not. Bella’s comparisons are juvenile, even though Bella is presented as an old-soul who can captivate the brooding and infinitely more compelling Edward. I just can’t see it. Bella just doesn’t bring a lot to the table. I’m having a hard time buying it that all these guys are completely enamored of her and am annoyed that Edward gives her a second glance. I’m hoping that dissipates as I soldier into the rest of the book, but so far, I wouldn’t date her… and we all know I'm easy...
One of the first instances when this struck me, feeling like I was watching a really bad audition for a musical, was in the very first chapter. When confronted with the statement, “You don’t look very tan,” Bella retorts, “My mother is part albino.” Not clever. At all. But, I thought to myself, this is an unremarkable teenager we’re dealing with here, maybe that’s just how she is and I’ll have to live with it. Maybe she’s trying to be funny and is supposed to fail. Maybe this serves a purpose. Yeah, not so much. I was rather crest-fallen by the following paragraph that stated, “He studied my face apprehensively, and I sighed. It looked like clouds and a sense of humor didn’t mix. A few months of this and I’d forget how to use sarcasm.” Groan. Oh, sweetie… That wasn’t clever. Disturbingly and disappointingly, this leads me to believe that not only does Bella think she’s clever and that she knows how to use sarcasm to great effect, but so does the author. That’s even worse than a character who simply isn’t clever to begin with. So annoying. Bella’s (well, the author’s) comparisons, observations, and quips almost invariably fall flat even when it’s clear that it’s supposed to be clever.
Would kids find her clever, I have to ask myself? I genuinely don’t think they would. Further, and I hate to keep comparing things to Harry Potter, but I’m certainly not the first, J.K. Rowling was genuinely, captivatingly, and unerringly witty on a level that all ages could appreciate. I think that’s what any so-called young adult or children’s work should strive for. It’s the same principle that makes Pixar animation so great. When something is genuinely clever, it works on all levels.
My final initial quibble with the Twilight series comes down to a genre issue. The truly skilled writer works to re-invent a genre in exhilarating, suspenseful, and unpredictable ways. That doesn’t seem to be the case here or even the intent. This whole story more than smacks of Buffy the Vampire Slayer… It borrows concepts (whether intentionally or unintentionally) wholesale from other works and makes no effort to re-invent them. While Buffy took a concept and turned it on its ear, Twilight plays to all the pre-conceived notions of forbidden love that have held true for ages. At the center of each story, the new girl in town falls for the brooding vampire who has sworn-off human prey and acts as protector and guardian to the heroine. Buffy, however, is clever, and is unique, taking the helpless damsel of yore and turning her into a kick-ass fighter of evil. Bella, on the other hand, is the hapless ingénue that has graced the pages of countless romances from countless other genres. That “mortal girl falls for a vampire (or some other such immortal, potentially evil being)” is in and of itself, a genre, means it has likely been played out and I would have expected more from Twilight than I’m getting. Sigh.
This has turned into much more of an epic than I ever imagine it would. Anyway, derisive jabs and critical barbs aside, the Twilight series really does offer the reader a quick escape into a world that at the very least is more interesting than the one we sit through every day. It’s not as “literary crack-esque” as Harry Potter, but it’s entertaining enough to suck you in and not let go.
I’m genuinely interested to see how things turn out. I’ll cop to it... with a few mitigating qualifiers… If anyone else asks, I was trapped under something heavy, shall we say, a sofa, and only had the Twilight series within reach. To keep my sanity as I was completely pinned (well, all but my left arm--my readin’ arm fortunately), I was forced to read… and read and read. As long as there are absolutely no follow-up questions, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
