Stephenie Meyers has arguably created the most debated modern day human/vampire romance since Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s Angel and Buffy and True Blood’s Sookie and Bill. Bella’s approach to love and relationships has ignited a wide ranging discussion pitting feminists against – well, just about everyone else who has read The Twilight Series.
Feminists Say That Bella Swan is a Bad Role Model for Today’s Teen Girls
One feminist argument for Bella’s failure as a good example for her target audience is that she is submissive to Edward; willing to give up everything, friends and family and life as she knows it, to be with him forever. They take umbrage at the fact that Bella seems to be constantly in need of saving. Each time Edward swoops in to whisk her away from danger, story book princesses and knights on white horses come to mind.
Twilight Author Stephenie Meyer Says Bella is Not a Wuss
On her official website, Meyer responds to feminist allegations that Bella is weak and easily led. “There are those who think my stories are misogynistic – damsel in distress must be rescued by strong hero.” But to Meyer that isn’t who Bella is. She points out that, in New Moon, the second book in the series, Bella must contend with Edward leaving. Meyer reminds her fans and her detractors alike that Bella is not mourning an ordinary teen romance but rather the loss of the love of her life, her other half, her soul mate. And perhaps this is the reason for the series’ massive success among modern young women. In his August 2008 Washington Post article, Twilight Sinks Its Teeth Into Feminism, Leonard Sax posits, “Three decades of adults pretending that gender doesn’t matter haven’t created a generation of feminists who don’t need men; they have instead created a hoard of girls who adore the traditional male and female roles and relationships in the Twilight saga.”
Is The Twilight Series Anti Feminist?
On the website for Writing for Film and Television based in the Vancouver Film School, in an article titled Anti-Feminism Affects Vampires Too, a feminist known as Tweezers, feels that Bella and Edward’s relationship is far from mirroring the love story that girls may be hungering for when she weighs in on Bella’s reaction to Edward leaving her, “Bella becomes severely depressed and goes into a catatonic state for three months …I think many would agree that this is nowhere near a healthy reaction for a teenage girl.”
Stephenie Meyer fields this type of criticism on her web site by suggesting that everyone grieves differently.
When Bella becomes pregnant in the final installment and finally gets her wish of becoming a vampire, proponents of the books feel that Bella proves her strength when she shows Edward Cullen and his family that she is able to control her bloodlust. But to many feminists it’s too little too late.
