Presentations of violence and gender in the Twilight novels

Note: While I do not give a full plot summary, some of the analysis may touch on topics that reveal the plot.  Also, I embrace "the author is dead" perspective, since I do not know anything about the author or her motives.  This analysis is strictly an analysis of the novel in question, and is not a criticism of the author, though I do criticize the author's writing, which I consider to be two different things.

I recently finished Stephanie Meyer's vampire romance, Twilight.  While it wasn't the most fantastic novel (certainly it took a lot of reading before reaching anything remotely climactic), it wasn't all that horrible.  But it wasn't all that good, either.  I didn't have high expectations for a romance novel as it was (admittedly I have read few, not having acquired a taste for the genre--yeah, studying literature makes you elitist.  I'm no exception).  This post will examine gender roles and gender presentations in the novel, as well as other problematic themes.

I. Gendering Monsters

In Twilight, we are introduced to the world of vampires.  From the moment we meet the Cullens, we are made aware through Bella's eyes that they are special:

I stared because their faces, so different, so similar, were all devastatingly, inhumanly beautiful (11).

Though all of the Cullens are stunningly attractive, there's a clear gendered difference in their appearances.  The men are large, and strong, while the women are small and graceful.  Though the women are also impeccably strong, they do not look it.  Several times Alice is referred to as being lithe and graceful in her movements:

Alice reached for Emmett's hand and they darted toward the oversized field; she ran like a gazelle.  He was nearly as graceful and just as fast--yet Emmett could never be compared to a gazelle.

[...]

[Edward's] run was more aggressive, a cheetah rather than a gazelle (192).

The males are not only less graceful, but more aggressive.  The exchange between Edward and James when James first catches Bella's scent is a prime example, complete with "feral snarl," "bared teeth," and "aggressive poses" (197).  The females, all of whom obviously feed at some point, are not depicted as so aggressive even though they are (presumably) just as strong and capable as the males.  Even Victoria, who in later books hunts Bella out of revenge (posing an obvious aggressive threat), is described in more traditionally feminine terms:

[Victoria] was wilder, her eyes shifting restlessly between the men facing her, and the loose grouping around me, her chaotic hair quivering in the slight breeze.  Her posture was distinctly feline (196).

We are presented with clear-cut male and female roles.  Within the Cullen family there even seems to be a hierarchy, with Carlisle being presented as the head of the vampire family.  And even Esme, who's presented as the mother figure for the Cullens, seems to be ranked below Edward, though this is perhaps a combination of gendered leadership and seniority, since Carlisle created Edward prior to creating Esme.  We also have the whole creation of vampires.  In the case of most of the Cullens, Carlisle created them, yet it seems that it's in a godlike sort of way rather than a full embrace of the father identity.

II.  Violence is romance

If I were to ever read this book again (I won't) I would count how many times Edward tells Bella he's dangerous, or outright threatens her.  It's deeply disturbing to me that the stalking, the death threats, and the constant mentioning of Bella as food is somehow supposed to be romantic.  I suppose this is just another product of our rape culture, where we inextricably link sex and violence, and the threat of violence is somehow supposed to be endearing.

There's also the vast power disparity, which is also a threat.  In the meadow, Edward demonstrates his strength as further evidence of why Bella should be frightened.  This creates an obvious illustration of Bella's fragility: in any given moment Edward could accidentally crush her.

Bella is willing to accept the constant threat of Edward's presence, and even goes so far as to blame herself for tempting Edward to kill her.  In Twilight Bella even goes well out of her way to not implicate Edward should he kill her--and she willingly walks to her possible death.

There are several instances where Edward is committing criminal acts: watching Bella sleep (breaking and entering), stalking her, obsessing over her to the point where he views her as a possession.  All of which is filtered to us through Bella, who finds this type of attention flattering and romantic.  These are highly problematic, once again driving the point that romance irrevocably involves fear and violence (or at least the constant threat of violence).

These issues are also evident in the later books: hyper aggression in the male characters, Bella's inferiority and apparently fragile nature, traditional gender presentations for the female characters.  Women are consistently presented as a hindrance to the male characters (think of Leah, who seems to be this unwanted burden on the rest of the male pack in Eclipse).

This is all worsened when we think of this in hindsight--yeah, it's great that he followed her all those times.  I mean, think of how she would have been smooshed or raped or murdered, and if he hadn't followed her he couldn't have rescued her.  At one point he even forces her into his car when she tells him to leave her alone.  But later, she resolves to tell him to leave her alone and "mean it this time" (71), which effectively negates any previous sincerity, which in turn adds to the stereotype of women not saying what they mean, which is often twisted into an argument of a gray area concerning consent.  Yeah, it's all connected, okay?

III. Likes

Before anyone accuses me of being an angry feminist who finds joy in nothing, I will admit to some likes:

• Bella is an awkward and clumsy teenager.  I can relate to that!
• It's a decent enough story.  Unfortunately Stephanie Meyer isn't a great enough writer to make it more than decent.  
• Bella's brief feminist moment: in Twilight she mentions writing a paper on female gender roles in Shakespeare's plays.  I really really wish there was more of this more.
• Oh, at the end she mentions something about needing equality in relationships.  Thank you!!!
• I did find it hilariously absurd whenever Jacob warned Bella (or whoever) not to make him anger.  LOL! JACOB SMASH!
• Bella's dad's name is Charlie (which is pretty similar to Charles, who stares at you every time you visit this site--yes, I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel here.  It's not a great literary work.  What the fuck do you want from me?)

Miscellaneous Complaints:

• Jacob was likable up until he turned werewolf.  He was happy and sweet to Bella.  For a time I was rooting for him because Bella could have been with a great guy.  Then he got all hairy, aggressive, and just as possessive as Edward.  Which means she then had a choice between Douchebag 1 and Douchebag 2.  And Jacob was actually worse in my mind because it seemed like he thought he deserved Bella, like she owed him something, which is totally creepy.  And the forced kiss between her and Jacob clearly lacks consent (and her father laughed and was all cool with it.  You can bet if I went home with the same scenario, Mommy and DaddyGrandeur would be kicking someone's ass--hint: not mine).  
• After Jacob's monsterization, so-to-speak, any description of Edward and Jacob is entwined in aggression.  Their issues with anger become so central to their characterizations, it's disturbing.  
• Bella's hearing Edward's voice scolding her like some errant child in New Moon.  God, even when he's not there his hold over her is totally creepy.  And she willingly (again) put herself in danger just to hear that voice--and relished the imagined anger.
• Stephanie Meyer's writing is...lacking.  Had she not tapped into a provocative premise (human girl falls in love with a vampire--sounds pretty sweet) she probably would never have had anything published.  Her writing is pretty substandard.  I mean, does she really have to have a character say the book's title in every fucking book?  If you have to have your characters explicitly state the name of the book, it kind of kills whatever metaphor you think you were going for (which speaks volumes of the anticipated thinking capacity of the intended audience).  Speaking of metaphors, did anyone else want to do a *headdesk* every time Bella mentioned the damn "hole" in her chest in New Moon?  Okay, we fucking get it--you got dumped, it hurts.  Think of some other way to describe that pain.  Fuck.

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Well, that's all I got.  But here are some other fun Twilight links.  If anyone else has written or come across any other good Twilight links, analyses, open threads, etc., drop them in the comments.

Bloody Conclusions

Edward Cullen, Face Of Girl Power: On the Girliness Of Pop, And Why It Matters

Third Twilight Flick to be Guy-Friendly  (okay, not so fun in terms of it's failtastic assumption that women don't get into action and men can't find joy in romance, but every now and then we gotta add logs to our fires, right?).

Works Cited:

Meyer, Stephanie.  Twilight.  New York: Little Brown and Company, 2005.

crossposted

The Legacy of Poe: Return to the House of Usher

Note: As with all my literary analysis, there is a heavy SPOILER ALERT. While I do not give any explicit plot summaries, many of the things I discuss may reveal the plots, so if this happens to be a book sitting on your shelf you've been meaning to read, please read it first and come back. I'd hate to ruin it for you.

Return to the House of Usher by Robert Poe was given to me by the professors of the English Department at my college, chosen by the professor which I was fortunate enough to do a one on one study of The Flowers of Evil. Fitting, since Baudelaire was a fan of Poe's, this new novel being a sort of sequel written by E. A.'s descendant. The events of the novel take place in little over a week, during a hurricane that, at first, is assumed to not come so far inland. The worsening weather provides a climactic backdrop for the story leading up to the second destruction of the famous house, now a Sanatorium founded by the new Roderick and Madeleine (who are twins).

This was a captivating novel, in that there was a drunk main character (and narrator), his best friend whose sanity slips because he is haunted by Edgar Allan Poe's story involving his ancestors, and both are involved in a sort of mystery involving a few awful secrets.

As usual, I interpreted this novel through my feminist lens.

Gender

I certainly hope it was intended that I hate the main character, though as many of you know intent does not always equal the result. As I have not met Mr. Robert Poe, nor have I read anything else by him (and I admit I don't even know if he has written anything else, though I could easily check), I do not assume that these ideas are indicative of him as a body existing outside the novel--as I safely assume the sexism of David Eddings based on the fact that I've read just about everything he's written, and the same sexist attitudes are present IN ALL OF THEM.

That being said, I hated the main character.

John Charles is a worthless drunk. He is a writer for the small newspaper in the fictional town of Crowley Creek. He has unresolved issues with his father--at some points he gets drunk and wallows in self-pity as he reflects on his poor relationship with his father, who is dead. He treats women poorly, and is guilty of the insulting objectification of them, and also of comparing cars to women.

With the three women characters provided,* we are presented with three versions of womanness.

Marilyn
In the first mention of Marilyn, we learn that she is "the town's sexiest woman" (31). She works as a hairstylist, and John Charles provides us with a colorful description of her:

Marilyn herself was a small, curvaceous blonde, whose ornate mop of curls would have made Dolly Parton stand up and take notice. I had always assumed her hair was a kind of professional advertisement. It had a sort of bedroom look that gave a man ideas (37).

Marilyn is presented as a woman whose main concern is her appearance, and she measures her looks off of other women. She's highly aware that she's beautiful, and finds that it is her duty to be as beautiful as she can so that men find her attractive:

Only one thing disappointed her: the hairstyles of the other women. "I don't know who they think they're kidding, John Charles," she told me as the waiter poured our wine, "but there's not a woman in the world who doesn't look better with big hair. Now look at the gal over there," she pointed to a plain-looking blonde in a black dress, dining with an older gentleman at a far table. "She's got a big rock on her wedding ring finger, so they can't be hurting for bucks, but she's done herself up dull as a dishwasher. With her money, she could have some decent highlights, get a little sex appeal, know what I mean? That guys she's with's been givin' me the eye for the last half hour. She's prob'ly boring him to death" (122).

Marilyn blames the man getting the "wandering eye" on the other woman's lack of superficial effort. Basically, if a woman isn't pretty enough, it's her fault her man fucks someone else.

But John Charles is one of those simple-minded menz:

She wore glittery blue stuff on her eyelids, which gave her brown eyes a sparkle, and a dark-red dress cut so low in front that I found it hard to concentrate on what she was saying whenever she leaned over to reach for the breadbasket. No question of my getting bored (123).

She probably wasn't saying anything important anyways.

Edith
We are introduced to Edith in the same scene we meet Marilyn. Her description sharply contrasts that of Marilyn, effectively creating two converse images of femininity:

An elegant-looking woman of an indeterminate age, her face seemed drawn and sad. She was looking into the mirror with an expression that seemed to suggest that whatever she saw there was not going to be sufficient to solve her current problems (37-8).

When John Charles speaks of Marilyn, age is never discussed--she's just attractive. With Edith, there's always a mention of her being older than he is. The word "elegant" also connotes a certain image associated with age, leading us to assume that Edith is not "young."

But Edith is not just some older woman that finds herself involved in a mystery surrounding the Usher place, aiding John Charles to figure out why Mayor Winsome, Mrs. Boynton, and Mr. Prynne are after the property. She's an intelligent woman, and also a motherly figure. Where Marilyn is single-minded and pretty, Edith is deep and nurturing. Her husband has just left her for his (supposedly younger and prettier) secretary (38), leaving her to care for their two teenage boys. Not only is this sudden situation difficult for her, but her ex has been telling the boys it's all her fault he's not around any more, turning them against her. She's constantly worrying about her children, since the man is known to have a temper (144-5, 232).

Mrs. Boynton
Completing the women and age spectrum, is the editor of the Crowley Sentinel. John Charles describes her as

a stout woman in her middle sixties, the epitome of a certain kind of Southern womanhood. Tough as nails, she ruled her domain with an iron hand and brooked no resistance from anyone. But underneath, she couldn't resist a little flattery and she had a vast and cynical understanding of human nature, which could always be appealed to in a pinch (61).

Boynton is also in on the deal to procure Usher's property, part of the bullying scheme to sell the land and house for less than it's worth. Basically, the impression we get of Boynton is that of a greedy old bitch. Which works, since this underscores the image of her being an old shrew.

John Charles
The entire novel is told from John Charles' point of view, and as such the women are filtered through his manly biases. His attitudes toward women are somewhat frustrating, when he tells the reader such things as "loud women's voices assailed my ears" (37) and "Sometime I'd like to be a fly on the wall when two women are talking. I've always wondered how they can go on for hours and hours and never once touch on anything important, like, say, cars, hunting or sports" (164); basically, typical manly things.

John Charles is particularly lovable when he helps his co-worker get his car out of the mud:

Back, sweet as a caress on a lady's soft skin, then put her in gear so gently and just slide her out of that sucking pothole[...]and she shot out like a greased pig. Damn, it felt good! (135-6).

Interesting how driving a car is synonymous with fucking a woman.

Chapter Seven is perhaps the best example of John Charles' despicability. He visits the town bar for (yet another) drink, and Marilyn joins him. How he treats her in this scene illustrates how he thinks of her as disposable:

I hadn't asked her to join me. I just wanted to get quietly drunk all by myself[...]
Marilyn looked at me. "I think maybe you should ease off a bit, John Charles. You have to drive home in the storm and I wouldn't want anything to happen to you."
It was none of her business[...]
I had forgotten she was there. I felt annoyed. Couldn't she see I was trying to concentrate. "I need to concentrate," I said to her.
"Well, thanks a lot!" she said.
I could see she was upset. One bad thing about women. They don't understand when a man needs to concentrate[...]
"Well, let me tell you one thing, Mr. Poe. I've had it up to here with hard-drinking men and I don't intend to have any more of 'em. You can't handle the whiskey, you can't handle me, you get my drift?"[...]
She got up and I watched her good-looking ass, in those tight jeans, sashay out of there. Quite a few other men watched it too. It's unfair, the way women do that. They always get the last word even when they don't say anything (184-7).

Revoltingly peppered throughout John Charles' sexism, is his insistence of his own Nice Guy-ness:

Why had she married him in the first place? I never get why smart, pretty women seem to go for the wild, irresponsible guys--the losers. The nicest guys I know seem to have no luck at all with women (144).

So nice of John Charles to pity Edith, while simultaneously engaging in victim-blaming.
He also admits:

It kind of makes my blood boil when a man takes off on a woman like that, after she's raised his kids and all. And it was not as if Edith Dunn had let herself go. For her age, she was a truly fine-looking woman (39).

Before he really gets to know her, he already has made assumptions about her regarding her roles as mother and wife--the first being that he assumes as a mother she is nurturing, and as a wife, she's a trophy (for her age).

As for John Charles and his being a man, there's an interesting scene in the novel that reeks of a masculinity struggle, between John Charles, and the New York mobster, Aldo Marco, who comes to Crowley Creek to get the Usher property. The hurricane reaches the town, and causes flood damage. As a result, a large crack appears from the foundation of the Usher house, splitting one wing of the house open. The two men exchange threats, John Charles telling Marco to back off and stop bullying the already unstable Roderick, and Marco hinting at causing harm to Edith if John Charles prevents Usher from selling the land (213-15).

So, to be clear, to John Charles, women are supposed to keep him interested, so they must be beautiful; they talk about nonsensical things; and even the "smartest" women are stupid because they fall for losers. Got it.

Oh, and he's also racist. The only black character in the entire novel doesn't even have a name (23). Here, a standard has been created in the novel, because the only time the race of a person is mentioned is with the black man, the "other." The rest of the characters have assumed whiteness.

Symbolism
Within the novel there is great use of metaphor and symbolism, which I'm sure was intended to echo the original story by Edgar Allan Poe. The storm itself is a symbol of destruction, its worsening effects foreshadowing the inevitable destruction of the House of Usher. Certainly it is not mere coincidence that the eye of the storm passes over the House of Usher when Edith and John Charles find Roderick after he'd been missing three days.

Similarly, the two peach trees mirror the illicit relationship between Roderick Usher and his twin sister, Madeleine, the "female" tree being the one that was ripped up in the storm, taking the entwined branches of the "male" tree with it (236), like Madeleine's threat to leave, and her death, did to Rod (258-59).

Conclusion

John Charles is an interesting character to read, since he's a self-centered sexist racist drunk. I think if I ever reread this novel I will take note of each time he drinks some whiskey--at least twice a chapter, I think. The final chapter is quite indicative about what really matters to John Charles in what he doesn't mention. For instance, what happened to Buzz, Aldo Marco's cousin who worked with John Charles at the Crowley Sentinel? After John Charles gets his car out of the mud, we don't see him again; we don't know if he survived the storm.

Similarly, we don't know what happened to the "ghosts," people supposed to be dead that Usher keeps locked in a room, hiding them from the state (and is thus the leverage that Marco uses to blackmail Usher into considering his property deal). But at the end, when John Charles is reflecting on everything that happened to Rod, Edith, the Mayor, Prynne, and Boynton, there is no mention of the old people--they're really alive, so where did they go? Who's caring for them now that they've been exposed to be alive? Clearly, these poor people are not worth an extra thought from John Charles. In the last chapter, he tells about the scars on his hands, mourns the loss of "the most beautiful trees," casualties of the storm (279), and even tells of how the tarn on the Usher property has polluted the land, condemning it. But nothing of the people that Rod Usher hid away and treated like prisoners.
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*I chose not to include Madeleine in this analysis, since she's only alive for a few pages. She is certainly gendered. We first see her gathering daisies, and even her "ghost" carries a basket of dried daisies--certainly there is gendering involved when Roderick dresses up as her, haunting the grounds: everyone is fooled into thinking it's really Madeleine's ghost.


Works Cited
Poe, Robert. Return to the House of Usher. New York: Forge, 1996.

Gender and Sexuality, Identity, and Duality in China Mieville's Iron Council (Part Three)

Note: Though I do not give a full summary, please be aware that some of the discussions inevitably mean that there are spoilers. Also, I've broken up my essay so it's easier on the eyes. You can read the first two parts of my essay here and here.

Identity and Duality

In the novel, we are presented with several dualities, opposing labels or ideas that alter perceptions of identities. For instance, the Iron Councillors being “sisters” feminizes the runaway train. Conversely, there are two groups in New Crobuzon: the Toroans, and Runagate Rampant. Though the Toroans are active and violent (masculine) and Runagate Rampant, is passive (well, passive in the sense that they aren’t out riling up crowds and murdering political figures—they’re just publishing revolutionary ideas) Runagate Rampant does have some masculine attribute at least. The members are all referred to as “Jack,” in honor of Jack Half-a-Prayer—a Remade man uplifted as a symbol for freedom. The use of the moniker “Jack” masculinizes Runagate Rampant. That these groups are led by their respective sexes (Ann-Hari leading the Iron Council—although they are a Council, Ann-Hari’s daring persuasion means she gets what she wants, and is thus the leader) further illustrates the gendering of these groups—and further, how these groups are fluidly gendered: Toro later being revealed to be a woman, the titles used by the Council and Runagate, and Runagate being led first by a man named Curdin, until he is captured and sentenced to Remaking, and later is led by Madeleina. The use of the name “Jack” to refer to all members is supposed to protect their identities from militia intervention. Basically, even the groups are simultaneously something else.

There’s also this duality concerning the Remade and the “free and whole.” These identities are clearly defined, as “whole and Remade could not fraternize” in certain areas of the city (323), and in fact Remade are treated as slaves, especially by the TRT. Remade cannot be made whole again—they were created in the punishment factories, condemned to have their bodies refashioned, parts added or subtracted as retribution for some crime. It is only a one way journey, since Remade are made from whole, and the procedures are irreversible (or at least there are laws against reversibility).

The character of Toro presents us with interesting notions of identity. First, Toro is the leader of a violent revolutionary gang in New Crobuzon, but this identity shifts to another body when the Toroans execute a plot to kill Mayor Stem-Fulcher. When Toro removes her helmet, what ensues is a moment of disconnect—her real identity is revealed:

Something went out of the air as Toro pulled the helmet away and broke a thaumaturgic current. Toro lifted the metal off, like a diver removing the heavy brass helmet. Toro shook out her sweaty hair (392).

When Toro the Remade woman remains behind (and presumably dies) Ori must escape using the Toro-helmet to push through reality. His learning to use the helmet is his first moment of accepting the Toro identity (397). Ori, defeated at finding out he was used, uses the Toro identity. Toro “was a dog now, a stupid and brutalized dog following a master it hated, unable to stop” (454). This new “Ori, Toro” (454) identity is mostly explored in Chapter Twenty-Seven, where Ori, Toro travels through the seams in reality. Ori is just Ori during the day, only using the bull helmet “to walk at night, and he did not know why” (456).

The Toro identity is a tool, dependent on the user:

Toro could have been a fighter for the Collective. Toro could have stood on the barricades, run boulevards between bomb-denuded trees and gored militia.

Ori did not[…] He was deadened by failure (456).

Toro is a transferable identity, a symbol of revolution, action, change. Toro is a Remade woman’s mask, which she uses for her own agenda. Toro’s identity merges with Ori’s, at some points separate identities, at others, merged identities. Ori “would rise and, as Toro” would travel, hunting his enemy using the thaumaturgy in the helmet. Ori is defeated, and thus, so is Toro. Toro “stalked at night” while Ori remains “unseen in his bull-head” (457).

In the world that Miéville has created, everything is something else. There are different aspects of everyone, everything may not be as it seems, and like in real life the reader has no way to guess how the story will turn out (unlike an Eddings’ novel where we know the good guy always wins—take that!). Even the crazy old man, Spiral Jacobs, isn’t just a crazy old man: “Spiral Jacobs was drunk. He was a real vagrant. He was just something else as well” (458). Even his “freedom spirals” (430) are simultaneously symbols for freedom, but later revealed to be the city’s doom if Spiral Jacobs is not stopped—in his madness, the old man wanders the city tracing spirals on buildings in preparation to unleash a hex that would destroy the whole city (and the interesting thing, if you’re familiar with Miéville’s work, is that you believe that the city could be destroyed. We have no reason to trust the narrator, or to trust that any plan will be successful—this is real; plans and people fail, and Miéville captures this perfectly).

Conclusion

Iron Council presents certain ideas of gender and sexuality, identity, duality, and a sense of realness. There is greatness in this sort of writing which combats the usual fantasy formula of good vs. evil, and the process of good always triumphing. The realness in Miéville’s novels and his excellent mastery of language makes his works incomparable. That being said, I am counting down until The City and the City is released.