I'm loath to think that I have anything new to say after 68 comments -
I read Twilight when I was in library school, when only the first book was out, and I had a really mixed reaction, roughly:
-That it was fair-to-middling on a craft level, perhaps half a notch below Harry Potter. But I think that our culture considers romantic writing more mockable than non-romantic writing - even among romance writers, there are web sites dedicated to mocking purple prose or bad covers, and Fabio is a joke that I can't find any parallels for in Tom Clancy war-porn-suspense or another genre marketed at men.
-That it was, despite craft flaws and feminist doom, kind of sexy and compulsively readable.
-That it was hella creepy from a feminist point of view, to such an extent that I had read the entire thing fully expecting Bella to figure out that it wasn't wise to have a vampire boyfriend with an anger problem and jealousy/possessiveness issues.
-That in my own youth I had read my way through Sailor Moon, Fushigi Yuugi, and later a long run of Japanese romance novels, all of which exposed me to hella creepy views of relationships and sexuality, and I hadn't been brainwashed by them, and it was vaguely condescending of me to expect other children to be brainwashed by them. (I was also much annoyed by Naomi Wolf's excoriation of Gossip Girls and similar novels, for the same reason.)
I think my reaction got less mixed as the books became both creepier and sillier as the series went on - to the point where I'm not particularly concerned about The Children, I just think they're hilarious.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2008-09-25 12:03 am (UTC)I read Twilight when I was in library school, when only the first book was out, and I had a really mixed reaction, roughly:
-That it was fair-to-middling on a craft level, perhaps half a notch below Harry Potter. But I think that our culture considers romantic writing more mockable than non-romantic writing - even among romance writers, there are web sites dedicated to mocking purple prose or bad covers, and Fabio is a joke that I can't find any parallels for in Tom Clancy war-porn-suspense or another genre marketed at men.
-That it was, despite craft flaws and feminist doom, kind of sexy and compulsively readable.
-That it was hella creepy from a feminist point of view, to such an extent that I had read the entire thing fully expecting Bella to figure out that it wasn't wise to have a vampire boyfriend with an anger problem and jealousy/possessiveness issues.
-That in my own youth I had read my way through Sailor Moon, Fushigi Yuugi, and later a long run of Japanese romance novels, all of which exposed me to hella creepy views of relationships and sexuality, and I hadn't been brainwashed by them, and it was vaguely condescending of me to expect other children to be brainwashed by them. (I was also much annoyed by Naomi Wolf's excoriation of Gossip Girls and similar novels, for the same reason.)
I think my reaction got less mixed as the books became both creepier and sillier as the series went on - to the point where I'm not particularly concerned about The Children, I just think they're hilarious.