I’ve been thinking about this for a long, long time now. The thing that actually made me want to actually write a post about it (okay, rant, it’s a rant, I’ll admit it) was the release party of New Moon that Zodi posted the other day.
It’s more than obvious the popularity of the Twilight series, both in movies and in book format. And to that, I draw into the argument another series that Zodi has also read. The Harry Potter series. While Twilight has received more than a few critiques from the internet faithful, poking fun mostly at the imaginative use of the mythos that we’ve come to know about vampires. Let’s face it, first and foremost it’s original. Second, it’s a well crafted romance and people who are very much into that kind of a story will read it.
Thirdly, and possibly the most important point, both Twilight and Harry Potter did something that many had feared would be lost with the new generation growing up. It got people to read books. With Harry Potter a complete controversy arose in that it was about wizardry and magic. Had the targeted audience been a little older, then there might not have been any controversy at all, because I’ve seen a lot worse in books written by Michael Slade. But because it was directed at children, there was an outcry from the religious right. Don’t get me wrong, I consider myself a Christian, but in no way do I push my beliefs on people.
As the Harry Potter book series became more and more popular, I watched in disgust as groups banded together to have book burning parties. Yes, there were those that actually took copies of Harry Potter and burned them. I was mystified by these people, because some were old enough to have remembered the Second World War. I wondered if they were horrified that the Nazis were burning books, and if they spoke out against the very thing they were doing in the present.
To sum it up, the reason for the anger was that Harry Potter, the character, was going to a school of wizardry. And as it states in the Bible “thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.” As has been translated, wizardry, sorcery, witch craft and it’s like was condemned by God. Okay, I get that, I can deal with that. Even though I know a great number of practicing witches who follow the Bible’s view of peace, love and the proper treatment of their fellow man closer than do many right wing Christians. Ain’t that ironic. But the focus of the Harry Potter books was all about witch craft and wizardry, and the religious right was worried that children would take this as the gospel truth. The religious right forgot two very important things. First, Harry Potter is a work of fiction. And second, kids are a lot smarter than we often will give them credit for. Kids aren’t stupid, but the adults who make the news these days sure are.
Harry Potter did the one thing that kids had not done in a long time. Crack open a book. Parents were reading them to their kids, and in many cases, even the parents were reading the books. The story was captivating and magical (see what I did there, huh, huh!). It drew a perfect picture so the reader could imagine what the world Harry Potter lived in was like.
The thing I found quite amusing was that the majority of people condemning Harry Potter had never opened the book at all. They didn’t read it, so they really had no clue what the story was about. In the end, it boiled down to the simple premise of most epic stories like Harry Potter; good versus evil, with good triumphing. It was a kid’s version of Lord of the Rings. Since J.K. Rowling has written that first book, several more have followed suit. A movie franchise has been created. There’s even a theme park in the works.
Those kids also grew older.
And many began reading Twilight.
I can’t compare the story of Harry Potter and Twilight, they are so far different. The only thing you can say is that both are fantasy. Twilight, however, is geared to an older audience. Teenagers and up. It’s fantasy romance, it’s nothing new that we haven’t seen before. Girl meets boy, boy turns out to be vampire, girl loves boy anyway. Just ask Joss Whedon about that.
Stephanie Mayer also did something that hadn’t been seen in such a way before with vampires. She tweaked it, just a bit. Bram Stoker and Anne Rice already had locked the market on the dark aspect of vampires. Joss Whedon did dark, but campy with Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel. Mayer kept one aspect from each of those, however. The romance.
To all those who think that I love sparkly vampires; it’s not really my thing. But I’m not gonna disparage someone for liking the book series and reading it. I don’t have that right, and neither does anyone else who has never read the book series. The only one who has said something against Twilight that I’ve heard of and respect is Movie Bob from theescapistmagazine.com. He watched the movies as part of his review. But he also read the books. His opinion matters. Anyone who hasn’t read the books, and still comes out complaining should just shut up.
You’re missing the point completely. It’s not about whether or not J. K. Rowling or Stephanie Mayer books will have a longevity like Shakespear (and, sorry, my money is firmly planted on yes they will), it’s about what the books did for people right now.
It got them to read. That’s all that matters.
Until next time…
…keep ’em flyin’.
Zodi hijack
Okay we all knew this was coming. Why wouldn’t it? I mean hell Tim just talked about two of the favorites on my list of reading.
And what is the first thing I see when I look at the comments? Someone who clearly missed the point of the blog post. I’m curious. Why on earth would you compare a novelist, yes that is what Stephanie Meyers and J.K Rowlings are, to Joss Whedon?
Okay so he redid Buffy and made it better and Stephanie showed a TEENAGED GIRL falling love. Where is the comparison? She showed a personality type, the shy quiet awkward girl. I’m sorry but no Joss Whedon did not do what Stephanie Meyer did. He took a stereo type in 1992 and made a joke.
I have said previously, yes the Twilight Saga could have been written better, and filled out more. But the concept is sound. What is to say that over thousands of years that Vampires didn’t evolve to make human-like decisions become ‘vegetarians.’ Who wrote the rules of vampires, of which I might add are FICTIONAL beings.
Now if you’ll excuse me I’ll start on Harry Potter.
SEVEN books that mixed the real world with fantasy. You know I think I know another book that did the same thing. The Chronicles of Narnia. The books hardly dealt with anything romantic until the end. Around the time when boys stop thinking that girls have cooties. Putting the children in real life situations, like dances, sport and competition.
OMG THEY ADDED WITCHCRAFT! DEVILS WORK! Did they even read the book? It’s not teaching anything the Bible hasn’t. Transfiguration is the same as transmogrifying. Did Jesus not turn water into wine? So Harry and his friend turned rats into teacup, I fail to see the difference.
Zach makes a good point here as we sit here discussing it. Jesus turning water into wine was a miracle because the water was undrinkable. But Harry turning his rat into cup was different simply because it didn’t benefit everyone. Something I’ve noticed with the world and I know I suffer from it as well. Xenophobia.
Another series that I’d like to point out that I’ve been reading is The Mortal Instrument Series. This book has a brother in love with his sister! Flowers in the Attic did the same thing. It’s books like this that cause controversy that get people to read.
I think the thing that irked me the most about the first comment is the simple fact someone had to gall to take writing a novel and compare it to someone who has never written a novel, at least to my knowledge has only written comic books and screenplays. Same genre yes; same media no.
All in all, I don’t care how shitty a book is, how dramatic it may be or how it portrays the female character to be weak and submissive. It gets to kids to read and that the important part. Here lemme repeat it:
IT GETS KIDS TO READ!
Keep it real and rockin’
Turn the Page 
cenobyte
March 22, 2010 at 11:30 am
I have read them.
I liked Harry Potter. It was a pretty good fantasy adventure series. Not the best, by far, but it was pretty well written, it was engaging, and it was robust. The stories were not new, the characters were predictable, and the latter books in the series were rushed, but I liked it. The movies were okay, but not great. I’m glad I didn’t spend full price for them, and waited for the cheap theatre or DVD.
Twilight, on the other hand, is not original, it’s not imaginative, and fantasy romance has been done many, many, MANY times before. Much better than “Twilight”. What bothers me most about Twilight is that it is poorly written. It’s full of tropes and cliches and it portrays girls and women and the relationship they have with boys and men in a TERRIBLE light (females are subservient and submissive to males). It’s a HORRIBLE series for young women to read, and that is its target audience.
I won’t even spend money on the Twilight movies.
Twilight and Harry Potter aren’t even in the same league as Joss Whedon; not even in the same *ball park*. Joss Whedon TOTALLY did what Stephanie Mayer did, he did it first, and he did it better. “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” was all about the love affair between a human girl (who was not submissive and subservient to males) and vampires. It was all about the romance.
The very nature of stories like Harry Potter and Twilight and Buffy and Angel is that they *are* romantic. They’re larger than life, and that’s what we want. That’s why we like them. I just wish that Twilight in particular was done better.
Tim
March 22, 2010 at 11:43 am
I get what you mean about Joss Whedon doing it better. Really, I liked Buffy and Angel a hell of a lot (if I didn’t, I probably wouldn’t have shelled out the money to buy the DVD box sets). As far as Twilight goes, I haven’t read it, and am going based on what I have been told from those that like it. However, after a recent (like, seconds ago) discussion with Moondancer Drake, there is a more important issue with Twilight, and you keyed in on it. That’s the rather stalkerish aspect. As far as tropes and cliches go, not all are necessarily a bad thing. As for originality, I never said the whole thing was original, merely the addition of “sparkly vampires” to the mythos. Which was really the main point of the argument, so they’re sparkly, who cares.
Again, the most important aspect was, and always will be, the fact it got people to read. In the case of light fantasy adventure, is that really a bad thing? And in some way, especially with Twilight, it brings up good issues, which you pointed out.
Moondancer Drake
March 22, 2010 at 2:37 pm
As Tim has already mentioned, I have some opinions regarding the Twilight series, which I can only talk about the first few books since I couldn’t force myself to finish all of them and keep my lunch down. What we didn’t discuss was my great love for the Harry Potter books. It is not J.K. Rowling’s technical gift as a writer, or the genius some say she has in crafting a story. She’s good, no doubt, but it’s the gift she has in getting children to read, in an age when forcing kids away from their electronic games long enough to crack open a book can be a next to impossible feat. Sure, I have some issues with choices she made in her stories, but as a whole the books are interesting, with clear messages about good vs evil, equality when it comes to friendship, the kind of thing I wish more kids fantasy series had going for them. The movies are entertaining for the most part, but a far better form of entertainment is listening to the audio books as read by Jim Dale…WOW.
As a mother of children moving toward their teen years am not a fan of the Twilight series. I do not find them well written or even marginally original in content. I say this not only as a reader of paranormal romance, but as a writer as well. To long have our young readers had wishy-washy heroines and thin plots to put up with just to find a taste of their beloved vampires, weres, and other magical urban fantasy beings. Now in a time where paranormal has blossomed into something more than the overshadowed offspring of the Horror genre, we have a series like Twilight taking the front stage. It’s troubling for many reasons, but one that disturbs me most is that our daughters and sisters, who are already getting antiquated messages about their value being tied to have a boyfriend, now have a heroine to look up to who pines after someone who basically stalks her, who give up more and more of her personal freedoms for this unhealthy relationship, until she become little more than a object for some mystical baby rather than a person. Bella runs the gambit from disturbing infatuation to full submissive dependence, not a healthy message for the future leaders of our society.
The Harry Potter books (and movies for that matter) may not be perfect, but with smart girl role models like Hermione, and clever heroines like Ginny Wesley, J K is giving young readers a lot more positives to work with than a lot of popular books series seem capable of. Its books like the Twilight series that drive writers like myself, who are concerned for the emotional well being of the young readers looking for magic in their modern world stories, to put aside their other projects and begin creating positive heroines and stories that glorify these girls smarts and bravery, not their looks and ability to “land” the right guy. There are not near enough stories like that for our tween to teen readers, not just for the girls, but for all the kids whom books like Harry Potter awakened a passion for reading, who now look for stories geared more for their age. What I’d like to see is less attention paid to garbage like Twilight, and for us to hear more about the paranormal and fantasy YA that is doing these stories right. I’d recommend anything by Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu, such as Zarah the Windseeker and The Shadow Speaker.
Zodi
March 22, 2010 at 8:43 pm
Hi-jacked zodi style. I dare someone to argue.
Moondancer Drake
March 23, 2010 at 10:34 am
I’ll take that dare.
My point is that there are plenty of good books out there that given the PR focus that the Twilight series has could get kids reading just as much, and DON”T teach girls (and boys) unhealthy ideas about placing their self worth of who they are romantically linked to, and not allowing themselves to become victims just because someone says “I love you”, and they need to be loved. We need more books teaching kids to love themselves, and to value things like intelligence, strength, free thought. There are books like this out there I’d be proud to have my kids read, that are just as magical and enthralling as the Twilight series, and with a much better message.
I’ll never forget how I grinned when my son said as much as he loved Harry Potter, he’d have liked the series better of Hermione or Ginny had been the main character. Though I explained to him that it was the trauma of Harry’s past and his struggle that made the series interesting, I had to admit my son had a point. Where are the stories about smart girls like Hermione, clever and strong galls like Ginny? I want more of those and less of our girls getting all submissive and mushy like Bella. I want to see the shy girls like her learn to love themselves, to find worth in their gifts, not in some guy. I think our girls deserve better heroines then what the literary marketing machine are giving them.
Tim
March 23, 2010 at 11:29 am
I think that’s very accurate. Which is something more deserving of an argument than what Twilight usually gets, and that being about sparkly vampires, and how that’s not they are supposed to be. First, I’ll deal with the latter, more childish of arguments, that being the crappy sparkly aspect. I mean crappy as in the argument. For starters, who cares. What one person does with a mythos shouldn’t matter to anyone, and if they do have a problem with it, then here’s a suggestion; move on, nothing to see here. Who cares what a person writes into the mythos of monsters. They’ve changed over the years, and each and every writer, screen writer and so on has added their own flare to the concept of a vampire.
My example of Joss Wheddon was also not a comparison of Whedon versus Mayer, because, as Zodi and I discussed last night, you can’t really compare the two. Whedon’s style is incredibly cinematic. Mayer is an author (whether she’s a good author or not is beside the point). They work in two different mediums. The comparison was more for the fact that there was a romance in each (Bella and Edward in Twilight, Buffy and Angel in Buffy the Vampire Slayer). By no means did I suggest that they were the same all around. Buffy was a much stronger character than Bella ever will be (particularily in the ass kickery department).
As for the other point that has been brought up, I think it’s valid. Building stronger roles for women in literature is important because it gives better examples for real world girls as they grow up. In that, Harry Potter wins out, as Moondance pointed out, because Hermione and Ginny were much stronger than some of the male characters. But, the title is Harry Potter, and it’s about him. His friends just tag along for the ride.
To some degree, I believe that a very old stigma is still there, and that’s the one that’s lingered since the 50’s where the woman has to appear as weak and not capable of doing what needs to be done. Until the male figure comes along. It’s becoming less and less, but it’s still there.
Moondancer Drake
March 23, 2010 at 11:38 am
The trouble is, within the industry itself the old stigma is there because the folks publishing the books intend for it to be there. I remember a panel at a specfic convention I went to for writers many years ago, in which we were told “If the main character isn’t a boy, then boy won’t read it.” We were also told that fantasy and sci fi (this was right before paranormal exploded in popularity) were something more marketable to boys so the main character, for this reason, had to be a boy. Now, over the last few years, we have seen more heroines get the spot light, but generally in romance heavy fiction (cause ALL we gals want to read is romance, right?). Does that mean romance is bad. Nope, not saying that at all. Do we need some variety at the very least? Sure we do. The truth is we wont get the variety our kids deserve until our money does the talking and we make the publishers see the old way is not necessary the most profitable way.