Love it or hate it, there’s no denying that Twilight has left it’s mark on literature. From a profusion of vampire novels, to the popularity of the fantasy romance book, Twilight has affected the literary landscape. However, what few consider is why Twilight is so popular. Yes, the book had unusual lore, sexy boys for the protagonist to mull over, and fulfilled any number of teenage fantasies. Yet there may be a deeper reason why the series, despite its flaws, continues to be so enduring.
The reasons are older than we think: Twilight thrives because it relies on old stories, classic myths we’ve been trained to love since we were children. It uses familiarity, utilizing tropes which have been beloved in fiction for centuries.
The oldest and most stubborn stories are, of course, your standard fairy tales. Whether it be Cinderella, Snow White, or Beauty & the Beast, we have all been reared on these tales. Many have argued that these stories are dated, featuring such tropes as the damsel in distress or a fixation on rude and terrifying male partners—problems Twilight has been criticized for.
However, if fairy tales are Twilight’s source of inspiration, it all makes sense—both why people hate the series, and why they love it so much.
It’s worth noting that Stephenie Meyer borrowed concepts from other great writers—namely, Shakespeare and Jane Austen. I’m not saying Stephenie Meyer is Shakespeare, but the success of her stories demonstrates that the old tropes have a staying power. Reusing these ideas is effective, even when one’s own execution of them is imperfect.
In a previous post, I discussed the ways in which Twilight resembles Jane Austen, breaking down the tropes Meyer reused. In today’s article, I’ll be doing the same with fairy tales. Our response to Twilight may have been no more than a jolt of recognition for our favourite stories growing up.
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1) The Damsel in Distress
It’s the oldest trope in the book. A princess or pretty girl is captured, and the prince, who is often equally good looking, has to rescue her. The girl never does anything to help herself, but instead relies on the intervention of the prince. When the prince does swoop in, the girl then proceeds to stand there and do one of two things—she admires the prince, or she screams.
Bella is guilty of having no goals, instead devoting pages to marveling at Edward’s appearance and talents. When Bella runs into trouble, it is Edward who rescues her—first from being crushed by a van, and then from a gang of rapists. Like most damsels in distress, Bella also attracts trouble. In the classic stories, the dragon or the witch have thousands of maidens to choose from, and yet they always target a specific one.
There are millions of girls on Earth, but all of the vampires have to make a point of attacking Bella. Even the less savoury humans seem drawn to her, necessitating a princely figure to protect her. Bella notes that she feels “safe” with Edward, which would imply that she doesn’t feel especially safe when left to her own devices.
To be fair, Bella does launch a rescue mission on Edward’s behalf in the second novel, but Alice is more responsible for actually pulling the mission off (but hey, at least a girl saved the day). Bella also gains autonomy in Breaking Dawn, when she becomes a vampire, though many would argue that she should have assumed this role from the first book.
2) The Ideal Prince
Edward isn’t royalty, but he has everything else a prince needs: he has powerful familial connections, good looks, and, of course, money. In fact, the money the Cullen’s have is excessive. Though they try to keep their designer clothes and expensive cars subtle, less subtle is the fact Carlisle owns a literal island. Edward can purchase a car for Bella at the drop of a hat, and Alice can throw lavish parties—to say nothing of the mass closet of high end clothes Alice purchases for Bella. With the money they have, there are no doors that won’t open for the Cullen’s.
Vampires, as a general rule, are good looking in Meyer’s books. All have muscles, perfect hair, good clothes, and the ideal jawline. Bella describes Edward’s looks more than is necessary because she is so impressed by them.
It might make us roll our eyes, but the truth is that girls and young women appreciate heroes who are dashing and wealthy. It’s a case of age old wish fulfillment, in which a poor girl is given the chance for a better life by marrying somebody with a stash of cash.
Like Cinderella, Bella is poor in comparison to her romantic interest. She isn’t living in poverty, dusting the fireplace in rags, but as the daughter of a single dad secondhand is the name of the game. The truck her father gives her is several decades old, and the book makes a point of describing how sluggish her computer is. Bella actually has to grab cereal while she waits for a single page to load. Next to Edward’s bank account, Bella, with her ancient truck and wheezing computer, might as well be Cinderella.
Snow White also influences this trope, featuring a girl in rags who is swept off her feet by a presumably rich, but attractive, man she has just met. While Bella has time to actually develop a relationship with Edward (arguably, actually learning her partner’s name first gives her a point over Snow White), their relationship, or at least the intensity of it, progresses quickly.
3) Early Marriage
Most of the princesses in the old tales were teenagers. While Bella is technically eighteen, going on nineteen, when she ties the knot, she’s on the line. She’s only a few years older than her fairy tale counterparts. Moreover, her marriage, if legal, is still early by modern standards. As Bella points out, marrying at such an early age is a way to broadcast you’re expecting.
As par for the course, with early marriage comes motherhood. At nineteen, most of us are attending college or exploring our identities. At the same age, Bella is married, has a house, and is raising a daughter.
Part of this trope comes from the fact that Bella, like most heroines in classic stories, had to grow up fast. From a tender age, Cinderella was expected to perform all the chores and care for the family’s needs—putting them above her own. Bella, likewise, has to act in a parental capacity. Renee isn’t an evil mother; in fact, she’s sweet, but her hair brained ways and impulsivity force Bella to act in the role of mother. Bella offers Renee advice, solves problems for her, keeps her out of trouble, and acts like a guide to the bumbling Renee. Ironically, it’s only in matters of love that Renee assumes any form of authority.
Even if Bella isn’t a teen (technically) when she marries, she is a teen when Edward sweeps her off her feet. If it wasn’t for Victoria trying to murder her, or Edward attempting to break up with her for six months, there’s every chance Bella would have married Edward sooner, and thus become a newly wed teen.
4) The Monster Love Interest
If having a woman fall in love with a handsome and wealthy prince is popular, it’s even more popular to give him fangs (and a scowl). This trope derives mainly from Beauty & the Beast, in which a young woman is kidnapped by a hairy and ferocious man covered in hair. Beast is scary; he has claws and jaws, and a temper to match. Even in the Disney version, he’s mean. After all, these men aren’t just monsters on the outside; they’re nasty on the inside too, offering insults and condescension in their wake.
In the Disney version, when Belle (even the names are similar), comes to stay with Beast, she is doing so in exchange for her father. She is not a willing guest, but a prisoner. What’s more, when Belle doesn’t comply with the beast’s wishes, he threatens to starve her. This is not how a healthy relationship starts.
In Twilight, Edward is better looking than the beast—yet he’s still a monster, a vampire with a killing bite and super strength. Like Belle’s Beast, he would have no trouble scaling a building or ripping a man’s arm off. Like Beast, Edward also has a bad habit of bossing Bella around. This is most noticeable in Eclipse, when Edward wrecks the motor of Bella’s truck so that she can’t visit Jacob. Edward, like Beast, even imprisons Bella, having Alice “watch” Bella while he’s away so that she can’t, again, see Jacob.
Even before there are any sparks, Edward is rude to Bella. He accuses her of being unobservant, and he lapses into brooding silences which make Bella squirm with guilt. Bella often walks on eggshells around Edward, afraid of setting off his unpredictable temper.
Jacob isn’t much better, given that a tantrum could cause him to turn into a wolf and shred Bella; Emily is evidence of this, as she now bears permanent scars across her face as a result of being too close when her love interest, Sam, lost his cool and phased beside her.
5) Single Parent, Single Child
Name a classic princess who has both parents. I’m still waiting. No? Heroines in old narratives seldom have both parents. In most cases, they have two choices—a mother who turns out to be evil, or a father who’s clueless. Bella’s parents aren’t evil, or idiotic, but they are bumbling to some degree. Unlike her fairy tale counterparts, both of Bella’s parents are alive—however, the fact they’re divorced means that Bella ends up with one at a time.
Like the old school princesses, Bella also lacks siblings. Cinderella has step siblings, but, with their cruel natures, they can’t be counted as true sisters. Snow White mostly looks after herself, neglected by the vain queen, while Ariel and Belle are left with single dads (this is closest to Bella’s situation). In fact, I may need to do an article on why Twilight is just Beauty & the Beast retold, because the relationship Bella has with her father is strangely alike to the one Belle has with hers.
In Twilight, Bella makes many of her decisions based on a need to protect Charlie. Belle’s father is almost childlike, and it’s likely Belle handles the important tasks—paying the bills, washing the dishes, and handling groceries and cooking—while he tinkers with his inventions. The relationship Belle has with her father is likewise reflected in Bella’s relationship with her mother. Bella literally admits to having to remind Renee to pay the bills when she’s a child, and Bella worries about leaving her mother behind (though she quickly takes on a mothering role to Charlie, volunteering for kitchen duty and lamenting Charlie’s overall helplessness in the culinary department).
The princesses of fairy tales have to (at least until the prince arrives) stand on their own. They have to care for others; they have to assume the responsibilities of adults, handling all cooking and cleaning; and they lack support, not only from parental figures but from siblings. Snow White and Belle are both single children (Ariel is an exception, having sisters, but Disney lessens their role to the degree that I forgot she had siblings until I watched it again).
6) The Happily Ever After
Once the princess marries the prince, life continues in bliss. Provided the kingdom isn’t invaded, the married couple is content and never sad. Arguments never happen; nobody becomes sick, or gets injured; and balls are par for the course, everything proceeding with perfection.
Until the Volturi arrive, Bella’s marriage is much like that of a fairy tale. She receives a cottage in the woods for a birthday present, and within the book she describes herself as being “euphoric” most of the time. It’s not unrealistic to experience frequent happiness when your life is going right, but euphoria is an intense form of joy. Most people need drugs to experience it constantly.
After marrying, Bella and Edward never fight. Everyone is always perfectly happy and safe, and everyone can ride off into the sunset. Like Snow White, Bella’s life is completed by marriage. Good looks and money are enough to chase away all of life’s problems, and true love provides as much bliss as a shot of heroin.
In Conclusion
Twilight owes it’s popularity to tales old as time. What makes Twilight both beloved and reviled among readers is it’s use of tropes familiar to us from our favourite childhood stories. Whether it be the fantasy of marrying a rich man who will solve all our problems, the attraction to beastly love interests, or the tendency for the damsel to cook while she waits to be rescued, Twilight emulates the best and worst of old school fantasy.
Twilight endures because it follows the tropes which allowed Disney to become a monopoly. Whatever feminists say, there’s always going to be a market for bad boys, orphaned girls, and dysfunctional parental figures. It’s worth noting that these tropes could even be redeemed by a skilled writer, but that’s a topic for another article.
Suffice it to say that Twilight endures, because it borrows, for better or for worse, from tales that have endured for centuries.
Have you noticed any other ways Twilight copies fairy tales? What other books have you loved or hated that used these tropes? Sound off in the comments.