Sometime last week? this week? somewhere on the web (see goodreads) Stephen King said "Harry Potter is about confronting fears, finding inner strength and doing what is right in the face of adversity. Twilight is about how important it is to have a boyfriend."
I was irked by the tone of condescension. I haven't read Twilight; I wouldn't be surprised if it's not very good.* But I can't abide snottiness. It's second on my list of vices, after laziness. And so my first formulated response was, "Harry Potter's not allowed to have a boyfriend."**
But as I was paraphrasing King's comment to my faithful dinner companion that night I had one of those occasional experiences of hearing myself from outside myself, and found my self – or one of my selves – thinking, "God, he sounds like a bloody libertarian."
Which lead me to think about that list of Harry Potter virtues – they are virtues of the lone heroic individual; they are not virtues of interdependence or relationship. (Why is Romance the largest genre by volume of book sales? Why do women keep wanting to re-imagine the world as kind to them?)
And suddenly I saw King's list of virtues as essentially gendered. Which I'd never seen before.
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*Which goes to show, again, that the words themselves are not what we read for.
**(Dumbledore's gayness was revealed in a post-Potter comment by Rowling. It’s not indicated in the books.)
A valid point. Still, I tend to agree with Stephen's point. I made the mistake of reading the first two Twilight books m'self, and promptly wanted my afternoons back.
ReplyDeleteIndeed, the afternoons media moguls owe us...
ReplyDeleteI'm sure the books are not either well-written or well-constructed. But their success really does suggest that they are talking about something early teenaged girls found very important. That's what I mean about the words not altogether always being the book.
Don't take it for granted that ALL us women want to reimagine the world as being kind to us. Some of us are trouble-making witches in real time!
ReplyDeleteSorry, Sarah, I've only just seen your comment!
ReplyDeleteNo, not ALL women want to re-imagine the world as kinder, & I didn't say they did. But a desire something like that might explain the popularity - or the sales figures, at least - of harlequin romances and the like.
Romantic suspense is a strongly growing sub-genre. Darker, by the looks of the covers!
Enjoy making trouble, & happy new year!
Sorry, Tina, have only just seen this.
ReplyDeleteOne of our interns was telling me the other day about Twilight's message in summary. If the message really is that girls are nothing without a defining male presence, then that is scary. It's even scarier when it's so vastly popular - it sounds as though there has been a real backlash against girls' autonomy, and that girls are being persuaded, one way & another, to buy into it.
Saying something about that would have been worth King's time. Attacking the message by condescending to the author wasn't. It made him sound like a snot AND slighted the issue.