And this Just Sounds Racist (Pg. 349-354)

It's been decided that Bella is going to watch the vampires play 'Thunderball' later tonight. Edward is doing Bella a disservice here because Thunderball is one of the good Bond movies...but we aren't talking about movies, we're talking about some ridiculous game related to baseball that the vampires play during storms. Not having arrived at the game yet I must be emphatic that the only reason for them to do this is so that they look cool, dark, and mysterious in front of Bella. While the idea is no more ridiculous than Quidditch at least Quidditch served a purpose: to let the neophyte wizards learn their abilities and practice them competitively. To take a routine game like baseball and change it to night/thunderstorm baseball is pointless at best. It's also not the vampires showing off, but Meyer showing off that the vampires are different. It's like she needs to convince us that Bella needs to be impressed by them more so that she falls in love more, but by now if the reader doesn't think she is hopelessly in his thrall they just aren't paying attention.

Bella needs to go home and get some new clothes so they take her truck back to her house. At the door are the Blacks waiting. Edward snarls. Bella is confused but then comes to a realization, "He came to warn Charlie?' I guessed more horrified than angry."

This whole section spirals downhill faster than I thought possible. It's symptomatic of the entire book, we get a pretty decent section (the cuteness between Edward and Bella in his room), a small descent (the whole scene with Alice and Jasper), then the sudden Wile E. Coyote drop off the side of the cliff. They've seen the Blacks, but it's doubtful that the Blacks have seen them and Edward needs to pick up Bella later. This isn't a problem because, as we know, he just shows up to check on her whenever he needs to. He tells her that he will be back, "After your get rid of them--."

He snarls at the Blacks and it comes off as racist. We know that the Cullens don't like the Blacks and vice-versa, but what we don't know specifically is why. As readers going through the book for the first time none of this makes sense. The old cliche of the "Magical/Wise Native," activates here for the reader. The Blacks know that the Cullens are vampires because their magical legends tell them so.* For the purposes of the story we can buy this as an explanation. What we don't know is why the Cullens hate the Blacks and it seems unreasonable for Edward not to explain any of this to Bella. It's not strange that he doesn't, because he never tells her anything that might be considered important, but for him to snarl and talk about "them" he should offer up something. Perhaps, Bella could ask about the myths that Jacob told her.

Edward vanishes and Bella invites the Blacks in. That's when Billy and Bella get into it. Billy wants to tell Charlie that he should watch out for his daughter because of who she is dating. Of course, it's not about who but what she is dating. In this respect, the whole thing comes off as racist but there's a problem. How does Billy know that they are dating? He's seen them together once, and that just happened a few minutes ago. Jacob might know a bit more, but only from distant rumors as he doesn't even go to school with her. Maybe Billy saw them together the last time he popped over but his leap from seeing them talking to assuming they're dating is too big to make. We know that Billy is right, but he can only be making an assumption based on the theoretical one time he's seen them together before tonight. Unless he has the foresight as well.

Billy explains that the Cullens have a reputation and that is why he is looking out for his friend's daughter. A noble motivation, but he never says what that reputation is, without explaining why he just comes off as racist. Which is appropriate because we are talking about another species here. Bella rolls with it, "But that reputation couldn't be deserved could it? Because the Cullens never set foot on the Reservation, do they?"

This fact-of the Cullens never setting foot on the Reservation-brings us waaay back to the beach trip in the beginning of the book. Sure this is a correct assertion, the Cullens do not set foot on the Reservation, but Bella leaves out the why. They don't come there because they aren't allowed on the Reservation. The eldest Black made that explicitly clear. We know why, Billy Black knows why, Bella knows why, but it's unclear why Billy should make that assumption about Bella. They aren't allowed, it's not their part of town and they need to 'git. The book heads in the typical direction of disapproval of the new boyfriend, "Though it would be my business, again, whether or not I think that it's Charlie's business right?"

The problem is that neither Bella nor Billy seem to be addressing two important facts: the first being that Bella is a teenager. She doesn't know anything so she doesn't really get to make decisions for her father's friends. Billy just admits that she is more informed than he thought she was and then backs off. Really!? Your best friend's teenage daughter just told you off and you are going to walk away? This is some shitty adulthood, but it's nothing worse than any of the other parents we've seen in Forks. Charlie lets his daughter treat him like they are equals, Carlisle really has no idea what is going on with his brood, and now Billy Black lets some smart ass teenage girl run him off.

It's especially weird because the second important fact is that Edward isn't human. It's in his nature to murder people and drink their blood, an action he's admitted to doing already, but Billy just ignores this small fact. A fact, that he knows to be true or else he wouldn't be there to warn Charlie of his daughter's new boyfriend which is the fact that he shouldn't actually know. Speaking of Edward, how come none of the Blacks inquired as to where exactly he went earlier when they noticed him in the car? No wonder the werewolves always lose.

_______________________________________
*Which in fiction is always portrayed as being 100% accurate. If the wise old Indian says so it must be, and this tends to blend in with real life unfortunately. Just look at how many idiots believe in this Mayan Doomsday bullshit.

It Just Doesn't Sound Right (Pg. 343-349)

We've dispensed with the story of Dr. Carlisle and now Edward wants to show off his room to Bella. Normal stuff for bringing home the girlfriend at that age...or at 17 which Edward certainly is not. Either way, they have some privacy but now the pair want actual privacy. Edward's room is large and has a bunch of CDs. I suppose this is supposed to give us a clue as to Edward's musical talent, but it begs the question about how exactly one shows off their music collection now.

Going to school I see a number of students plodding along with headphones and little red and pink squares attached to their bags. These are obviously their iPods and MP3 players. It's a scene right out of the nightmares of Ray Bradbury,* but how does one show off their music collection nowadays? I've never been a big music person myself, my collection is maybe one hundred albums and all of them are in my computer. I carry around with me, maybe 200 songs on my cellphone, how do the kids do it now? Do they have to impress their paramours with actual conversation or do they just toss their little plastic cubes over and let that person scroll through their playlists?

We can't really fault Meyer for this idiosyncrasy, the book was published in 2005 and iPods were certainly popular then and the digital music player goes back to 1979, but only very recently has the idea of buying music without actually paying for a thing (i.e. a physical medium) really taken off. The next Video Game Consoles probably won't even have drives on them, yet most people keep their cds that they have already bought if for nothing else than a testament to what they paid for.

The two have a some banter, it's nothing of note until Bella again asserts that she's not afraid of being in the house alone with a bunch of vampires. That's when Edward bares his fangs and leaps at her in playful wrestling. It's sort of cute and how I imagine the children of Krypton flirted...until that is I remember that it orbited a red sun. It's at this point, when the making out is about to ensue that Alice and Jasper walk into the room, "It sounded like you were having Bella for lunch, and we came to see if you would share,' Alice announced."

Wait, I saw this movie. It used to air at 2am on Cinemax right? I thought this was a book written by a Mormon for teenage girls. Does the film adaptation star Alyssa Milano and Charlotte Lewis? They've aged well if the movie posters are any indication. Obviously I'm reading into this more than is necessary, but what is the other conclusion that I am to draw? That they are joking about murdering her? The fact about this book is that there are so many unlikable characters that I want to like Alice and Jasper so I'm forced to think that they are making a sex joke and not a murder joke because of the two choices that's the better one. Adding to that is that Alice doesn't laugh through the comment, she announces it then gracefully dances through the room. It has to be a sex joke.

Their proclaimed reason for coming in the room is to ask Edward if he wants to go play thunderball with them later tonight. This is something, related to baseball, that the Vampires do when there is a thunder storm. I'll let the ridiculousness of this slide since it's no more outrageous than Quidditch. Also thunderball is just another really obvious way to show that Vampires are cool: they play baseball in the rain! duh duh DUH.

Alice then has an idea, "Let's go see if Carlisle will come,' Alice bounded up and to the door in a fashion that would break any ballerina's heart. "Like you don't know,' Jasper teased."

Aside from the really difficult time I had imagining the layout of Edward's room these two sentences really made me think. I don't think that Jasper is actually teasing Alice here, I think he's rolling his eyes. It's been established that Alice is Delphic Pythian of the group and given her carefree cute nature I'm willing to bet she's just a pain in the ass to live with. If she can correctly prophesy whether or not Carlisle is going to play a game, a trite prediction no matter how you look at it, then she just has to be the most annoying person in the world. Especially since the limit to the power she has is that it is only really accurate when it has to do with others of her own kind. If Jasper sits down to watch a hockey game, he's interacting with that game--albeit passively, but that's interaction as he is involved in the game. That activates Alice's power and if she wants to be a jerk she can just tell him who wins...all the damn time. There's a funny scene in Scary Movie 3 where this is portrayed as the "Oracle" ruins a basketball game for "Morpheus," who then laments, "I get shit for women I ain't even slept with yet."

It's such a trite prediction for her too, usually the device of fortune telling in fiction is used for important plot points not things like choosing to play a game. In this I think that Meyer gets it right. For my part, skepticism has obliterated any faith I put in prophecy and the greatest weight of my skepticism comes from Cicero's "De Divinatione." Cicero makes a great point of mentioning that all of the examples of accurate fortune telling have to do with great events. As if the soothsayers** are building in an excuse for why the Delphic couldn't predict the outcome of the Olympic games, or the Augurs various matches in the Arena, or why John Edwards hasn't made a ridiculous killing betting the ponies or the Superbowl. If Alice can make these types of prediction, on day to day affairs it actually gives her credit toward her ability. Even more so that Jasper makes his comment.

He doesn't know, but he knows that she does and all they are doing is going through the motions of actually having to ask him. This is probably the best thing Meyer has written so far, but it's subtle. We believe Alice has the gift because everyone else is annoyed with it. It's too bad this kind of subtlety doesn't prevade the rest of the writing.
____________________
*If you ask him, Fahrenheit 451 isn't about censorship and burning books, it's about not reading and becoming detached from society through media like the personal radio.

**I know I'm using terms that different types of prophesying as if they were interchangeable.

The Prodigal Son (Pg. 341-343)

Continuing on from the strange origin of Dr. Carlisle, we have him in the New World more than likely prior to the American Revolution.* At this point Carlisle has probably been established as a doctor of medicine in Italy and travelling to the English Colonies would mean that he's probably got a job and estate already set up there. At the very least he has the means to do it himself. It's odd though, "He dreamed of finding others like himself. He was very lonely you see."

He's in Italy among members of his own kind. They have a rift over human blood and he leaves for the undiscovered countries of the Americas so that he can find others like himself. It's quite a leap of reasoning to assume that there will be other vampires in the West. Which works with the story very well because he doesn't. He's alone for two centuries, well not alone, I'm sure with his outrageous perfection he's at least making friends. This is like the Jesus story in the bible, you read all about his infancy to middle childhood (in some versions anyway) and then bam, he's thirty with followers and on his way out. I would be more interested in a story that dealt with these two centuries of Carlisle rather than this tired story of two sociopaths getting together.

Especially from the point of view of a doctor. When exactly did leeches go out of style? Was there some sort of medical establishment backlash against not using leeches? How did Darwin's theory impact the study of medicine? What about the advent of psychology? There is so much that happens in those two centuries from a purely scientific standpoint that it would be a far more interesting story, but no, we skip ahead.

"When the influenza epidemic hit, he was working nights a hospital in Chicago." Suddenly it's 1918 in this flashback and Edward gets turned. Edward thinks it's of note that Carlisle chose him because he was already dying, that somehow that makes Carlisle ethical in his choices. However, that's like asking a person if they want to take an experimental drug to prevent their terminal cancer. A dying person is going to say yes to just about anything that gives them a small fraction of hope for survival. Just look at what we do to keep 90 year old people alive. Fear of death is one of the most primal habits** man possesses. When Carlisle asks Edward (we assume) if he wants to live or die, that isn't a choice. Instinct answers that question. Carlisle isn't morally better because Edward is already on his way out, it actually makes him worse. Ethically you have to be very careful when you experiment with inmates in a prison, because they will agree to most anything just to break the routine. A dying person has more than just monotony to worry about.

Edward being the first of the new brood is instructed by Carlisle to ignore the raging blood lust in his mind and just eat animals. It's a nice sentiment and all but this is like asking a cat to start eating its veggies. So Edward splits. He relates the tale of his murdering for food by trying to portray himself as some sort of avenging angel. He would only stalk and kill criminals. One time he saves a young girl from being murdered by mauling the would-be perpetrator and Bella wonders when the girl sees him, "would she have been grateful, that girl, or more frightened than before?"

The question would be pertinent if this were a well thought out idea. It works in stories like Batman or the Punisher where a murderer/rapist is brutally attacked by a shadowy figure saving a young, usually female, victim. Here, because we have been constantly reminded of how beautiful Edward is it comes down to looks. Would she be grateful if the angelic Adonis Edward had saved her? Bella, we know, thinks yes. The question is abnormal for another reason as well, and that is the manner of saving. When Batman beats someone up or the Punisher shoots someone; those are normal things. They are scary and dangerous, to be sure, and no one wants to be such a close witness to that kind of extreme violence, but they are normal fitting in with the rules of our world. When Edward attacks the murderer it breaks those rules and defies expectations.

It's not the flip of the cloak and the blur of a shadow that saves the her. It's something that has come to feed, an ultra fast human that is drinking the blood of another human being. No matter Edward's victims' intent, it's still a human being and one of the rules of the world is that people don't get eaten by people. In this case, surely the woman must have been in abject terror.

After years of this behavior Edward comes back to Carlisle and now Esme, "They welcomed me back like the prodigal. It was more than I deserved."

"The prodigal," is obviously an allusion to the parable of the prodigal son in the Christian Bible. Summarizing, a father gives his two sons their inheritance early. One stays at the farm and works while the other gets as drunk as a poet on payday, consorts with loose women, blows through his money. Poor he returns home looking to work for his money earning the enmity of his brother. The moral of the story is that it is good that the prodigal son returns and we should rejoice rather than hate him for his ways.

The problem is that most people misunderstand the word "prodigal." It isn't the fact that the son left home that makes him prodigal, it's that he spend all of his money on women, wine, and parties. He could have been prodigal without ever leaving his home...which actually would have been a better story.

It's a misunderstanding that most people fall into because those that speak from the pulpit get it wrong when they speak of the moral of the story. Because oddly enough, the moral of story doesn't change one bit if the person telling the story doesn't know what the word "prodigal" actually means. As said earlier the moral of the story is about welcoming back one who has become lost, perhaps that is where the misunderstanding actually comes in: we tend to think of "lost" primarily in a spatial sense. The prodigal son was lost both in location and in his ways so again, it oddly works.

For Edward's example it works accidentally as well. It all depends on what he meant by "prodigal." Was he referring to himself as being like the person from the story? If the answer to that is "yes" then he is completely wrong. He wasn't prodigal, he was merely bloodthirsty, and Jesus' tale wasn't about a person who left the home to go on a murder spree. Edward wasn't throwing parties and such. Only if his reference was to the welcoming back by Carlisle does the allusion work in the correct sense. Unfortunately the structure of the sentence doesn't support the latter claim.

Not even the religious can get the religious stories right most of the time. I do wonder if Carlisle's father at least had it right.

____________________________
*Since it kind of ceased to be called "the New World" once
**I stress the word "habit" in the vein of American Philosopher John Dewey.

Prodigies (Pg. 338-341)

It's the 1660s, give or take since time was marked that accurately or something back then (hint: it was), and Carlisle has just swam to France. Edward is still telling his story about his patriarch and Bella despite being afraid of the fact that vampires don't need to breath has decided to stick around. Let's be clear: the only thing that scares Bella about hanging around with Vampires is that they don't need to breathe. Not the fact that it is only through an exercise in will that they are resistant to their bloodlust. Perhaps it makes sense because the lack of breathing reminds her that she's falling for a corpse but that's me being generous.

Edward continues with the history of Carlisle, "By night he studied music, science, medicine--and found his calling, his penance, in that, in saving human lives."

There's a lot to unpack in that one sentence. When I was teaching one of the eminent philosophers I used to cover was Thomas Hobbes. He lived from 1588-1679 and was one of those rare people who actually lived through what he was teaching. He also was a professional academic. It's important here because the University system worked a lot differently back then than it does now. There wasn't tuition, the student paid by the class. A student of Hobbes would go to a lecture, learn what he could, then pay the professor directly. This was the standard method of attending higher education during this period, unless you were royalty. It's been established that Carlisle wasn't royalty being the son of a preacher. So we have an important question: how exactly did Carlisle attend school.

Another problem is that this isn't England, it's France. French Universities during this period weren't like Universities now. You don't just show up with the requisite money and you are in. The University system of those days required you to be of the Aristocracy or at least have a benefactor who was Aristocratic. Carlisle has no one in France, but somehow he manages to get in to the colleges...at night.

Which brings us to problem three in this failure of a sentence. The concept of "night class" is formed around the idea that someone would want to better themselves while already working, thus they can go to school and their job with no conflict. This wouldn't even be an idea that Royal France would have in the late 17th century. It makes sense now, although I doubt you can become a medical doctor by only attending night classes, but this explanation for how Carlisle became a doctor only works if you know nothing about the history of academics. Carlisle would have been better served an origin detailing his work at the barber shop and slowly being introduced to medicine through it.

Which brings us to the last problem, although it's not with this book but with history. Medical history is so full of oddities that it's remarkable people made it through at all. Medicine in those days largely relied on the theory that blood would spoil, so in order to get better they bled people. Ask George Washington how the "bleeding treatment" worked out for him. Given Carlisle's nature he must really have overcome his blood lust quite quickly (only a couple of decades) in order to be able to bleed a person's fever out (seriously) and toss the blood away. I guess his strength of will was really quite remarkable even in the youth of his Vampirism.

"He was studying in Italy when he discovered the others there." The Italian vampires are described as being much more refined than those of England. These are the Aristocratic vampires that are so popularly depicted in literature. If Carlisle had stumbled upon them first, then went to school, we would have a much more believable story. Yet these vampires must be the Stregoni Benefici that Bella stumbled upon back when she knew Eddie was a Vampire but needed to prove her theory on the internet. Here's the trouble: according to the book the Stregoni Benefici, are supposed to be "on the side of goodness, and the mortal enemy of all evil vampires."*

So Carlisle has found that group of vampires that are old enough to have overcome their bloodlust as well. Edward points at a picture that Bella describes as either Greek/Roman mythological or Biblical...not really much of a difference since the images of God on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel are clearly inspired by representations of Zeus/Jupiter from the classical period. So their at the latest Roman. Yet Carlisle doesn't stay with them, he decides to try the New World, the phrasing means that it is at the latest the mid 1700s. He doesn't stay with them because they are at a detente over the lack of human blood in his diet. Yep, he's one of THOSE vegetarians always preaching about their moral superiority because they don't eat cow. I wish I could be like those vampires and kick them out of my continent as well but what this means for the story is that the "good" vampires still eat people.

What I really I really love about the implication here is that even thought these Romans are "good" they still drink blood. Which means that in order to be good in Meyer's world the measuring stick is being true to your own nature. How very pagan of her to be slipping this type of lesson into her books. It also means that there is a separation in her eyes between being good and being a vegetarian. Or barring that you can still be a vegetarian without being a douche about it...maybe I do like her after all.

__________________________________
*I mentioned this site before and it so obviously is the site that Bella went to that I wonder who set it up: the publishing company for the book or some fan. In either case this is the definition that she gives.