Stephenie Meyers Twilight and the Stereotypes of Gender Roles in Vampires Genre

When the word vampire is mentioned, many would immediately think of the images of
haft-bat and haft-human shaped monsters, who sleep in their coffins by day, rise at midnight to
feed upon the blood of human beings. However, those descriptions are only the popular traits or
rules of vampires that exist in the modern literature. Vampires have existed for a long time
through the course of human history and, as they were popularized across countries, the figures
of vampires and the characters involved in those tales have been the complex metaphors for the
contemporary anxieties existing in such eras. In Murgocis article researching the history of
vampires in folktales, she denotes that the early appearances of vampire in myths related directly
to the primitive ideas about body and soul and served as superstitious metaphors for
unexplainable death linked to plagues and transmittable diseases (320). However, in 2005, when
Stephenie Meyers introduced the first novel of her vampire genre trilogy, which, though, gained
extreme popularity among young female adults and teenage readers, has been a constant target of
critic readers, questioning whether Meyers novel has followed the path of reflecting the fears of
society on sexual relationships or not. This is due to one well-known fact that the vampire figures
presented in Twilight are significantly different from the rules of vampires existing in folktales
and classic literatures. Although Twilight brings into play new kinds of vampires, it reinforces
the stereotypical representations of gender through male and female roles in love relationship
and sexuality, as well as the contemporary fear about these topics.
Troughout the course of human history, the images and ideas regarding vampires have
been changing accordingly to the development of the society. When Meyers introduced her new
images of vampires, it raised the ultimate question: Are vampires in Twilight completely
different from the old vampires?

In folklores, the images and traits of vampires are not solidified into one particular figure
but vary as based on the myths of each region. Among those variances, Murgoci states that there
is one most common kind of vampires, found in many areas of Eastern Europe: the deadvampires because she finds that vampires is related directly to the belief that all departed spirits
wished evil to those left (320). This type of vampires are bodies rising from the graves at night,
feeding on intestines of other dead corpses, sometimes on human blood and doing mischieves to
those who are living. However, these traits are not exactly similar to that of the modern vampires
as they are served as the superstitious metaphor used by the residents in such era to
psychologically deal with unexplainable deaths due to limitation of contemporary medical
condition. At that time, due to the large number of plague victims, graves would be dug up to
make room for more people in mass burial. According to Murgoci, in several cases, which she
cites from the Romanian periodical of peasant art and literature, it terrifies the grave diggers to
find the dead ones have not shown significant sights of decomposition but looked rather liveliked with long growing nails and hair, red blooded faces and pieces of shroud in their mouth
(323). These cases turn into the folktales, myths of vampires and become the predecessors for
modern vampire tales.
In an interview with Oprah in 2009, Meyers has said that she was not familiar with, and
did not research, the folklore or literature of vampires, but instead the concepts of Edward was
based on a dream she had. As the result, she introduced her vampires as completely different
kinds of blood sucking monsters that do not follow the rules of vampires created by folklores.
While in those old tales, vampires are depicted as zombie-liked corpses coming to life and harm
the living; in Twilight they are more likes superhuman with variable displays of power like
telepathy, precognitive abilities and beautiful appearances. In common, their powers are super

strength, super speed and incredible durable bodies. Furthermore, Edward, the main protagonist,
becomes the representation of a new kind of vampires, the vegetarian ones. These vampires no
longer feed on and abstain from human blood as an effort to blending in with human society.
Edward, who is a 100-year-old vampire in the body of a 17-year-old teen, goes to school, takes
class like normal person. As the result, the significant differences between the images Meyers
vampires and those of the old tales are the omission of the horror element related to the fears and
anxieties about unknown created of darkness. Now, the cruel blood sucking monsters are
replaced by the tamed, vegetarian and human-friendly predators.
Though Meyers changes the image of vampires, the ideas of her male and characters in
their romantic relationships are closely similar to those that presented in older vampire tales.
In old tales and classic stories about vampires, male and female characters are marked
with traits that expressing the stereotypical believes regarding their roles in love relationship:
men are presented with the active roles, both non and sexually, women is the more passive ones,
becoming the objects for male desires. Mina Harker, in the film Nosferatu, directed by
F.W.Mernau in 1922, is an excellent example for this typical image of feminine damsels in
distress. The gazes of the characters in this movie support this idea about Mina Harker. In one of
Irene Peinhopfs conference about Gemanic and Slavic studies, she comments on how, at begin
of the film, when Mina was introduced to the audiences, she was seen at and through the
window via the gaze of Jonathan, depicting the idea of his wife was more of an object in his
eyes. Her gaze also show her passiveness as when Jonathan delivered that he going away for a
real estate mission, Mina shows worries and anxiety on her face but she was not able to express
such feeling directly to her spouse but only to her fixate her eyes at him. One of the most
important clue is how Mina changes when she under the power of Nosferatu. She enters a state

closely resembled hypnotized: she sleeps walked on the balcony, faints and even reaches out for
the vampires regardless of her own will. She is an object controlled by Nosferatu. Meanwhile,
Nosferatu has already moved into the block across their house, spending his time gazing at Mina
as an object of his desires. Throughout the movie, despite being the main female protagonist,
Mina does not do anything on her own will besides passively responds to other characters and
the courses of the stories which makes her fall into the stereotypical traits belong to female
protagonists in classic vampire tales. Furthermore, what should be taken into consideration here
is that the representation of the stereotypical images of men and their desires over women are
found within the character of Nosferatu rather than Jonathan, Mina husband. This is due to the
fact that Jonathan shows many traits of a passive feminine character namely his constant refuse
of the existence and danger of the vampire Count and this denial cause him to overlook the
danger of the vampire over Mina.
Meyerss main female protagonist of Twilight, Bella Swan, has the very same image of a
stereotypical damsel in distress, like Mina Harker, as directly taken from her life as a teenager: a
bland and constantly self-depressing girl who has no life own her own. Bella begins the film
miserable, in a new town where all the girls appears to be super-friendly to her, the new girl, and
all the boys hit on her, to the point it never stop. Her passively acceptance of what pitiful life she
is in, shows when she responds to a boy (not Edward) hitting on her: I am kind of a suffered in
silent type (Twilight). When Edward comes along, some readers might expect her to change, to
develop as a main character. Nevertheless, her passive self is illustrated even more on her
relationship with the 100-years old vampire. Bella is submissive to Edward love and his
commands. In one scene, Edwards abruptly invites her to his house Youre coming to my house
tomorrow (Twilight), to which, her concern of whether or not his family will like her instead of

her own safety in a nest of blood sucking vampires. This shows how much passive and
submissive Bella is to Edward: she spends too much thought and time on whether he can
possibly be in love with her. Her constant waiting for him to appear reflects her need for
validation from him, to the point when it is okay and not creepy at all for his magical boyfriend
to spy on her in her sleep. As the result, Bella and Edward are in a patriarchy relationship in
which the man is the dominant one.
In the vampire old tales, the concept of vampires as frightening creatures that corrupting
people is directly linked with the anxiety in the contemporary eras: morality and virginity is
significantly important to human lives. In the vampires in Romania, Murgoci brings out a
stories of a girl who has a vampire as her lover. When the vampire is still a young man, they are
deeply in love; however, as his proposal of marriage is declined by the girls parent, he seeks
suicide and become a vampire. At night, the vampire comes to his lover, makes love with her and
leaves. The girl, following advice from an old wise woman, finds a way to follow the vampires
to his grave and witnesses him eating the heart of a corpse buried there. Later that night, the
vampire asks her to tell the truth of what she has known about him, yet she refuses to answer,
despite his threat on the lives of her family. Gradually, he kills all the members of her family and
in the end, the girl as well, as she keep refuses to give him the truth he seeks. What happen
afterward is like a fairy tale, the girl is reincarnated in to a flower then this flower turn into the
same girl herself. She meets and gets married to a prince live happily ever after (337-339). The
message in this story is that as the young man committed suicide, he goes again the moral
believes about body and soul. It reflects the link between vampires and the idea of body and
soul (320) that Murgoci has claimed. As the consequence, he is now the representation of sin
and because the girl continues to associate with him, she is also up against the morality of the

society. However, her constant refusals to give the vampire what he wants represents that she is
willing to correct her mistakes and pay for her sin through her own death. That is why she
received a happy live while being free from the cursed vampire.
In a similar manner, Twilight reinforces the ultimate believes in morality and virginity by
presenting the ideology of Christian: pre- marriage sex is sin. Throughout the course of not only
the first novel but until the last one, Breaking Dawns, Edward and Bella have been abstinence
from sexual interaction. Edward, in the role of a sexually driven figure, shows his greatness by
abstaining himself from Bella blood and body. Bella though passive, show her strength through
the relationship she has with Edward. Both desire each other but abstain from lust. They are
rewarded with happy ending. Edwards life is completed by his marriage to Bella and the birth of
his child. Bella receives vampirism as an eternal reward in form of youth and supernatural
power.

Work Cited

Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens. F.W. Murnau. Perf. Max Schreck, Greta Schrder and
Gustav von Wangenheim. 1922. Youtube.Web. 20 Apr, 2014
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KO5mMVeFZEQ>

Meyer, Stephenie. Interview. The Oprah Winfrey Show. ABC. WJLA, Washington, D.C. 19
Nov, 2006. Television.

Murgoci, Agne. The Vampires on Romania. Folklore. Vol.7, No.4. 31 Dec, 1926.

Peinhopf, Irene. Ellen and Greta on the Deathbed: Representations of Death and Agency in F.W.
Murnaus Nosferatu: Eine Symphonie des Grauens (1922) and E. Elias Merhiges
Shadow of the Vampire (2000). Walking the Wire: Culture Language Identity: 2nd
Annual Germanic and Slavic Studies Graduate Student Conference. 23 February, 2012.
University of Victoria. Victoria, B. C. PDF file.

Twilight. Catherine Hardwicke.Perf. Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson. DVD. Summit

Entertainment, 2008