Very nice analysis. Bella and Edward are both jerks--but in different ways, and since Edward is a stalker who likes to watch her while she sleeps he's probably the worse one. Although oddly enough that is not one of the things that Bella whines about in her narrative of bleak, boring, depression.
It's not necessarily bad that Bella obviously has some kind of sexual desire for Edward and appreciation of pretty men, but she would sound just as shallow if she were a male narrator, with only a slim veneer of her pretended interest in literature.
Edwina was beautiful like a Renaissance angel, like an underwear model, like a Playboy bunny, in spite of the way that these three things are not very similar. Not that I know what a Playboy bunny looks like, because I am Virtuous. Edwina's eyes were topaz sapphires melted in amber and glittered golden in the light; her skin was pale and the fairest of all and therefore the most beautiful by all clearly non-racist standards. She had perfect high raised cheekbones and deepset eyes and a long protruding nose. Her bosom was like a white flock of goats. Please note that the allusion to literature means I am very deep and intelligent. Her toenails were flawlessly shaped like pale pink shells on her bare feet, the free margin of the nails curving delicately inward like seafoam crashing over white sand, even her lunulas at the base of the toenails perfectly white and pristinely curved...
(I think I just gave Bob a bit of a foot fetish there.) The shallow self-centred whine makes it bad, and the girl whose entire life is centred around her boyfriend makes it awful.
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It's not necessarily bad that Bella obviously has some kind of sexual desire for Edward and appreciation of pretty men, but she would sound just as shallow if she were a male narrator, with only a slim veneer of her pretended interest in literature.
Edwina was beautiful like a Renaissance angel, like an underwear model, like a Playboy bunny, in spite of the way that these three things are not very similar. Not that I know what a Playboy bunny looks like, because I am Virtuous. Edwina's eyes were topaz sapphires melted in amber and glittered golden in the light; her skin was pale and the fairest of all and therefore the most beautiful by all clearly non-racist standards. She had perfect high raised cheekbones and deepset eyes and a long protruding nose. Her bosom was like a white flock of goats. Please note that the allusion to literature means I am very deep and intelligent. Her toenails were flawlessly shaped like pale pink shells on her bare feet, the free margin of the nails curving delicately inward like seafoam crashing over white sand, even her lunulas at the base of the toenails perfectly white and pristinely curved...
(I think I just gave Bob a bit of a foot fetish there.) The shallow self-centred whine makes it bad, and the girl whose entire life is centred around her boyfriend makes it awful.