Bella Swan: A Bird Who Didn't Want to Know How to Fly

[majestamoniet]

Now that you're all stunned by my profound subject line...

A Character Analysis of Bella Swan

Another product from the Town Hall Meeting, this is a post where you can assert your opinion of the character Bella Swan and comment on her role in Twilight fanfiction.  If enough people participate, this post can act as a resource for writers in the future

Comments

[greeneyed_me]

I like Bella Swan:

I’m gonna say this even though it won’t be popular: I like Bella Swan. I do. I know a lot of J/Bers don’t, but honestly I find that I little bit ridiculous. If I didn’t like Bella, I wouldn’t care whether or not she made healthy decisions, I wouldn’t have read all four books in the series, I wouldn’t have started reading fanfiction where’s she’s the leading lady, and I wouldn’t have wanted her to be with Jacob, whom I adore. Yes, I know the popular counter-argument by heart: “I don’t really know why I want Jacob to be with Bella.I guess it’s because I want him to get what he wants and be happy.” But that just doesn’t cut it for me. If it did I would write about him falling in love with a nice, normal, loving OC. Maybe someone here will have a more convincing explanation to offer in regards to this logic.

I’m not saying the girl doesn’t have flaws. She does. Bucket loads. But so does every other character in the books (yes, including Jacob). And I have to add that I stopped liking Bella when BD came out, but because I don't like to acknowledge that book's existence, it works out. So all of the following is made in reference to PRE-BREAKING DAWN BELLA.

THIS. I completely agree with all of this.

I just get most of the Bella-bashing that goes on around the fandom. I mean I suppose I can understand where people are coming from...but to me this is BELLA'S story. No one else's. So why continue to read if you don't even like her character?

[greeneyed_me]

**just don't get

[majestamoniet]

I just get most of the Bella-bashing that goes on around the fandom.

I think some of it stems from the fact that Team Jacob can be sore losers (which I guess is better than being sore winners like Team Edward). There's a lot of anger towards Bella for not choosing Jacob, but I feel like that's a poor excuse for bashing her. She chose to spend her life with the man she loved the most. When it comes to making that kind of decision, it shouldn't base it off the desires of others. It's basically deciding her future. Plus, people were still hoping Bella would choose Jacob in Breaking Dawn before the book came out, so they must have at least liked her up to that point.

but to me this is BELLA'S story

Yes, and it's not Bella's fault that Smeyer decided to write in first person. Of course a character is going to come off self-centered when you're inside their head; it's THEIR thoughts. As each one of us goes about our business during the day, most of our thoughts are in fact about ourselves. That's just common sense. We think about our feelings, our plans, our likes, and our dislikes and no one consciously censors their thoughts to center more around others. I understand that you can point at some of Bella's actions/decisions and call them selfish, but complaining that she is whiny and self-obsessed based solely on what crosses her mind is ridiculous. If you could record people's thoughts and play them back at them at the end of the day, I think most people would be shocked by just how "selfish" they sound.

[greeneyed_me]

Indeed. I would hate to see what the inside of my own mind looked like, displayed in book form. :shudders:

And you are right about the sore losers issue. We all know she should've picked Jacob...it's what the sane woman would have done. It feels almost personal on a level with Twilight fans, I believe. As if Team Edward is purposefully shoving their 'win' in our face or Team Jacob fans purposefully trashing Bella and more often Edward because of our pride being hurt.

As Jane would say 'This one brings out great emotion from in kind,' talking about Stephanie Meyer, of course.

It also strikes me as odd that most fans are Team 'Whatever Guy' or 'Switzerland'.

How about Team 'Move Bella The Hell Away From Forks So She Can Grow Up & Get Some Post High-School Education'?? And then maybe down the road...she can come back and make pretty babies with Jacob. :D

[audreyii_fic]

I suppose the sore loser thing is possible, but I have to ask a question -- have you guys had much experience with real life Bellas? I have, and I admit, it colors my feelings on the matter. I don't like people who try to have their cake and eat it too, all the while lying to themselves and others that the real reason they're stringing people along is because they "can't bear to hurt anyone." It's an awful thing to do to people. That's why I'm done with Bella in Eclipse. She flits back and forth between Edward and Jacob, torturing them both, causing Edward to doubt and Jacob to have hope -- all the while knowing who she's going to choose! As the readers, we're supposed to believe it's because she's selflessly trying not to break anyone's heart, when it's nothing but the most wretched cowardice.

I know I'm speaking harshly -- and probably offending both of you. But I've nursed a lot of people through a lot of Bellas, and it has left me with absolutely no patience for them.

[likexaxdove]

I completely agree. I have a few friends and a brother who have been fucked over by Bellas. It sucks :/

[maria_madalena]

And all this because, in my point of view, she's a contradictory character. I think, in Bella case, she really believes in her own excuse: she cant't bear to hurt anyone. And the truthful point is that she is insecure - derivative from her low, low self-esteem - and can't keep up her own opinion, without run in circles for quite a while. And, then, she hurts the people in that way. And thaht's sucks!

[majestamoniet]

Well, the truth is, none of us can really know Bella's motives beyond what she tells us. And then who knows how reliable she is as a narrator?

I'm assuming that when you talk about stringing along, that you're referring to Bella's behavior towards Jacob. I agree that Bella clung onto her relationship with Jacob much longer than she should have, but, to me, Jacob was just as reluctant to let go. I honestly believe, from what we saw of her behavior and internal monologue during Eclipse, that she wasn't trying to encourage a romantic relationship with him. Maybe I'm being naive by thinking she just wanted to keep her best friend, maybe not. But as soon as she did realize the extent of her feelings for Jacob (just before the battle with Victoria) she came to him and explained that she couldn't give him what she wanted (while he was healing).

I'm of the thought that Jacob and Bella share the blame for the hurt that transpired between them.

And, no, I wasn't offended. :)

[audreyii_fic]

I honestly believe, from what we saw of her behavior and internal monologue during Eclipse, that she wasn't trying to encourage a romantic relationship with him. Maybe I'm being naive by thinking she just wanted to keep her best friend, maybe not.

I agree that she was not actively trying to encourage a romantic relationship with him -- but she was feeding off his desire for one. She knew how he felt; Jacob was always extremely open and up front with her about his feelings. She used those feelings to make herself feel better.

If a guy is in love with you -- especially if he's been open about it -- and you know you won't be returning those affections, you explain things to him and you set up boundaries. The best thing to do is just rip the bandaid off and stop seeing him entirely, but at minimum, you stop engaging in physical affection and you scale back the intimacy in a huge way. If you don't do these things, you're selfishly using his hope to serve your own needs, to his detriment. This is Relationship 101. If Bella were fifteen, perhaps, I'd give her a slide on this. By eighteen-and-a-half, there is no excuse for not understanding this. (And, besides, her internal monologue makes it clear that she pretty much does understand what she's doing, and she's doing it anyway. The fact that she's eighteen and doing this to a sixteen year old makes it even more egregious.)

I do give Bella a pass on her shameless usage of Jacob's affections in New Moon because she hasn't, at that time, settled against a relationship with him. In fact, she actively contemplates it for much of the book. Her worries are centered on whether she's capable of being with him, given how seriously fucked up she is. Those sorts of questions are more like Relationship 328. Her usage, while self-centered, isn't cruel because she honestly doesn't know how it's going to turn out. That's not the case in Eclipse.

And trust me, I'm not letting Jacob off the hook. I'm disgusted with everyone in Eclipse. For you, Breaking Dawn doesn't exist; for me, things stop right before Alice shows up in New Moon.

[majestamoniet]

Those sorts of questions are more like Relationship 328.

Lol. It makes my head spin. And, maybe I shouldn't do this, but of a lot of Bella's relationship flounderings I chalk up to Smeyer's complete inability to deal with the concepts AT ALL. I think Bella's character got out of her hands, and she spent all of Breaking Dawn trying to real her back in with awful plot devices. *shakes head*

It really is sad how that series went down the drain.

[audreyii_fic]

Which brings us back to liking Bella's potential, rather than liking Bella as-is. In capable hands (fanfic), she's got value.

[maria_madalena]

They share the blame; that's true. Bella, to running in circles, and Jacob, to believe in what he wanted to.

[caramia_darling]

At the end of the day, it comes down to this: Bella is a CHARACTER being essentially driven by Meyer. Perhaps the ire/frustration/whatever towards Bella Swan is actually transference to Meyer, not only as an 'author' (and I'm one of those who use that word to describe her veeerrryyy loosely) but as a person because many of us can't understand why she would have made Bella make the choices she made - or maybe I'm guilty of this transference myself.

I honestly don't think Meyer expected TS to become this BEHEMOTH that it did. Colour me cynical but I think visions of a seven-figure bank-statement was the main motivation for continuing and, like you said - it (Bella and EVERYONE's character) got out of hand. I for one cannot imagine that Meyer thought Jake and the Wolfpack would have gotten the attention it did, least of all that it would split the fandom into essentially two factions and, for the sake of the fans, Bella might actually have to make a decision between two very different men.