Monday, 6 January 2014
Is it just me...
Is it just me, or does anyone
else scoff and chuckle placatingly at a book when fictional male
characters say something in text that a guy in real life would never say. Ever.
I don't know if it is just my sore track record of relationships, or if im seriously
lacking in the imagination department (false), because when I read a male
character say to his female counterpart something like -
As you were sleeping, you said my name. You
spoke so clearly, at first I thought you'd woken. But you rolled over
restlessly and mumbled my name once more, and sighed. The feeling that coursed
through me then was unnerving, staggering. And I knew I couldn't ignore you any
longer.
- I hardly find it romantic or poetic or charming.
Really? First of
all, I have never heard any guy that I know say out loud the words
"staggering, and unnerving" in the same sentence in real life. And
those two words alone aren't' even that bad. Its the context in which they
are being said that truly invokes hilarity. If someone told me that they a.
watched me while I slept, and/or b. fell in love with my sleep-talking, I would
either be running for the hills or staring open mouth and gaping like a fish
while contemplating methods of escape.
rant over.
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This is the truest thing I have ever read about men in books.
ReplyDeleteLike, seriously when is it ever cute to sleep talk let alone have a guy fall in love with you for it.
Although I agree that this is generally true, that what boy characters say is never what someone would actually say in real life, I think this particular case is different.
ReplyDeleteHe isn't supposed to sound like a normal guy, thats the whole point. He is from another time period, so most often he says things that seem to precede our current prose. Also, his character isn't even a normal human nor anything close to a teenage boy, and its things like this that make him stand out from the norm. Also, when he says weird ass shit like this, I feel like it helps build his character in my head and lets me know what's going on in his mind. This is how I see it:
a) he's been so lonely his whole life, has absolutely no experience and now he just sounds ridiculous when he tries, and
b) since he can hear everyones thoughts, he really isn't that good at conversing as a general skill ... not really in his tool belt so what he says sounds odd
Also, when I read this I got the impression that she was trying to even further emphasize whats going on in Bellas head too, cause I thought the whole book was built along the same premise: "this man is a dangerous monster, I should be running and screaming but I think instead I'll stay right here and put your creepiness in the pros column" If you took out the words "dangerous monster" and replaced them with "freaky peeping tom stalker" it would still apply. I think she was going for a 'true love beats all else' type thing, but it just didn't really work.
Do not think that I'm defending this passage because I think this is a cute romantic moment. I think its stupid and ridiculous and if someone said that to me that douche would be lying on the ground k.o.'ed.
procrastination successfully completed lol
The real reason I happened to use this quote from Twilight is because I knew that Stephenie would play the role of the victim quite well. While you are 100% correct about the roles Edward and Bella portray in this exchange, this is actually a flaw that I notice in almost every book I read. I recently finished a book which was terrible in this aspect and it was that which this post was inspired. While I didn't want to read the whole book over again to find the really bad passages, it was easier to Google 'creepy twilight quotes' and go from there.
ReplyDelete:) hehe i love that thats a valid google search, probably gets a billion hits
ReplyDelete