Creating the myth

In the Twilight (Meyer, Stephenie) saga Bella Swan is the hero. The Volturi and Edwards’s reluctance to change her into a vampire are the obstacles that she must overcome. In Twilight Bella Swan comes to Forks to spend time with her dad while her mom travels with her stepfather. There she meets Edward who she finds to be mysterious. She falls in love with him, and him with her, however he warns her that she should stay away from him for safety. When she finds out that he is a vampire she decides that she wants to spend forever with him. She wants him to change her into a vampire so that she can spend forever with him, but he is reluctant to change her into a vampire. Edwards’s dad Carlsile informs Bella what it’s like to be a vampire and guides her. Esme who is Edwards’s mom is a loving maternal figure in Bella’s life especially in the last book. The Cullen’s and Bella play baseball and while playing encounter three bad vamps (nomads) that smell Bellas' blood. The Cullen’s protect Bella and kill one of the three vamps. The bad vamp that they kill is the mate to one of the other of the two vamps, Victoria essentially vows revenge for her fallen mate. Later on Edward leaves Bella out of concern for her safety. She breaks down and finds comfort in a childhood friend named Jacob whom she finds out is a werewolf. As Bella falls somewhat in love with Jacob she learns that Edward believes her to be dead. Because Edward believes her to be dead he goes to Italy to have the Volturi (who are essentially royalty vamps) kill him. She goes to Italy to confront Edward and to tell him that she isn’t dead. While she is in Italy the Voultri find out that she knows about vampires yet hasn’t been killed or changed. They give the Cullen’s the choice of either changing or killing her. The Cullen’s opt to change her later. After the Cullen’s leave Italy and return to Forks, Edward tells Bella that he is still reluctant to change her however he is willing to change her if she will marry him. Jacob still loves Bella and tries to convince her that she can stay with him and not have to change. She says yes to Edward and they get married. After they get married they go on a honey moon and Bella gets pregnant. Bella’s baby isn’t fully human and it almost kills her. While having the baby she almost dies. To save Bella Edward injects her with his vampire venom and changes her into a vampire. The Volturi find out about the half vampire-half human. The Volturi are afraid of the half vamp-half human and they wage a war over its life. Edward and Bella live happily ever after.

In the Twilight (Meyer) saga there are many myths and archetypes. Victoria, the other nomads, and the Volturi are the “shadow figures” (Signs of Life, Seger, Linda p.362). They are the ones that either want Bella dead or want her changed to be a vampire for their own reasons. Carlsile, Edwards’s dad would be the “wise old man” (Signs p.362). He is a doctor and helps Bella. Esme who is Edwards’s mom would be the “good mother” (Signs p.362) because she loves and protects Bella. Bella and Edward are the heroes of the story. They are the main characters.

The author describes several myths, the hero myth, the combination myth, and the healing myth. The differences are the path that the hero takes, the reason the hero takes the path and the outcome. All myth story plot lines have an up and a down to the stories’ plot. The plot changes as the story goes on. Things happen to the heroes and their lives change. The Twilight saga was written by Stephenie Meyer. The words used to describe the archetypes are from Linda Seger’s “Creating the Myth”. (Signs of Life p.356-364) Linda’s examples were from Star Wars (Lucas, George) and my examples were from Twilight (Meyer, Stephenie).