Is Twilight about real vampires?

Real Vampires. No Thank you

Dear Twilight-lovers,

For today’s Tuesday Twilosophy, let me set the scene with a conversation I recently had with my husband:

Me: What movie are we watching?
Him: Interview with a Vampire since you’ve never seen it.
Me: No! I can’t! I didn’t finish the book
Him: You never will
Me: Well…. I don’t really like vampires….
Him: (gives me ‘the look.’ Let me define this look as one which says “are you f*cking kidding me? You’ve spent the last 7 months of OUR lives devoted to writing about them daily”)
Me: Well, I don’t like real vampires…

It’s true. I don’t. I never once read about a vampire or watched a movie with a vampire before Twilight. My only connection to the world of vampires before August of 2008 was Count Chocula cereal. And after Twilight was recommended to me and I bought the first book without knowing anything about it because I was desperate for a quick read for my beach vacation, I read those now infamous lines on the back of the cover:

About three things I was absolutely positive. First, Edward was a vampire.

And I stopped. “Vampire? What the hell was Jess thinking recommending this book to me?” And I continued:

Second, there was part of him — and I didn’t know how potent that part might be — that thirsted for my blood. And third, I was unconditionally and irrevocably in love with him.

Okay the last line peaked my interest a little bit. But not enough to overlook the vampire part. So what did I do? Yep- you got it- I read Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants book two instead.

Read on about how I don’t like Vampires after the jump

Fake, sexy vampire. Yes please

After growing extremely depressed over the realization that made-up girls in smelly, dirty old pants lead a more exotic, exciting life than I do, and I had nothing else to read, I gave in and read Twilight. And I fell in love with Edward. And then with Alice and finally with Harry Clearwater. (It was his fish fry that won my heart- I cannot resist a man with the ability to fry up his latest catch.) But I stand by what I said to my husband, I don’t like real vampires.

You cannot tell me that the sparkly Cullen family are real vamps. Again, I don’t have a lot of vampire knowledge since my only experience is with a chocolaty-delicious cereal, but I’ve heard and read enough to know what I believe. So this leads me to my next questions: Would we love Edward as much if he were a different mythical creature? What if he were an elf? Or a Hippogriff? Or a Unicorn? Or what if Edward was the werewolf and Jacob was the vampire? Would the story work in any other way?

And can real vampire fans actually like Twilight? I don’t mean fans of vampires like Bill Compton from True Blood/The Sookie Stackhouse series. To me, while he acts more on his evil ‘vampiristic’ qualities than Edward, he’s still just a mythical creature looking for a human lady to get freaky with. I mean fans of Vamps that kill without a second thought- tossing bodies out of the way and occasionally stopping to create a companion- Evil, sadistic creatures. People like them! And those people aren’t me.

So…Do you like vampires? Should the Cullen family be taken serious in the vampire-world? Do we only like Edward because he is a vampire? Would we like him as an elf? Or a, ugh, werewolf!? And is it blasphemous that I run a blog such as this but still confess that I don’t even like real vampires?

Hopeless addicted to fake vampires,
UnintendedChoice

See past Twilosophy entries here

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