Stephen King on Twilight vs. Harry Potter
“Harry Potter is about confronting fears, finding inner strength and doing what is right in the face of adversity. Twilight is about how important it is to have a boyfriend.”
– Stephen King
Agree? Or disagree?
I don’t think it’s fair to compare these two. They are two different kinds of series, targeted to the same people. I don’t know why Twilight gets such a bad rap, actually. There are a lot of vampire books out there that are a lot worse. At least Myer’s tried to be original with the whole vampire sparkling in the sun thing.
(Now, I am in no way saying I enjoy or like twilight. I think it’s absolutely terrible.) I’m just saying that comparing the two of them, isn’t really fair. The only thing they have in common is their target audience.
Agreed.
I don’t think it’s a fair comparison- they are not the same genre. Twilight does not pretend not to be a romance. It is a romance novel- so what? So is Pride & Prejudice, so is Wuthering Heights.
If you’re going to comment on the quality of books, fine, but it’s not fair to comment on the themes when the themes of the two series are so obviously different.
While I understand that you disagree with compairing these two due to the differences in plot and the differences in what the author was attempting to write, I still don’t believe comparing Twilight to a good romance novel is going to improve the outcome. You’d have to compare Twilight with it’s likeness in crappy romances instead, not Pride and Prejudice or Wurthering Heights, those novels will eat Twilight for breakfast simply because they have character development through the novels as the main characters.
I’ll admit I never read all of Twilight, just the first book, but through that book, I did not see much development in the main female’s character at all. Her main revelation was that Edward was a vampire. It wasn’t anything dramatic, like figuring out people portray themselves differently according to their standings and a development of feelings throughout the novel. I can’t speak for Wurthering Heights either, but in comparing Jane Eyre to Twilight, again, Jane Eyre is about overcoming hardships by remaining true to yourself. Twilight is about being a victimized masochist.
I guess when I think about it, I really can’t agree, but this made me laugh all the same.
I think that Twilight is deeply underestimated. Like it was said before, the two are different types of books. Its normal to like one book type and not like the other. But also think that twilight is about a lot more that have a boyfriend. Its about deciding things under pressure, its about sacrifice, and it’s about doing what’s best for the one you love. I think that people try and find thins to hate about the series, like how the vampire sparkle in the sunlight, but to read a book, it is necessary to have a suspension of disbelief.
But don’t get me wrong.. I LOOOOVVVVVEEEEEE Harry Potter!!
oops! sorry about the spelling errors!!
Honestly I agree that Twilight goes a bit overboard with focusing on just the romance, but Harry Potter does have it’s fair share of that too, it just has more elements to it that make it slightly less simplistic. I must say I’m a little unhappy at Twilight for starting the vampire (then werewolf, and we’re on angle now?) trend. Twilight has the fantasy elements along with the elements of romance, and lots of it.
Harry Potter has friendship, inner self conflict, love interests, and also some intellectual conflicts. Personally I preferred Harry Potter, but every now and then I’ll remember the decent parts of Twilight, and I just love the fact that he sparkles. He can kill me? So what, I don’t sparkle in the sun XD Kind of ruined his awesomeness, but at least I got a good laugh.
I honestly can’t believe you guys are defending Twilight. I personally think King should have thrown in some more insults here. These books, and especially the movies, are setting women back several decades.
I have difficulties thinking up a worse role model than the main character of this series. And Meyers’ big contribution to the vampire genre was making them sparkle? That is horrible!
Maybe someone should write a generic zombie story….but in this story, the zombies play disco music when you rub them. Ooooh, original.
Never liked Harry Potter either, but that is just a personal opinion. Don’t like mixing magic and modern times. Love how it made so many people read though.
Sorry if I seem angry. Just pissed me off.
🙂