Eclipse- Dedication, Pre-Preface and Preface

Here we go. Are you ready? Am I ready? Only one way to find out.

To my husband, Pancho, for your patience, love, friendship, humor and

willingness to eat out

So, Pancho, does this dedication make up for the fact that your wife has turned her wet dreams and romantic frustration into a multi-million dollar book deal?

And also to my children, Gabe, Seth and Eli, for letting me experience the

kind of live that people freely die for.

Okay, this is kinda sweet. But on a side note, in Breaking Dawn did anyone else get the feeling that Renesmee was created out of a desire for a perfect child who didn’t need any parenting at all and could be handed off to a sitter while she could live like she had no responsibilities at all? And note that Bella’s baby is a girl and Meyer only has sons.

Now Meyer prefaces the preface with a poem by Robert Frost that is mind numbingly unsuitable for this book.

Fire and Ice

Some say the world will end in fire,

Some say in ice.

From what I’ve tasted of Desire

I hold with those who favor fire.

But if I had to perish twice,

I think I know enough of hate

To say that for destruction ice

Is also great

And would suffice

Now, I actually happen to love this poem. I first read it in ninth grade, during my English final. We were all given this poem and another (A Dream Deferred by Langston Hughes, another favorite) without ever having seen them before and were told to analyze them. Even though I was 15 and this was my first year having an English class that required me to learn this type of analyzing, I still feel that I, with only having about fifteen minutes to prepare that essay, kicked ass, as evidenced by the A I got from my notoriously difficult English teacher. In any case, I’m pretty sure that even then I had a better grasp on the intent of this poem than Meyer ever did.

Let’s take this poem apart, shall we? We’ll start on a superficial level, trying to figure out why Meyer chose this poem. I have two theories:

My first theory gives Meyer more credit than she might deserve, but I supposed one could argue that because the poem is about destruction, i.e.: death. Now, we know by now that Bella wants to die, or at least die and be reincarnated as a sparkly vampire. So perhaps this is talking about the process of death. In the first book we see when James bites Bella that the pain of becoming a vampire is akin to burning up. Thus Frost’s first choice of death in fire. And obviously, after that she becomes a vampire and she turns into ice. This however seems unlikely as it is rather hard to extrapolate from the poem before you read Breaking Dawn and even harder before you read Eclipse. Also because there seems to be a more obvious analysis of how this poem relates to this series.

This brings me to my second and more favored theory. Meyer saw a poem about a conflict between fire and ice which a metaphor she’s been using for Jacob and Edward respectively for the entire. She decided that this was perfect for describing Bella’s dilemma of which handsome, perfect boy she will chose- even if anyone with IQ points in the double digits would know which one she’d chose. This use is unbelievably stupid and downright illogical. In fact, it begs the question of if Meyer actually read any of the poem past the second line.

For starters, there’s the whole Edward=Ice and Jacob=Fire thing. Let’s look at the third and fourth line of the poem “From what I’ve tasted of desire/I hold with those who favor fire.” Which seems to imply Frost prefers the fire to the ice, doesn’t it? Actually, it doesn’t really imply that, it flat out says it, nay yells it from the rooftops. Frost merely says ice would “suffice,” meaning if the whole fire thing didn’t work out then he guesses ice could work too. So in this analysis, Jacob is Bella’s first choice and Edward is her back up plan. And as I said earlier, any one with the mental capacity above that of a fetus should know that there ain’t no way in hell that Bella is going to choose Jacob over Edward. Please.

Then we have Frost’s own metaphors for what ice and fire are. Read the two lines quoted above again. Fire a metaphor for desire. Now, there are many interpretations of what that desire means, which I’ll get to shortly. But clearly, if we follow the metaphor of fire standing in for Jacob, Jacob is desire. Now, this one actually holds up very well. Jacob has always been very passionate. While Edward is chaste, refusing to kiss Bella open mouthed or have premarital sex, Jacob clearly wants Bella on a carnal level. Later on in the tent scene we’ll see that he fantasizes about doing dirty things to her. And we’ve also got that whole assault thing. So, kudos Meyer, your metaphor works. Sorta. But not really.

But if we follow that analysis to the second half of the poem well, it all falls apart. Frost says “I think I know enough of hate/To say that for destruction ice/Is also great/And would suffice.” Yeah…now we have Edward being equated to hate. Now, I know for antis this is a very reasonable comparison. But since Meyer portrays Edward as the perfect man, the love of Bella’s life, comparing him to hatred might not have be the best move.

And then we have the most glaring issue: FROST IS TALKING ABOUT DESTRUCTION!!! Read the first freaking line Meyer “Some say the world will end in fire.” Yeah, we’re not talking about love here; this is about the freaking apocalypse. Now, I have my own theories for what fire and ice represent in the actual poem and obviously, this is up for debate so feel free to tell me how wrong I am in the comments.

Fire represents desire, we’ve already established that. My feelings toward this are that Frost was not speaking of only sexual desire here. When it comes to passion there are so many more facets to desire than sexual cravings. To me this line speaks of thoughtless acts, people following their hearts rather than their heads, chasing their impulses and whims without any thought to the consequences. Now, again, this is a rather good metaphor for Bella in Eclipse because of her cavalier attitude of abandoning her friends, family and entire life in favor of an eternity with Edward. But since Meyer clearly doesn’t feel this is a stupid choice, as evidenced in Breaking Dawn when the consequences magically disappear and Bella gets everything she ever wanted tied up in a sparkly bow, this probably isn’t what Stephiepoo was going for.

So what is ice? I feel that ice is cold calculation, hatred yes, but it’s not just hatred of a person or a thing. It seems to speak to me of a deeper hatred, a hatred towards mankind in general, a hatred of passion and love. I think that Frost was saying that while he feels the end of the world, or at least the downfall of civilization, will most likely be caused by crimes of passion. But he knows that when it comes to the chess masters, the guys who stay far away from the action and manipulate every move, make plans with clear heads and no hearts, Frost knows that these guys have the capability to topple civilization as well. And, as with the fire, this is again a good metaphor for Edward from a analytical stand point, but we know from the books that Meyer doesn’t see it that way.

Whew, that was intense. Okay, two pages down, way too many to go.

Now for the preface, or as I like to call it, Spoiler Alert! And here is where the sporking begins in earnest.

All our attempts at subterfuge had been in vain.

Somehow, this doesn’t seem very surprising. It must be because the characters in these series are incapable of making a smart plan. In Twilight for instance it was, “let’s go to the place we say we’ll go, it’s the last place James will look!” One issue with that- the fact that James could easily figure that out. And once he did he knew exactly where you were. If instead of saying you were going to Phoenix and going to Phoenix, you said you were going to Phoenix and went to Milwaukee, if he figured out you were lying all he’d know was that you weren’t in Phoenix, without having any clue if you were in Milwaukee or New York City or Paris. Idiots.

With ice in my heart,

Ouch

I watched him prepare to defend me. His intense concentration betrayed no

hint of doubt, though he was outnumbered. I knew that we could expect no help

—at this moment his family was fighting for their lives just as surely as he

was for ours.

These ambiguous pronouns are so confusing! I have no idea who she’s talking about! I’m at the edge of my seat here, tell me Stephiepoo, is it Edward saving Bella or is it Edward saving Bella?

Would I ever learn the outcome of that other fight? Find out who the winners

and the losers were?

Would we? And more importantly, when it comes will we actually have cause to doubt that the good guys win?

Would I live long enough for that?

I wonder, does Meyer actually have the balls to kill off her self-insert protagonist? Let’s think that one over for a bit… And furthermore, does she have the talent to form actual believable conflict?

The odds of that didn’t look so great.

Clearly you haven’t been paying attention.

Black eyes, wild with their fierce craving for my death, watched for the

moment when my protector’s attention would be diverted.

Wait, why are Victoria’s eyes black? Shouldn’t they be red from her people eating?

Somewhere, far, far away in the cold forest, a wolf howled.

And on that clichéd as all hell note, I leave you.