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Bella SwanBella Swan is the central character in Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight books. During the four-novel series, she transforms utterly - from a clumsy insecure teenager to a fierce and gifted vampire.
 Kirsten Stewart as Bella Swan in the 2008 movie Twilight
Bella’s real name is Isabella but she prefers to go by Bella. She enters the series as a 17-year-old girl from Phoenix, Arizona, who has just moved to the small town of Forks, Washington,
to live with her dad. Shy and insecure, she is dreading her first day
at school and all the attention she’s bound to receive as the resident ‘new girl’.
Most teenage girls are interested in boys and fashion. But Bella Swan is not your typical teen.
She takes little interest in the gossip and trivialities that preoccupy
her friends. She doesn’t care about being popular or having a social
life and has to force herself to hang out with her (non-vampire)
friends. Preferring her own company (or ideally that of her vampire boyfriend),
Bella Swan is quite content to sit in her garden reading a romance novel.
Bella has little interest in music or movies and has few hobbies. She is clumsy and uncoordinated,
which makes her really bad at sport, and is always falling over and
hurting herself. She has absolutely no interest in her appearance. She
hardly ever wears make-up, pays little interest to her hair and prefers
wearing loose comfortable clothes to anything high fashion.
Bella Swan is definitely not the materialistic type.
She can have anything she wants and yet she wants nothing – nothing
that is, except for her vampire boyfriend Edward. She could care less
about the luxurious life Edward can offer her. She refuses to let him
buy her expensive gifts or
to replace her banged up old truck with one of his slinky fast cars (at
least until after she’s become a vampire). In fact, she barely
tolerates him – or anyone - buying her anything at all.
Bella Swan is mature, selfless and compassionate.
She often puts the feelings and interests of others before her own. She
gives up her life with her mom in sunny Phoenix so that her mom can
spend time alone with her new husband. She hides her occasional fear
of Edward and his family (when their true vampire natures are revealed)
to spare their feelings. And time and again when she’s in danger of
being murdered by vampires, she risks her life to safe the ones she loves.
Even when Edward leaves her, Bella tries to suppress her heartbreak
to stop her father worrying about her. She copes with Edward’s absence
by living in a kind of lifeless limbo, going through the motions of
living while feeling dead inside. The only times she feels alive is
when her life is at risk, which is why she takes to doing crazying things (like riding a
motor-cycle and jumping off a cliff). At those times, she hears Edward’s
voice scolding her for her carelessness.
The
only thing that stops Bella Swan ending her life to escape her
grief at losing Edward is the pain it would cause her parents. However,
when she accidentally almost drowns, she feels relief and not distress at the prospect of death.
 Here are some of Bella’s other characteristics:
(Left: Kristen Stewart as Bella and Robert Pattinson as Edward in the 2008 Twilight movie)
Bella has low self-esteem
and can’t believe that anyone as remarkable as Edward would ever be
interested in her. She has no idea of her own appeal or beauty and how many guys want to be with her. She is easily embarrassed,
blushing often, and hates being the centre of attention. The only time
she acknowledges her beauty is on her wedding night, when Edward forces
her to look at her reflection in the glass wall of the Cullen house.
Bella has a strong conscience.
She feels guilty for wanting Jacob Black’s friendship when she knows
it’s painful for him (because he wants to be more than just friends).
She is also unconventionally open-minded. When she finds out that
Edward is a vampire and later, that Jacob has become a werewolf, she
pretty much takes it in her stride.
Bella Swan is stubborn.
She refuses to reconsider her decision to become a vampire so she and
Edward can spend eternity together. That's despite Edward’s objections, the
prospect of being unable to see her parents again and her own fears.
However, she’s also capable of compromise, which she demonstrates by agreeing to
marry Edward before becoming a vampire.
Bella has incredible strength and self-control.
She fights the urge to give into her exhaustion on a trip home from
Italy so that she won’t miss a second with Edward. She refuses to
allow Dr Cullen to abort her baby despite the agony she has to endure to carry it to full term. Even
when she’s transforming into a vampire - an agonizing process –
she resists the urge to cry out, as she knows how much that would upset
Edward.
It is this self-control that underlines Bella's vampire existence. As a human, Bella is clumsy and insecure. As a vampire she is elegant, coordinated and (knowingly) beautiful.
She also has astonishing self-control. Most new vampires are incapable
of resisting their desire for human blood. But Bella finds the strength
to fight it so that she can be around the humans that she loves, including her human father, Charlie, and her half-human daughter, Renesmee.
Edward Cullen can hear people’s thoughts, everyone’s that is except those of Bella Swan. The human Bella is impervious to certain vampire
attacks. The vampire Bella is able to extend this protection to other
vampires to protect them from attack too. She was never a gifted human
but she is an extraordinary vampire. As she acknowledges to herself, it’s as though Bella Swan was born to be a vampire!
Above all, it is Bella’s love for Edward and Renesmee
that makes her who she is. Bella almost dies giving birth but her love
of her daughter brings her back from the brink of death. And in the final chapters of Breaking Dawn, she draws
strength from her love for her family to shield them from attack from the Volturi
family.
Finding themselves outnumbered, the Volturi retreat, leaving Bella,
Edward and Renesmee to savour an eternity together.
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