Edward Cullen (né Edward Anthony Masen, Jr.) is a character in the Twilight book series by Stephenie Meyer. He is featured in the novels Twilight, New Moon, Eclipse and Breaking Dawn, and their corresponding film adaptations, and the novel Midnight Sun—a re-telling of the events of Twilight from Edward's perspective. Edward is a telepathic vampire who, over the course of the series, falls in love with, marries, and fathers a child with Bella Swan, a human teenager who later chooses to become a vampire as well. In the films, Edward is played by actor Robert Pattinson. Concept and creation Stephenie Meyer stated that the original concept of Edward originated in a dream that she had, in which an "average girl" and a "fantastically beautiful, sparkly ... vampire ... were having an intense conversation in a meadow in the woods". In this dream, the pair "were discussing the difficulties inherent in the facts that ... they were falling in love with each other while ... the vampire was particularly attracted to the scent of her blood, and was having a difficult time restraining himself from killing her". She chose the name "Edward" because she thought it was "a name that had once been considered romantic, but had fallen out of popularity for decades". Meyer says that Edward is a combination of her three favorite leading men—Jane Eyres Edward Rochester, Fitzwilliam Darcy from Pride and Prejudice, and Gilbert Blythe from Anne of Green Gables—particularly Edward Rochester, who, like Edward Cullen, sees himself as a "monster". A recurring theme in the series, especially in the first three books, is that Edward is constantly trying to avoid accidentally harming Bella, due to his vampire nature. Appearances Twilight In Twilight, Edward meets Bella Swan, a 17-year-old outcast whose thoughts he is unable to read, and whose blood smells overwhelmingly sweet to him. Edward builds a growing attraction to Bella, but after saving her life on several occasions, he succumbs and eventually falls in love with her. Edward admits to Bella that he is a vampire, and that although he retains the physical body of a seventeen-year-old, he was actually born on June 20, 1901. His adoptive father, Carlisle Cullen, transformed him into a vampire in 1918 to prevent him from dying in the Spanish influenza epidemic in Chicago, Illinois by the request of Edward's mother, who begged him to do whatever it took to save