A Visitor's Guide to Mystic Falls - By Red Page 0,60
together as Elena confessed: I got home tonight, planning on doing what I always do: write my diary, like I have been since my mom gave me one when I was ten. Where I get everything out, everything I’m feeling. It all goes in this little book that I hide on the second shelf behind this really hideous ceramic mermaid.
And then I realized that I’d just be writing things that I should probably be telling you. (“Night of the Comet,” 1-2) It was at this point that Elena proceeded to tell Stefan what she would’ve written in her journal about how she was feeling about him: her hopes and fears. Mostly fears. Stefan quickly countered with what he would write about his feelings, having met her. (Elena’s version of what she’d write 6882 Visitor's Guide to Mystic Falls[FIN].indd 167
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down was long and angst-filled. Stefan’s? Rather surprisingly, not so much: “I met a girl. We talked. It was epic.”) It was truly a game-changing conversation, and not only because it ended with their first kiss; here were two damaged and guarded individuals, coming together and opening themselves up to each other for the very first time.
They were both admitting that writing in a diary can sometimes—not always, but sometimes—be a safe way of expressing the things that we’re too afraid to voice. Really voice. As in, out loud. And putting those words down on paper is an alternative that appeals to the romantic poet hidden in the heart and soul of many a fictional character.
The characters of The Vampire Diaries are no exception.
The Gilberts, we learn, are a family of writers, not least of whom is Johnathan Gilbert, the Civil War ancestor whose journal everyone wanted to get their hands on by the middle of the season. Jeremy Gilbert was the first person to find it (thanks to Aunt Jenna), and after reading it he lent it to Alaric Saltzman. Anna stole the journal from Alaric. Stefan and Elena got a photocopy of it from Alaric. Damon took it from Anna. Really, it’s a very popular diary, and its appearance marked a change in the way the “diaries” element of The Vampire Diaries was presented. We saw far less of Elena and Stefan scribbling furtively in their journals and a lot more running around searching for an actual artifact. The secret life of diary writers had been uncovered and brought out into the open, which perfectly mirrored the uncovering of truths between the show’s main characters—especially our star-crossed lovers.
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Finding diaries and unearthing their secrets is another storytelling device used to great effect in The Vampire Diaries.
Just as young wizard Harry in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets finds himself in the possession of Tom Riddle’s diary, so young Jeremy Gilbert discovered his ancestor’s journal—with consequences that reverberated throughout the rest of the first season. Jeremy, like Harry, is “in training” for something, maybe even for something greater than he fully realizes. Until he fell for Anna, he seemed destined to take up the vampire-hunting mantle, just like his uncle and the other members of the town’s Founding Families had before him.
It was Alaric, aware of Jeremy’s family history, who gave Jeremy an extra-credit assignment, a paper on the history of Mystic Falls, that lead to his discovery (“History Repeating,”
1-9). Jeremy rummaged through the box of Gilbert heirlooms and found a journal that dated back to 1864—the year that Stefan and Damon were turned into vampires. When he read from Johnathan Gilbert’s journal, the viewer was introduced to a new kind of voice-over, one that often led into flashbacks that presented the viewer with a crucial glimpse into the history of the Salvatore brothers: I live in fear. It consumes me. In the early evening, when I see the sun begin to fade, the fear comes because I know that the night brings death. (“The Turning Point,” 1-10) In fact, we later learned that all of the Founding Families kept journals so that they could be passed down through their family line in order to help keep Mystic Falls safe from the 6882 Visitor's Guide to Mystic Falls[FIN].indd 169
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