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50 greatest villains in literature

Started by droog, September 23, 2008, 11:57:08 PM

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droog

September 23, 2008, 11:57:08 PM


Quote from: The TelegraphOur critics' choice of the 50 foulest fiends in literature

Compiling a list of the 50 Greatest Villains in Literature, without too much recourse to comics and children's books, proved trickier than we'd imagined - but gosh it was fun.

It's perhaps the nature of grown-up literature that it doesn't all that often have villains, in the sense of coal-black embodiments of the principle of evil. And even when it does, it's not always so easy to tell who they are. Is God the baddie, or Satan? Ahab, or the white whale?

Yet even writers as subtle as Vladimir Nabokov have spiced their work with a fiend or two. And here they are. We hope you'll furnish a few more we missed.

These are the best of the worst: bloodsuckers, pederasts, cannibals, Old Etonians...the dastardliest dastards ever to have lashed damsel to track and waited for a through train.

"Who's bad?" Michael Jackson asked. "They are," we can at last, with confidence, reply.
The past lives on in your front room
The poor still weak the rich still rule
History lives in the books at home
The books at home

Gang of Four
[/size]

jhkim

#1
September 24, 2008, 02:30:18 AM
If you're like me and just want to skip to the end...

10 Vindice from The Revenger's Tragedy, by Thomas Middleton

9 Mr Kurtz from Heart of Darkness, by Joseph Conrad

8 Claudius from Hamlet, by William Shakespeare

7 Ambrosio from The Monk, by M G Lewis

6 Robert Lovelace from Clarissa, by Samuel Richardson

5 Voldemort from the Harry Potter series by JK Rowling

4 Iago from Othello, by William Shakespeare

3 Cruella de Vil from The Hundred and One Dalmatians, by Dodie Smith

2 Samuel Whiskers from The Tale of Samuel Whiskers, by Beatrix Potter

1 Satan from Paradie Lost, by John Milton


I'm a bit dumbfounded by some of these.  Voldemort?  Cruella de Vil?

droog

#2
September 24, 2008, 02:48:51 AM
What sort of monster wants to make fur coats out of Dalmatian puppies?

I don't really know from Harry Potter.
The past lives on in your front room
The poor still weak the rich still rule
History lives in the books at home
The books at home

Gang of Four
[/size]

David R

#3
September 24, 2008, 06:47:42 AM
They should do a longer list and include :

Lady Macbeth ? - Glamis thou art, and Cawdor, and shalt be
What thou art promis'd.
Yet do I fear thy nature,
It is too full o' th' milk of human kindness
To catch the nearest way.

Norman Bates - Psycho

Bill Sykes - Oliver Twist

Marquise de Merteuil & Vicomte de Valmont - Les Liaisons dangereuses

And I'm sure the Pundit approves of this entry:

Quote40 Captain Hook from Peter and Wendy, by J M Barrie

Captain James Hook's reputation suffers from selective emphasis, since although he was an old Etonian and was never happier than when plunging his hook into people, he also has a gentle side. He could play the flute and the harpsichord (it does not matter how), loved Wordsworth and Coleridge, and was a stickler for form. And, come on, Peter Pan is a little swine, isn't he?

Regards,
David R

arminius

#4
September 24, 2008, 09:50:04 AM
What was villainous about Kurtz? I don't remember him even being as fleshed out as the movie version by Brando.

droog

#5
September 24, 2008, 10:13:41 AM
I quote:

QuoteIn Europe, he is an organist and scholar with a charming fiancée; but in Africa, Mistah Kurtz prefers genocide and surrounding himself with impaled heads. In the ivory trade, this kind of behaviour used to be called unsound; even today's ivory smugglers might think it inappropriate.

The horror....
The past lives on in your front room
The poor still weak the rich still rule
History lives in the books at home
The books at home

Gang of Four
[/size]

Demonoid

#6
September 24, 2008, 05:39:48 PM
Oh, come on, guys! Hannibal Lecter has to be in the top 10!

arminius

#7
September 24, 2008, 11:45:37 PM
Quote from: droog;250807I quote:
The horror....

I remember thinking the guy was pathetic and/or crazy--"gone native" to the extreme, swept up in "savagery", not really villainous. Then again, I guess I don't remember the book very well...

Vaecrius

#8
September 25, 2008, 02:58:19 AM
Quote from: Elliot Wilen;250802What was villainous about Kurtz? I don't remember him even being as fleshed out as the movie version by Brando.
Nothin', he was just batshit crazy, in the book or in the movie.

And given they included Lolita but the character listed was anyone but Humbert himself, I openly question the panel's reading skills.

Also fail for lack of Miss Havisham.

droog

#9
September 25, 2008, 06:41:59 AM
Quote from: Elliot Wilen;251041I remember thinking the guy was pathetic and/or crazy--"gone native" to the extreme, swept up in "savagery", not really villainous. Then again, I guess I don't remember the book very well...

"Exterminate the brutes!"

But who would you like to see in the list?
The past lives on in your front room
The poor still weak the rich still rule
History lives in the books at home
The books at home

Gang of Four
[/size]
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