Skip to main content

Meme: Top Ten Villains, Criminals & Degenerates

The Top Ten Tuesdays meme is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. To see more villains, criminals and degenerates, why not head on over there and click on some of the other entries.

I am dividing my gallery of villains and monsters into two groups: the possible and the impossible:

Impossible:
  • Count Dracula from Dracula by Bram Stoker. A monster capable of turning his victims into monsters.
  • Dorian Grey from The Picture of Dorian Grey by Oscar Wilde. All the more evil for being so charming and innocent-looking. Comes under this heading because of the painting.
  • The Queen from various Discworld books by Terry Pratchett, especially The Wee Free Men and Lords and Ladies. She knows people think she is evil and she doesn’t care.
  • The Red Queen from Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. A totally loony, creepy villainess.
  • The Snow Queen from 'The Snow Queen' by Hans Christian Andersen. Creepy and completely evil.I found her terrifying when I was a child.

The possible:
  • Hannibal Lecter from Red Dragon and The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris (I haven't read the rest). The guy nobody wants to meet in a dark alley – or have dinner with.
  • Tom Ripley from the books by Patricia Highsmith. Even more dangerous than Lecter, this charming sociopath will charm and befriend you before he kills you. But at least he will not eat you. Probably.
  • Iago from Othello by William Shakespeare. Possibly the slimiest villain in all of classical literature.
  • Humbert Humbert from Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov. I haven’t even read the book, but I have a special loathing for pedophiles, so he is included here.
  • The Marquise de Merteuil from Les Liaisons Dangereuses by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos. Does what she does because it amuses her, and enjoys watching the consequences.

Possibilities I considered as well:

Victor Frankenstein from Frankenstein by Mary Shelley; Mr. Teatime from Hogfather by Terry Pratchett; Carcer from Night Watch by Terry Pratchett; Lily Weatherwax from Witches Abroad by Terry Pratchett; Heathcliff from Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte; Cruella de Vil from The Hundred and One Dalmatians by Dodie Smith; Mr. Hyde from Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by R.L. Stevenson; Professor Moriarty from the Sherlock Holmes stories by Arthur Conan Doyle: Lady Macbeth from Macbeth by William Shakespeare; The Grand High Witch from The Witches by Roald Dahl.
Labels:

Comments

Dorte H said…
I think it is hopeless to make those lists; I like or loathe far too many characters.

You´ve made a great selection, though. Perhaps I should re-read The Picture of Dorian Grey. I really liked that one. The Snow Queen is also a wonderful choice - and such a suitable name!
November 16, 2010 12:39 pm
Bibliophile said…
Dorte, the Snow Queen was THE villain of my childhood. C.S. Lewis' White Witch (who is clearly based on her) isn't even half as scary.

I re-read The Picture of Dorian Grey every now and then, and always find myself wishing Wilde had written more novels.
November 16, 2010 1:40 pm
Sarah Reads Too Much said…
I like how you separated them into categories... Tom Ripley is definitely one sick, evil man. Victor Frankenstein did make my list...


Sarah
http://sarahreadstoomuch.blogspot.com
November 16, 2010 1:40 pm
Tony D said…
Read the book. Lolita is awesome. And Humbert will remain on your list.;)
November 16, 2010 3:17 pm
Bibliophile said…
Tony - it's on my TBR list and has been for several years, but somehow I never get round to reading it. Maybe next year...
November 16, 2010 3:30 pm
Red said…
Iago's on my list as well. He's an awful person but one of my favorite Shakespeare characters. I hate what he's doing but at least it's interesting to watch him work.
November 16, 2010 3:48 pm
Bibliophile said…
Red, I find Iago absolutely fascinating, in an icky kind of way. He is so good at manipulating people that it's scary.
November 16, 2010 4:11 pm
danya said…
I can't believe I didn't put Iago on my list. He is such a sneaky villain!
November 16, 2010 7:22 pm
George said…
My villains tend to come from the comic books I read as a kid: The Joker, Lex Luthor, etc. But I agree with you about Iago. He's endlessly fascinating.
November 16, 2010 7:47 pm
Stephen said…
I can barely remember the White Which, but of course Iago's always a favorite.
November 16, 2010 11:48 pm
Unknown said…
The Red Queen, nice call! Wish I'd thought of her! Hannibal made my list as well. You can check out my top ten list here.
November 16, 2010 11:54 pm
Eileen said…
Heathcliff was #9 on my list.

Possible actually outnumbers Impossible on my list 6:4. I think that's because I generally find realistic villains so much more frightening . . . precisely because they can exist!
November 17, 2010 12:54 am
Deb Nance at Readerbuzz said…
You certainly had no problem coming up with candidates for this list. Good work.

Here's my post.
November 17, 2010 1:48 am
Irena @ This Miss Loves to Read said…
What a great list! It's so cool to see Dorian Gray on it. I didn't even think of him, but he truly is an evil man. Great choices!
November 17, 2010 8:16 am
Anonymous said…
Oh the Snow Queen! Yeah, I was terrified of her as a child. I can't even revisit it now.

I've never read Les Liasions Dangereuses but I think I'd like to give it a go.
November 17, 2010 10:44 am
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Book 40: The Martian by Andy Weir, audiobook read by Wil Wheaton

Note : This will be a general scattershot discussion about my thoughts on the book and the movie, and not a cohesive review. When movies are based on books I am interested in reading but haven't yet read, I generally wait to read the book until I have seen the movie, but when a movie is made based on a book I have already read, I try to abstain from rereading the book until I have seen the movie. The reason is simple: I am one of those people who can be reduced to near-incoherent rage when a movie severely alters the perfectly good story line of a beloved book, changes the ending beyond recognition or adds unnecessarily to the story ( The Hobbit , anyone?) without any apparent reason. I don't mind omissions of unnecessary parts so much (I did not, for example, become enraged to find Tom Bombadil missing from The Lord of the Rings ), because one expects that - movies based on books would be TV-series long if they tried to include everything, so the material must be pared down ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Icelandic folk-tale: The Devil Takes a Wife

Stories of people who have made a deal with and then beaten the devil exist all over Christendom and even in literature. Here is a typical one: O nce upon a time there were a mother and daughter who lived together. They were rich and the daughter was considered a great catch and had many suitors, but she accepted no-one and it was the opinion of many that she intended to stay celebrate and serve God, being a very devout  woman. The devil didn’t like this at all and took on the form of a young man and proposed to the girl, intending to seduce her over to his side little by little. He insinuated himself into her good graces and charmed her so thoroughly that she accepted his suit and they were betrothed and eventually married. But when the time came for him to enter the marriage bed the girl was so pure and innocent that he couldn’t go near her. He excused himself by saying that he couldn’t sleep and needed a bath in order to go to sleep. A bath was prepared for him and in he went...
Post a Comment
Read more

List love: 10 recommended stories with cross-dressing characters

This trope is almost as old as literature, what with Achilles, Hercules and Athena all cross-dressing in the Greek myths, Thor and Odin disguising themselves as women in the Norse myths, and Arjuna doing the same in the Mahabaratha. In modern times it is most common in romance novels, especially historicals in which a heroine often spends part of the book disguised as a boy, the hero sometimes falling for her while thinking she is a boy. Occasionally a hero will cross-dress, using a female disguise to avoid recognition or to gain access to someplace where he would never be able to go as a man. However, the trope isn’t just found in romances, as may be seen in the list below, in which I recommend stories with a variety of cross-dressing characters. Unfortunately I was only able to dredge up from the depths of my memory two book-length stories I had read in which men cross-dress, so this is mostly a list of women dressed as men. Ghost Riders by Sharyn McCrumb. One of the interwove...
Post a Comment
Read more