Nicholas Bulstrode from Middlemarch, because he's such an ugly hypocrite
Nicholas Bulstrode from Middlemarch, because he's such an ugly hypocrite
Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.
To keep our faces toward change and behave like free spirits
in the presence of fate is strength undefeatable.”
Helen Keller
I've only read 30 pages of Silas Marner so far, but I'm finding Dunstan Cass horrid.
"...You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?..." E. A. Poe
I thought Iago from Othello was horrible. He's a brilliant character, but his manipulation of Othello results in, I believe, every death that occurs, unless I'm leaving out someone.
Antonio from Bless Me, Ultima, was a coward. He's an emasculated wimp who lacks any form of moral fiber. Him hiding behind his mother for most of the major decisions, until the very end, was terribly frustrating to read.
Alex in A Clockwork Orange
pure evil
Obidiah Slope from Barchester Towers by Anthony Trollope makes me cringe!
and the horrible slimey little Noel Vanstone in No Name by Wilkie Collins.
I'm sure there's plently more but theres 2 to be going on with.
Scarlet O'Hara
I don't know. It's a contest:
Aramis (The Three Musketeers) turns quite horrible at the end of the trilogy... Horrible enough... I believe so...
Heathcliff. He's been named a couple of times, but somehow he is very pitiable. Yet he is truly horrible and scary before the end.
Tom Tulliver (The Mill on the Floss): he is so much convinced of his own righteousness that you would shout at Maggie to leave him and marry her guy. Even with that deformed wreck (that's how they considered it then) she'll be better off than with such a brother. (Yes, it's a long time since I was considering to give up. I am glad I didn't)
Alec d'Urberville: he is also quite horrible, but maybe a little stuck in the ways of his class. Useless he is, but he is also convinced of the ways that are...
As a person... I would have to go for Tom Tulliver as he is not educated by the ways of his class, but just by his own pride, at the cost of his sister's happiness. She gives him all, he takes it for granted and still believes he is superior.
From a factual point of view, there is no contest, is there. It has to be Heathcliff. Aramis and D'Urberville are somewhere in the middle... Too much ambition on the one side and boredom on the other.
But that is so far of course... Next book will maybe bring another horrible one.
One has to laugh before being happy, because otherwise one risks to die before having laughed.
"Je crains [...] que l'âme ne se vide à ces passe-temps vains, et que le fin du fin ne soit la fin des fins." (Edmond Rostand, Cyrano de Bergerac, Acte III, Scène VII)
A truly horrible character is Félix Tholomyès, in Victor Hugo's novel "Les Misérables", the student who abandoned Fantine, and was consequently responsible for all her misery:
Félix Tholomyès — Fantine’s lover and Cosette’s biological father. A wealthy student, he cares more about his own welfare than for his responsibilities. He does not think much of his relationship with Fantine, considering it as "a passing affair." After impregnating Fantine, he abandons her as a joke. Hugo then concludes Tholomyès’ involvement in the story by saying that "twenty years later, under King Louis Philippe, he was a fat provincial attorney, rich and influential, a wise elector and rigid juryman; always, however, a man of pleasure."
(quote: Wikipedia)
Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.
To keep our faces toward change and behave like free spirits
in the presence of fate is strength undefeatable.”
Helen Keller
I do think Tholomyès is pretty horrible, but not volunatrily so, or rather Fantine's naivety also had a lot to play in that episode. She meets a wealthy student, has a good time (obviously also in bed), but did she think for one minute that he was going to marry her or what? Rich, studying at the Sorbonne (probably) in order to become a lawyer (?)... Did she really think that she would have made any chance, already alone in the world at about 17 and no money? That is not a wife for a Tholomyès.
Rich people never marry poor people. She could have let Tholomyès for what he was and turned her eyes to an honest worker and maybe she would have married and been happy...
I suppose that is what is really horrible, the surroudings of the situation. Her naivety and yearning for nice clothes and pleasure together with his taking advantage.
One has to laugh before being happy, because otherwise one risks to die before having laughed.
"Je crains [...] que l'âme ne se vide à ces passe-temps vains, et que le fin du fin ne soit la fin des fins." (Edmond Rostand, Cyrano de Bergerac, Acte III, Scène VII)
I couldn't take Tholomyès/Fantine seriously at all. We've heard that story too many times before, and Victor Hugo didn't succeed in making it any different.
Exit, pursued by a bear.
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