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Category A:
Bertha Mason from Jane Eyre (and no, not because of Wide Sargasso Sea)
Lord Henry from Dorian Gray
Oedipus
Leontes from Winter's Tale (though he's arguably not a villain?)
Grendel
Category B:
Moriarty
Abigail Williams from the Crucible. I really really hate her.
Lorenzo from the Spanish Tragedy
Hmmm, I can't decide where Heathcliff goes. A year ago, I would've put him in Category A, but more recently I've had less and less sympathy for him.
Category A: Hannibal Lecter, Frankenstein's Monster, Grendel, Smeagol, nearly all the pirates from Treasure Island (they don't really know any other way to live), many others I can't remember, Lucifer 'Paradise Lost', Cao Cao 'Three Kingdoms Romance', Yang Kang 'Legend of the Condor Heroes' by Louis Cha, Ouyang Feng 'Legend of the Condor Heroes', most of the gangsters in 'The Godfather'
Category B: Milady 'Three Musketeers'. I'm sure there are many others which don't immediately come to mind.
Hmm, I do not know if you assessment of Ouyang Feng or Yang Kang as dynamic or tragic-heroic. Perhaps in the third edition they were given more colour as characters, but the early Yang Kang, right through the second edition is rather one-dimensionally evil. In television he seems to be treated a little better because of his rather weak characterization in the novel, but the original conception I find of Yang Kang is in keeping with Jin Yong's early Sinocentrism - that is, you take two characters from essentially the same background, and you raise them in different spots, one with a "Confucian" mother, and simple nomads, and one raised by a "barbarian" father, and you end up with two different trajectories - one upon entrance into his "Chinese heritage" absorbs it, and accepts it, thereby forgoing his upbringing in keeping with his birthright, whereas the other rejects it. Nothing in the novel ever suggests to me any non-selfish act by the character, down to his last breath.Quote:
Originally Posted by Silas Thorne
As for Ouyang Feng, to me that character reads as a comical ploy rather than much of a character. Here is there to balance off the righteous with the foil of the selfish - conveniently, he also is a "western barbarian." But on the whole he seems more dynamic than the rather minimal Yang Kang, whose role in the novel is quite minimal compared the television adaptations (They seem to make him an actual character, but in truth, Mu Nianci appears more than he does, and Ouyang Ke is more a central character than the two of them).
The only real dynamic hero, this is, up until the second edition of the text, in my eyes would be Genghis Kahn who seems to struggle with his sense of honor, value, and identity as "barbarian" within an ethnically biased novel.
Then again, Jin Yong at this point in his career wasn't much into complex characterization, so I would wager very few characters ever make it past card-board cut-out swordsmen. It really isn't until his next novel where he actually begins to cloud the distinction between good and bad on a level that effects the main characters in my eyes.
Sorry to go off on a tangent though, since I realize you were just naming names, but it is so rare that Jin Yong is mentioned on these boards, that perhaps a discussion would be interesting, despite 射雕英雄传 still being unavailable in English translation (though I read somewhere that one is pending).
JBI, you are probably right. Here's where I admit that I haven't read these Chinese books in their entirety, and am largely basing my opinions on the TV series depiction of them and the parts that I have read. ;) But Mei Chaofeng in this 'Legend of the Condor Heroes' is a villain we can feel sympathy for, isn't she?
She is supposed to be. In the first edition she is a "redeemed" villain, but not exactly so interesting, whereas she is given much more backstory in the second edition, and then even more so (supposedly) in the third edition.Quote:
Originally Posted by Silas Thorne
She however isn't so cut and paste - definitely more dynamic than the main hero, Guo Jing, but even so, she starts off as a horrific villain, and only moves toward forgiveness toward the end of her life.
As a character she seems to function as the darker aspect of her associative compliment, Huang Yaoshi, in that she represents the evil most people would see in him - embodied in his disciple, the crazy murdering witch.
He on the other hand is far more complex, and seems by the end to be shown in a rather favorable light (perhaps a change of heart within the serialization?)
whereas she dies off, but is ultimately forgiven.
For a more interesting villain in the text, I think, one must turn to the villains outside of the martial world, and into the political world - Wanyan Honglie, and Genghis Kahn, who both offer interesting insights into the real idea of heroic, and right and wrong.
Even so though, Chinese fiction traditionally blurs right and wrong more than Western fiction. The whole idea of what is right, and what is wrong, is what is discussed, given that there is no divine framework or code by which to follow - the heroes themselves must decide what is right and wrong, and ultimately that is the climax of the book. The final chapters basically are didactic in their preaching, something which Jin Yong sought to undermine in his later novels, where he reversed his own didactic message in favor of a new, less jingoist, and more skeptical and cynical politics.
@Dark Muse
There is a splendid poem about Medusa by Carol Ann Duffy in her collection The World's Wife. She clearly feels as you do.
I was going to post it but c&p doesn't work on this board. You can Google it though.
Category A
Satan Paradise Lost
Category B.Iago from Othello
Uriah Heep from David Copperfield
For category B villains, there is the driver in Quentin Tarentino's Deathproof who delightfully gets his head kicked in in the end. Also the South African embassy workers in Leathal Weapon II, especially the one who gets his head slammed repeatedly by Mel Gibson in the car door after Gibson finds his girlfriend drowned, would be another. And there is that general or sergeant in James Cameron's Avatar who wants to destroy home tree so he can get back in time to enjoy his supper.
For category A, most of the villains that I'm aware of in the Bhagavatam stories would qualify. They all seem to be reincarnations of devotees of Vishnu, which is the point, I suspect. But I've only read the ones translated by Amal Bhakta. It makes me wonder about my choices for category B.
That sounds interesting I will have to look it up!Quote:
Originally Posted by Seasider
I wouldn't call Leontes a villain. He does genuinely seem to be jealous, even if there is no reason for it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Wilde woman
I would argue he's a villain figure in the first half. Or, at least, his madness is driving him into an antagonistic position. He's put into opposition against his entire court, Bohemia, even Apollo's oracle at Delphi.Quote:
Originally Posted by kelby_lake
Also, for Category B: Javert from Les Miserables. How could I forget him?
To be honest, in Shakespeare I do not think there are villains. Each character seems justifiable in their own understanding of their emotions, to the point where such categorizations really fail. Even Don John in Much Ado About Nothing, or Edmund in King Lear - all justifiable within their own conceptualization of the world in regard to them.
I think that's a hard case to make for the likes of Aaron, Iago and Richard III...Quote:
Originally Posted by JBI
Iago is the only difficult one, but at the same time, he doesn't strike me as a Villain, just because we are reading his point of view, he is in the hero position, it has been argued. That is the problem with the play - he is victorious in his endeavor - the play is about his feat, not Othello's - his quest for destruction is the centre of the play, we are awaiting to see him succeed.Quote:
Originally Posted by Lokasenna
Same with Macbeth, he is not a villain, though vile. That is a problem I guess for such categorization.
Richard III has his reasons, doesn't he?
The disturbed quality of being brilliant but deformed.Quote:
Originally Posted by kelby_lake
catigory A (and I not only sympasise with them .... )
first of all Count Dracular (don't really wanto to know what Freud would say concerning my exitement when thinking of beeing bitten... and bite myself whatsoever)
then the one I coul fall for Heathcliff (I'd cast Jonny Depp if I was asked...)
furthermore Sweeney Todd (no matte what version)
there are probably more ... all those vampire like men...
category B
Judje Turpin (Allan Rickman made him come to life in such a disgusting way... real good job)
who else... well perhaps there'll be some more coming to my minde later on...
I love villains, a lot more than heroes. My favorite is Crake, but I also like Hannibal Lecter, Iago (if one classifies him as villian), Medea...
OH!!! Satan from Paradise Lost is actually my favorite favorite.
yeah.. villians are well.. dunno I feel the same about them.. as long as I can remember I've always bin on their side... always bin on the side of the dragons as well ... perhaps because the bad once are appear stronger or because someone entirely good is too surreal because however hard you try to escape by reading you actually always search the mechanisms of reality just in other worlds and stories... the rules remain the same... and the bad once are those who do what we don't dare to do but always wish... perhaps adoring the bad once keeps us from doing those things ourselves and so indulge to the imp of pervers (as poe puts it) .
dunno, I'm afraid I'm not really making a point here ... I'm rather raving or something, sorry for being so vague but perhaps you can make something of it....
Isn't one of the problems how to make good people interesting? The only way is to pit them against a villain and hope they come out on top. Heroism needs Villainy if it is to be noticed.
Madame Defarge.
Not sure which category to put her into though....
your favourite and why?
This is an interesting thread :)