Most Horrible Character

Which characters have you particularly disliked and why?

Two spring to mind for me.

Dean Moriarty from On The Road: Jack Kerouac (through the character Sal) goes out of his way to convince us that Dean is a misunderstood intellectual hero, but I thought he was just horrible. He squirms all the time, drives like a maniac, drinks and takes drugs, steals without any conscience and worst of all beats his wife. I just can't see any redeeming features. He reminded me so much of T-bag from Prison Break :lol:

Madame Bovary: I couldn't help comparing this character to Anna Karenina and finding her wanting. She was shallow, self-absorbed, greedy and selfish, and never showed any signs of remorse or of wanting to change, whereas Anna was tormented by guilt and was fully aware of the effect of her actions on others.

Harald from The Group by Mary McCarthy. He is beyond horrible -- leaves his wife in an insane asylum, has affairs on her, thinks he's god.

Nurse Ratched, to be sure. I don't think it's possible not to loathe her.

And although I think I'm in the (female) minority, judging by previous responses to this opinion--one girl actually got quite angry with me--I never liked Heathcliff, or pitied him, or saw any point in making excuses for him. I'm mystified as to why he gets grouped with the romantic male figures.

Odette, Mme Swann, of In Search of Lost Time.

Poor Swann. He should have known better, but the nonsense she put him through...

Also, I did not tend to care for any of the characters in Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises, except perhaps the narrator. Even so, I loved the novel.

Scout in To Kill A Mockingbird. God, she was annoying.

Heathcliff for me.

Phoebus from Hunchback of Notre Dame he caused so much suffering with out being the least bit aware of the pain he was causing. He never thought about others or the consequences of his actions. Just thinking about him makes me angry.

I think what really annoys me is that he could be the cause of so much anguish, be in the midst of it yet be so blissfully unaware. It seemed so utterly unfair.

My reply to that is a blend of higley's and mayneverhave's responses: for me there isn't a single likable character in Wuthering Heights, yet I quite like the novel. And I guess the same applies to Women in Love. It's not like I think they're 'horrible', though; in the former they're all too flawed to be likable, in the latter too weird.

In Portuguese literature, the choice is obvious: the obnoxious Dâmaso Salcede, from Os Maias.

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Originally Posted by higley

And although I think I'm in the (female) minority, judging by previous responses to this opinion--one girl actually got quite angry with me--I never liked Heathcliff, or pitied him, or saw any point in making excuses for him. I'm mystified as to why he gets grouped with the romantic male figures.

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Completely agree with you; except I would go one step further and add almost all the other characters in Wuthering Heights as well! Can't think of one likeable character in that novel.

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Completely agree with you; except I would go one step further and add almost all the other characters in Wuthering Heights as well! Can't think of one likeable character in that novel.

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Yes the characters are pretty repulsive (or stupid) but it is a pretty damn good book.

As for mine well, Medea kills her own children, which is pretty harsh. God in Paradise Lost is a bit of an evil dictator so he can join the list, Lady Macbeth is pretty blood thirsty, though there are plenty of Shakespeare villains which are up there. Frankenstein's monster is particularly devilish when he has been shunned by society as is Mr Hyde, so they would probably be mine.

Antonio in The Merchant of Venice, and his friends. I end up wanting Shylock to get his pound of flesh.

Anna Karenina. I couldn't wait for her to be gone.

I am disgusted with Mildred from Of Human Bondage. Even saying her name makes my mouth feel violated. She's everything that I don't want to be. The worst part is, I know several women that resemble her personality in real life. Some people just shouldn't have kids.

Mae and Gooper from Cat on a Hot Tin Roof were pretty gross people, but you could tell that they were miserable with themselves and their lives which kind of lessened my dislike for them (especially Gooper).

Sam Spade sucks.

Every character in Dracula except for Renfield rubbed me the wrong way.

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Originally Posted by kelby_lake

Scout in To Kill A Mockingbird. God, she was annoying.

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I'm going to go with this one too. Certainly the most overrated American novel, but what do you expect really? It seems the perfect schoolroom text - it actually praises the innocence of the white girl girl in relation to her racist surroundings, and ultimately robs the voice of African Americans subjected to racism, and gives the voice instead to, once again, a white person, one who is too smart to be racist, yet at the same time, is ultimately privileged by all the racist programs in her society.

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Originally Posted by JBI

I'm going to go with this one too. Certainly the most overrated American novel, but what do you expect really? It seems the perfect schoolroom text - it actually praises the innocence of the white girl girl in relation to her racist surroundings, and ultimately robs the voice of African Americans subjected to racism, and gives the voice instead to, once again, a white person, one who is too smart to be racist, yet at the same time, is ultimately privileged by all the racist programs in her society.

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Or the novel is simply depicting how things were at the time when a white person was needed to voice the injustice an African American was subjected to.