here's a question...

what would be your top ten list of literary villains?

im especially interested in the really greedy ones. hades couldnt qualify because he believes in evil just for the sake of it. but i want greedy ones, and i want them now!!!

Big Brother from 1984. Now there was a greedy totalitarian maggot.

Would Richard III count???? Even though he was a real person, R3 was villified as an overambitious to the point of greedy fiend by Shakespeare and many since him....
Best Regards,
~Antonio Salieri~

Steerpike from the Gormenghast trilogy gets my vote

Jago from Othello gets mine.



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Colourless green ideas sleep furiously.

(N. Chomsky 1957)

Iago definitely, but also Moriarty.

Saruman in LOTR. He wasn't tops in the evil stakes, but they don't come much greedier.

Count Olaf has gotten eviller over time.



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Those who forget the pasta are doomed to reheat it.

Quinn Dexter from Peter F Hamilton's Nights Dawn ranks high up there for me.



Post Edited (10-26-04 13:40)

Nelson from Animal Farm



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If the English language made any sense, a catastrophe would be an apostrophe with fur.

I don't know why, Ali, but I'm inclined to agree with you on your choice, and compliment your insight.

Definately Count Olaf, He is the the one from Unfortunate Events, isn't he? I haven't read past no 9.

How about Jasper? He's not fictional, but he is evil getting us hooked on his books, just so he can make money, and putting up this fforum, just so we waste all our time here.



=)

Yes.... Uh, no.... Actually......I don't know.... Um, hang on.... What was the question again?

Count Ignatieff was rotten.



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Those who forget the pasta are doomed to reheat it.

In theory, you could site Paradise Lost, and say Lucifer. Who is really more evil than the devil himself?



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Turn the silliness to eleven!

No one has mentioned him but a word for the most greedy of all......Fagin.

Barefoot Andy said:

"In theory, you could site Paradise Lost, and say Lucifer. Who is really more evil than the devil himself?"

In Paradise Lost, depending how you read it, it's God.



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Colourless green ideas sleep furiously.

(N. Chomsky 1957)

Does big brother really count since he is more of an idea than an actual person?

Good question. I'd say yes.

Siridar-Baron Vladimir Harkonnen ('Dune', Frank Herbert). So evil, so rapacious that even after dying in 'Dune', he came back to possess his grand-daughter in 'Children of Dune'. Them's evils!

I'd also put in a word for Blofeld from the James Bond series.



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"Whisky-wa-wa," I breathed - she was dressed as Biffo the Bear.

Please don't forget Yorick Kaine.
But Zhark isn't bad; he's just written that way.