Top 30 Villains in Literature

Top 30 Villains in Literature

The fictional villains we love to hate

Love them or hate them, villains provide some of the most memorable characters in Literature. From the blood-sucking Count Dracula to Shakespeare's dastardly Iago, Stylist looks back at some of our favourite literary nasties.

Click on any of the images below to launch the gallery. Missed one out? Tweet us @StylistMagazine to let us know your ultimate literary villain

Lord Voldermort

Harry Potter by J. K. Rowling Key quote: "He… More details
Lord Voldermort

Harry Potter by J. K. Rowling

Key quote: "He disappeared after leaving school ... traveled far and wide ... sank so deeply into the Dark Arts, consorted with the very worst of our kind, underwent so many magical transformations that when he resurfaced he was barely recognisable."

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Claudius

Hamlet by William Shakespeare Key quote: "Oh… More details
Claudius

Hamlet by William Shakespeare

Key quote: "Oh my offence is rank, it smells to heaven. It hath the primal eldest curse upon't- a brother's murder."

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The Grand Witch

The Witches by Roald Dahl Key quote: "My… More details
The Grand Witch

The Witches by Roald Dahl

Key quote: "My orders are that every single child in the country shall be rrrubbed out, sqvashed, sqvirted, sqvitted and ffrrritered before I come here again in vun year's time. Do I make myself clear?"

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The White Witch

The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis Key quote:… More details
The White Witch

The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis

Key quote: "You know that every traitor belongs to me as my lawful prey and that for every treachery I have a right to a kill... And so, that human creature is mine. His life is forfeit to me. His blood is my property."

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Captain Hook

Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie Key quote: "It is a… More details
Captain Hook

Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie

Key quote: "It is a princely scheme,’ cried Hook, and at once it took practical shape in his great brain. ‘We will seize the children and carry them to the boat: the boys we will make walk the plank, and Wendy shall be our mother."

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Professor Moriarty

The Final Problem by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Key… More details
Professor Moriarty

The Final Problem by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Key quote: "[Moriarty] is the Napoleon of crime, Watson. He is the organizer of half that is evil and of nearly all that is undetected in this great city. He is a genius, a philosopher, an abstract thinker. He has a brain of the first order. He sits motionless, like a spider in the center of its web, but that web has a thousand radiations, and he knows well every quiver of each of them."

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Lady Macbeth

Macbeth by William Shakespeare Key quote:… More details
Lady Macbeth

Macbeth by William Shakespeare

Key quote: "Yet do I fear thy nature: it is too full of the milk of human kindness."

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Nurse Ratchet

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey Key… More details
Nurse Ratchet

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey

Key quote: “Now calm down. The best thing we can do is go on with our daily routine.”

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Sauron

The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien Key… More details
Sauron

The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien

Key quote: "But Sauron was not of mortal flesh, and though he was robbed now of that shape in which had wrought so great an evil, so that he could never again appear fair to the eyes of Men"

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Iago

Othello by William Shakespeare Key quote: … More details
Iago

Othello by William Shakespeare

Key quote: "So will I turn her virtue into pitch, And out of her own goodness make the net That shall enmesh them all."

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Humbert Humbert

Lolita by Vladamir Nabakov Key quote:… More details
Humbert Humbert

Lolita by Vladamir Nabakov

Key quote: "Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul"

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Richard III

Richard III by William Shakespeare Key quote:… More details
Richard III

Richard III by William Shakespeare

Key quote: "Since I cannot prove a lover to entertain these fair well-spoken days, I am determined to prove a villain."

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Javert

Les Misérables by Victor Hugo Key quote:… More details
Javert

Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

Key quote: "He (Jean Valjean) asked himself whether human society could have the right to...seize a poor man forever between a defect and an excess, a default of work and an excess of punishment. Whether it was not outrageous for society to treat thus precisely those of its members who were the least well endowed in the division of goods made by chance, and consequently the most deserving of consideration."

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Mrs Danvers

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier Key quote: "Why… More details
Mrs Danvers

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier

Key quote: "Why don't you go? We none of us want you. He doesn't want you, he never did. He can't forget her. He wants to be alone in the house again, with her. It's you that ought to be lying there in the church crypt, not her. It's you who ought to be dead, not Mrs. de Winter."

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Big Brother

Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell Key quote:… More details
Big Brother

Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell

Key quote: "There will be no loyalty, except loyalty towards the Party. There will be no love, except the love of Big Brother. There will be no laughter, except the laugh of triumph over a defeated enemy. There will be no art, no literature, no science."

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Goldberg

The Birthday Party by Harold Pinter Key quote:… More details
Goldberg

The Birthday Party by Harold Pinter

Key quote: "Whereas in other plays of mine every single character, even a bastard like Goldberg in 'The Birthday Party, I care for."

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Ferdinand

The Duchess of Malfi by John Webster Key quote: … More details
Ferdinand

The Duchess of Malfi by John Webster

Key quote: "Whether we fall by ambition, blood or lust, Like diamonds we are cut with our own dust."

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Fagin

Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens Key quote:… More details
Fagin

Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens

Key quote: "he looked less like a man than some hideous phantom"

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Dr No

Dr. No by Ian Fleming Key quotes: "The… More details
Dr No

Dr. No by Ian Fleming

Key quotes: "The Americans are fools. I offered my services, they refused. So did the East. Now they can both pay for their mistake."

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Augustus Melmotte

The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope Key… More details
Augustus Melmotte

The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope

Key quote: "Of course he had committed forgery;--of course he had committed robbery. That, indeed, was nothing, for he had been cheating and forging and stealing all his life"

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Count Dracula

Dracula by Bram Stoker Key quote: "We are in… More details
Count Dracula

Dracula by Bram Stoker

Key quote: "We are in Transylvania, and Transylvania is not England. Our ways are not your ways, and there shall be to you many strange things"

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Mephistopholes

Dr Faustus by Christopher Marlowe Key quote:… More details
Mephistopholes

Dr Faustus by Christopher Marlowe

Key quote: "I am a servant to great Lucifer."

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Kevin

We Need to Talk about Kevin by Lionel Shriver Key… More details
Kevin

We Need to Talk about Kevin by Lionel Shriver

Key quote: "You regarded redemption as an act of will. You disparaged people for their cussedly nonspecific dissatisfactions, because to fail to embrace the simple fineness of being alive betrayed a weakness of character."

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Volpone

Volpone by Ben Jonson Key quote: "I glory… More details
Volpone

Volpone by Ben Jonson

Key quote: "I glory More in the cunning Purchase of my Wealth, Than in the glad Possession"

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Arturo

The Resistable Rise of Arturo Ui by Bertolt… More details
Arturo

The Resistable Rise of Arturo Ui by Bertolt Brecht

Key quote: "Do not rejoice in his defeat, you men. For though the world has stood up and stopped the bastard, the bitch that bore him is in heat again. "

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Hannibal Lecter

Red Dragon by Thomas Harris Key quote: "Oh,… More details
Hannibal Lecter

Red Dragon by Thomas Harris

Key quote: "Oh, he's a monster. Pure psychopath. So rare to capture one alive. From a research point of view, Lecter is our most prized asset."

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Aaron the Moor

Titus Andronicus by William Shakespeare Key… More details
Aaron the Moor

Titus Andronicus by William Shakespeare

Key quote: "Oft have I digged up dead men from their graves, and set them upright at their dear friends' door."

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Count Olaf

A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony… More details
Count Olaf

A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket

Key quote: "Man hands on misery to man, it deepens like a coastal shelf. Get out as early as you can, and don't have any kids yourself."

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Patrick Bateman

American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis Key quote:… More details
Patrick Bateman

American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis

Key quote: "I have all the characteristics of a human being: flesh, blood, skin, hair; but not a single, clear, identifiable emotion, except for greed and disgust. Something horrible is happening inside of me and I don't know why. My nightly bloodlust has overflown into my days. I feel lethal, on the verge of frenzy. I think my mask of sanity is about to slip."

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Judge Holden

Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy Key quote:… More details
Judge Holden

Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy

Key quote: "The judge tilted his great head. The man who believes that the secrets of this world are forever hidden lives in mystery and fear. Superstition will drag him down. The rain will erode the deeds of his life."

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