Baddies in books: Sauron, literatures ultimate source of evil

In the first of a new series on fictional villains, Sarah Crown argues that Tolkiens unseen Sauron from The Lord of the Rings is the most frightening and enduring

More baddies in books: Humbert Humbert, the most seductive villain in fiction

A really bravura villain grabs you by the throat. From childhood bogeymen via the dastards and arch-nemeses of adolescence, all the way to adulthoods more nuanced sociopaths, schemers and political tyrants, theyre the grit that makes literary pearls, the dynamos who keep us reading and part of their appeal is their infinite variety: there are as many brands of evildoer as there are stars in the sky, fish in the ocean. Collectively, they adhere to a modified version of the Anna Karenina principle: all saints are alike; each sinner sins uniquely. How, then, are you supposed to pick a favourite?

In my case, it comes down in part, at least to first contact. Assuming were among the lucky ones, our initial encounter with evil with the idea that there are those out there who, given the chance, would do us harm takes place in the realm of fiction. Fairytales with their murder, bestiality, suicide, rape, incest and cannibalism are the obvious jumping-off point. In The Uses of Enchantment, Bruno Bettelheim deemed their unflinching portrayal of wickedness essential to our education a necessary corrective to the dominant culture [that] wishes to pretend, particularly to children, that the dark side of man does not exist. Certainly, those tangled-wood images of wolves got up as grandmothers and witches in sugar-coated houses retain a disproportionate power to disturb. For me, though, despite a protracted phase during which I hid my Ladybird Sleeping Beauty at bedtime in case the witch climbed out to get me, the baddie who informed my vision of evil the one against whom all subsequent horrors would be measured didnt figure on the cover of a fairytale book. His defining feature is that we never lay eyes on him.

a contrivance of the Enemy ... They say in my land that he can govern the storms in the Mountains of Shadow that stand upon the borders of Mordor. He has strange powers and many allies.

His arm has grown long indeed, said Gimli, if he can draw snow down from the North to trouble us here three hundred leagues away.

His arm has grown long, said Gandalf.

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Published on October 27, 2014 07:19
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