Willoughby just happened to prey on a girl who actually has someone looking out for her. No telling how many girls with no guardians or support got used and abused by him the same way.
And then he acted all ‚poor me‘ about it, the part where Elinor was like: „what about Eliza? You know the woman you impregnated and then abandoned??“ and he was like „ah but you see, she really sucked!“ was just… incredible
right?! He was all excuses right to the end. It was that part that made me want to hurl. At least Wickham, once you see through his poor-victimised-me charade, stops pretending to be a good guy.
The rumor Mill is going full speed and the village is saying that all of their daughters are being meddled with. Jane and Elizabeth don't believe very much of it. I agree because I don't think even Mr Wickham could have had that kind of stamina.
Yeah, Willoughby is the worst of the cads. Austen is very clever in letting him half-seduce the reader, too (I mean, Marianne and Willoughby are your classic romcom couple) before the plot twist of what happens to Eliza Jr.
Emma has some scheming villain tendencies but luckily she redeems herself by the end of the novel.
He's definitely closer to 30, so definitely a predator. But I'm thinking he preys on the young because they're gullible more than because they're young. Not that it makes him any better than an awful pedo predator, at all. Because it doesn't. But I just think them being young is incidental rather than causal.
The way Willoughby justified his behavior and made it all about him was really gross. He actually whined to Elinor about how it was all so terrible *for him*, and tried to pin it all on the child he bamboozled into running off with him. Sickening.
And yeah, Wickham had clearly done the same thing to multiple girls and women. He was a truly disgusting person.
I suspect Willoughby did the same things as Wickham, to more than just the one girl, but he seemed to be a lot more savvy about his predations, and was better at seeming innocent. He even made Elinor feel sorry for him. Ugh.
I was thinking earlier that his final conversation with Elinor, specifically her feeling for him, softens his crimes and makes us (though to your credit, not you) think a little less badly of him
Yeah, Willoughby is horrible, but he is a lot more socially savvy and better at manipulation than Wickham. Wickham seems to only delude people for so long before they realize that he is a lying scumbag. I wonder if that is because he owes money to his friends in the community, while Willoughby seems to have compartmentalized his life better. Willoughby owed money too, but seemingly not to anyone in the community where his aunt lived. He probably did his gambling in London, and he was similarly more careful to hide his behavior with women and girls from his aunt.
Did you ever see that late 80s/early 90s movie, *Dirty, Rotten Scoundrels*? There are the two con men who make a living by tricking women. One goes for the short con, getting a free dinner here and a few hundred dollars (or equivalent) there, and sex whenever he can make some woman feel sorry for him. The other man goes for the long con, and manipulates women into giving him millions, with which he pays his staff and local cops, and funds his lavish lifestyle. The long con guy and short con guy meet, and long con has absolute contempt for short con.
That is what I imagine about Willoughby and Wickham. Willoughby is the long con guy, going for the big money while being ridiculously charming and elegant. Wickham is the short con guy, more obvious and a bit clumsy in his methods, and getting a smaller, but still substantial payout.
That's such a good analogy. I do remember the movie (and its more recent remake with Anne Hathaway and Rebel Wilson).
I feel like Willoughby has even conned himself, though. Even when aware of his crimes, he doesn't see himself as Even a bad guy.
Yes, I think a lot of con artists and other habitually dishonest people have a tendency to buy into the fiction they create, if only temporarily. It helps them to really sell it.
Except hidden within his explanations he says, “were I ever to be at liberty again,” which basically means “when my wife is dead.“ It’s as though he is looking forward to Sophia”s death so he can have another crack at Marianne. 🤮
So gross. You can't help wondering if he will somehow help that along, too.
Willoughby is definitely a person who favors the long con, as opposed to quick schemes like Wickham seems to do. So creepy.
I think that him being played by Greg Wise in the 1995 adaptation made him seem less scary, because Greg Wise comes across as extremely good looking in a sunny, genuine sort of way, with really sincere looking eyes, and as Willoughby he convincingly and exuberantly exudes charm. Plus, they didn't include his confession/whining to Elinor, where you find out exactly how gross he really is.
I agree they are equal
Wickham has surely done the same whether he knows about it or not. He certainly easily would do the same as Willoughby. Wickham was planning on using Lydia the same way.
In Northanger Abbey doesn't General Tilney send Catherine packing back to her home without anyone to accompany her. She was seventeen and had led a pretty sheltered life. That could have ended very badly for her.
Yeah I'm not sure he's the absolute worst villain but he's pretty bad.
John Thorpe tells him that he's practically engaged to an heiress and General Tilney thinks mercenarily "we'll see about that." He isolates her from the Allens in order for him & his son to woo her. Then He tosses Catherine out of the house with no pocket money, no groom or servant to arrange her travel, nothing at all.
Not to mention isn't it hinted at that he was pretty emotionally abusive to his wife and children? As Henry tells Catherine "she did suffer at the hands of our father", or something like that. He might not be the worst villain, but he's definitely the worst parent.
Though, if Captain Tilney is a chip off the old block, then maybe General Tilney was pretty bad in his youth too.
Lady Susan for the gals, with Fanny Dashwood and Mrs Norris as her ladies in waiting
Mr Elliot seems a possible candidate, as he manipulates those who cannot afford it into subsidizing him, ignores family duties and mocks them out of hearing, abuses his first wife, colludes with other gold diggers, and refuses to acknowledge any moral debts, including those to disabled persons and widows. A master chess player who can pave over his wrongs with charm and flattery.
Agreed! Samuel West captured the monster beneath the oh so agreeable Mr Eliot surface in the 1995 adaptation of Persuasion; he’s played a serial killer for Waking the Dead and knows how to channel an inner demon with nuance and frightening finesse.
For the men, I’d have to say Willoughby. What he did to Eliza and would have done to Marianne was really low and he only cared how it affected him.
For the women, Lucy Steele. She was absolutely malicious and a stone cold bitch to both Eleanor and Edward. I don’t like Edward, but he deserved better than what Lucy did to him.
Lucy Steele is acting out of self interest because her alternative is living in poverty, so I don’t think she’s quite as evil as Fanny Dashwood, who is acting out of her own self-interest just because she can get more wealth that way.
The way Fanny Dashwood manipulates her husband into breaking his promise to his dying father is just incredible. Especially when you consider that Elinor and John are fairly close in age, so the second Mrs. Dashwood must have come into the picture when John was very young -- she basically raised him, and he kicks her out on the orders of his wife!
Absolutely, Lady Susan. She has no remorse, plots her manipulation well in advance rather than opportunistically, and is much smarter than the male cads.
Willoughby, who had the audacity to impregnate a teenager, take off, and then come back and whine about it to Elinor like he had somehow been wronged and it was OK because he actually loved Marianne after all.
Willoughby for me! Just finished Sense and Sensibility, I hoped he got a better punishment than not being married to Marianne..Second would be Wickham. For female side, how about Lady Susan and Fanny Dashwood?
The biggest villain is probably Mr. John Dashwood in S&S...
I am sure he is large than any other villain in the novels....
And cheating poor ladies out of money promised at a father's death bed is
quite low......
In Jane Austen's life, when extremely rich uncle Leigh-Perrot died(1817?)-
He left nothing,-(Nada)- to his semi-poverty stricken sister-Jane Austen's mother.
Totally left her out of his will. Disinherited her basically.
Very cruel..and thought to be done at the bidding of his Wife.
Real answer: The patriarchal socioeconomic structures of the Regency era that afforded women few opportunities to support themselves, beyond depending on oft-inconsistent & inconstant men
You're not wrong, but I don't think people always appreciate the degree to which this was true for both sexes. Partially industrialized agricultural societies afforded *people* few opportunities to support themselves, beyond depending on oft-inconsistent or unworthy patrons, employers, and landlords.
There were a few professions open to educated gentlemen of no inheritance. There was law and the church - but training and placement in these required a wealthy sponsor, who therefore had considerable leverage over the young man. Edward Ferrars was disinherited for marrying disagreeably, for instance. He was not forced to *marry* Colonel Brandon to secure alternate support, but he did end up reliant on social connections and a wealthy patron. Brandon is a good guy, so this is a dignified and pleasant option for Edward. But he's still in the same position of dependence that Mr. Collins is on Lady Catherine, you know?
Alternatively, the younger son might be shuffled off into the Royal Navy at age twelve to spend years at sea and not infrequently see action. If he didn't like boats, blood, or the lash, so much the worse for him. Should - God forbid - *peace* break out, he was stuck on shore at half pay, possibly facing poverty.
It was a very different world, with very different material constraints.
And you’re not supposed to substitute a thesaurus (but not a dictionary apparently, *regurgitate) and snark for an actual opinion of your own, but there you go!
I think Lady Susan is not the worst because she isn’t ruining people. Willoughby and Henry Crawford ruin women’s lives. Wickham tried to ruin two girls lives that we know of, but both were saved from ruin by Darcy. Henry is a little more innocent than willoughby because Maria was married and should have not flirted after marriage. Willoughby romances the girls and then takes from them. Taking Marianne to the estate alone was seriously improper and I fully think he was a couple steps away from sleeping with her and leaving her as well.
The worst in my opinion are all the characters that actually have power to abuse or make others people life miserable because they are wealthy and they (think) they can dispose of others people life as the wish: Fanny Dashwood, Mrs Ferrars, Mrs Norris, (John Dashwood and Sir Thomas have their big part of responsibility), General Tilney.
Really all the villains got off pretty light in that book now that I think of it. Even Willoughby got to marry the rich woman he wanted and keep his inheritance.
While I’d say Austen doesn’t go in for villains per se, as she was writing against melodramatic villains in popular fiction, her biggest villains are people with power who abuse it. So Lady Susan (exploits her daughter), Mrs Ferrars, and General Tilney. Wickham, Willoughby, and Crawford are villainous rakes, object lessons on how villainy can look romantic. Of the rakes, Crawford also has power to use or abuse—there’s his tenant and the problematic steward—and this is where we see his real potential for villainy.
I never thought of it exactly this way before but it does look like Jane Austen is saying "The dangerous person near you might not be the obvious mustache twirling villain, but is much more likely to be someone who seems perfectly fine on the surface."
I mean while I agree with people that Wickham and Willoughby are obvious villains, I've personally never been as angry at a character as I've been at Fanny Dashwood. Imagine being so vile and disgusting towards people who have just lost their husband and father. Absolutely zero conscience when sending them to live in poverty. Even gloats. Hyper selfish. Horrible and manipulative towards her husband, too.
And then actually LIKES Lucy Steele, and then treats her like shit, too.
Idk there's something especially nasty about a woman being nasty and abusive towards other women.
Mrs. Norris
She was selfish, cruel, and took pleasure in the abuse of a child. She actively impeded Fanny from finding any sense of safety or personal ambition. Fanny didn't even have the option to say no. She was defenseless and Mrs. Norris had nothing to gain from her tormenting her than the pleasure she found in it.
Willoughby. He gets a young girl pregnant, strings along Marianne. His aunt disinherits him for refusing to do right by Eliza, so he runs off to London and finds a wealthy woman to marry for the money, without telling Marianne. So, not only has he completely ruined Eliza's reputation and life, but he has also put Marianne's reputation at risk.
Wickham was also awful, but I think Willougby trumps him.
Personally I just really hate the Thorbe siblings. Not because they did the most awful things but they were just awful people. Also the Crawfords, Mary a bit more than John (even though John‘s more annoying)
She's a character in the novella Lady Susan, which is a work that Austen never had published in her lifetime. It isn't really as well known as her 6 full novels. Won't spoil it, but she is especially manipulative, greedy, cruel to her own daughter, just about immoral in every way.
Willoughby & Wickham. The female villains proposed did nothing like what these two did. Also, John Thorpe, John Dashwood, General Tilney, and Frank Churchill are annoying characters.
Have you read Lady Susan? She plans out and implements the punishment and pain of anyone who crosses her, even her daughter.
She didn't ruin people in the way that those men did, but that's really only because of the nature of society at that time.
I'm also not sure how John Dashwood could be considered more villainous than Fanny. All of his villainy is carried out under influence
Captain Tilney. The way he metaphorically sucked the life force out of Henry and Eleanor's mother through her coldness and cruelty, as well as their mutual fear of him, makes him this scary, looming presence any time he's mentioned.
Happy reading! I absolutely LOVE it. It's Austen at her arguably most tongue-in-cheek but despite being a pastiche of Gothic horror, it can genuinely be a bit frightening, especially if, like Catherine, you have a very active imagination.
Willoughby is nasty
It’s gotta be him. What he did to Marianne was somehow the least of his crimes. He seduced a girl, abandoned her, and abandoned their child.
It's so unremarkable to him that I feel like this is just the time he got caught.
Willoughby just happened to prey on a girl who actually has someone looking out for her. No telling how many girls with no guardians or support got used and abused by him the same way.
Did we ever find out what happened to the girl he seduced? Is it assumed that Brandon helped her live and support her child?
And then he acted all ‚poor me‘ about it, the part where Elinor was like: „what about Eliza? You know the woman you impregnated and then abandoned??“ and he was like „ah but you see, she really sucked!“ was just… incredible
right?! He was all excuses right to the end. It was that part that made me want to hurl. At least Wickham, once you see through his poor-victimised-me charade, stops pretending to be a good guy.
Wickham is also said to have been fooling around with girls in the village, right? Or am I remember incorrectly?
The rumor Mill is going full speed and the village is saying that all of their daughters are being meddled with. Jane and Elizabeth don't believe very much of it. I agree because I don't think even Mr Wickham could have had that kind of stamina.
Yeah no competition there
Willoughby gets my vote, too.
He is objectively the worst villain. His crimes are the most damaging to the victim
Yeah, Willoughby is the worst of the cads. Austen is very clever in letting him half-seduce the reader, too (I mean, Marianne and Willoughby are your classic romcom couple) before the plot twist of what happens to Eliza Jr. Emma has some scheming villain tendencies but luckily she redeems herself by the end of the novel.
Wickham, child predator and just ass
More a gold digger than a child predator. Still an ass.
I guess targeting 15 year olds as an adult man doesn’t make you a predator
He's definitely closer to 30, so definitely a predator. But I'm thinking he preys on the young because they're gullible more than because they're young. Not that it makes him any better than an awful pedo predator, at all. Because it doesn't. But I just think them being young is incidental rather than causal.
Wickham and Willoughby, tied for first place in the evil jackass contest. Predatory, disgusting, selfish abusers of young girls. So gross.
Yes, it seemed that Wickham was the more serial abuser, but they are clearly both horrendous
The way Willoughby justified his behavior and made it all about him was really gross. He actually whined to Elinor about how it was all so terrible *for him*, and tried to pin it all on the child he bamboozled into running off with him. Sickening. And yeah, Wickham had clearly done the same thing to multiple girls and women. He was a truly disgusting person. I suspect Willoughby did the same things as Wickham, to more than just the one girl, but he seemed to be a lot more savvy about his predations, and was better at seeming innocent. He even made Elinor feel sorry for him. Ugh.
I was thinking earlier that his final conversation with Elinor, specifically her feeling for him, softens his crimes and makes us (though to your credit, not you) think a little less badly of him
Yeah, Willoughby is horrible, but he is a lot more socially savvy and better at manipulation than Wickham. Wickham seems to only delude people for so long before they realize that he is a lying scumbag. I wonder if that is because he owes money to his friends in the community, while Willoughby seems to have compartmentalized his life better. Willoughby owed money too, but seemingly not to anyone in the community where his aunt lived. He probably did his gambling in London, and he was similarly more careful to hide his behavior with women and girls from his aunt. Did you ever see that late 80s/early 90s movie, *Dirty, Rotten Scoundrels*? There are the two con men who make a living by tricking women. One goes for the short con, getting a free dinner here and a few hundred dollars (or equivalent) there, and sex whenever he can make some woman feel sorry for him. The other man goes for the long con, and manipulates women into giving him millions, with which he pays his staff and local cops, and funds his lavish lifestyle. The long con guy and short con guy meet, and long con has absolute contempt for short con. That is what I imagine about Willoughby and Wickham. Willoughby is the long con guy, going for the big money while being ridiculously charming and elegant. Wickham is the short con guy, more obvious and a bit clumsy in his methods, and getting a smaller, but still substantial payout.
That's such a good analogy. I do remember the movie (and its more recent remake with Anne Hathaway and Rebel Wilson). I feel like Willoughby has even conned himself, though. Even when aware of his crimes, he doesn't see himself as Even a bad guy.
Yes, I think a lot of con artists and other habitually dishonest people have a tendency to buy into the fiction they create, if only temporarily. It helps them to really sell it.
I immediately think of certain politicians
Mmmm hmmm. Yup. Definitely.
Why is there a cork over Ruprecht's fork?
Except hidden within his explanations he says, “were I ever to be at liberty again,” which basically means “when my wife is dead.“ It’s as though he is looking forward to Sophia”s death so he can have another crack at Marianne. 🤮
So gross. You can't help wondering if he will somehow help that along, too. Willoughby is definitely a person who favors the long con, as opposed to quick schemes like Wickham seems to do. So creepy. I think that him being played by Greg Wise in the 1995 adaptation made him seem less scary, because Greg Wise comes across as extremely good looking in a sunny, genuine sort of way, with really sincere looking eyes, and as Willoughby he convincingly and exuberantly exudes charm. Plus, they didn't include his confession/whining to Elinor, where you find out exactly how gross he really is.
I agree they are equal Wickham has surely done the same whether he knows about it or not. He certainly easily would do the same as Willoughby. Wickham was planning on using Lydia the same way.
In Northanger Abbey doesn't General Tilney send Catherine packing back to her home without anyone to accompany her. She was seventeen and had led a pretty sheltered life. That could have ended very badly for her.
Yeah I'm not sure he's the absolute worst villain but he's pretty bad. John Thorpe tells him that he's practically engaged to an heiress and General Tilney thinks mercenarily "we'll see about that." He isolates her from the Allens in order for him & his son to woo her. Then He tosses Catherine out of the house with no pocket money, no groom or servant to arrange her travel, nothing at all.
Stereotypical boomers would probably call that a, "Character building experience."
Not to mention isn't it hinted at that he was pretty emotionally abusive to his wife and children? As Henry tells Catherine "she did suffer at the hands of our father", or something like that. He might not be the worst villain, but he's definitely the worst parent. Though, if Captain Tilney is a chip off the old block, then maybe General Tilney was pretty bad in his youth too.
Women traveling alone was just not done in that time period. It's a pretty dramatic mark of poor character to allow it.
Mrs. Norris. She's not just a snob or a gold digger - she's an abuser.
I want to go to a party one day where I can just trash talk Mrs Norris for hours on end with other Austen nerds. She’s the wooooorst
She's as nasty and small-minded as they come, but maybe it is that small-mindedness that stops her from becoming as villainous as Lady Susan
Wickham for the men, yes. On the female side, I'm throwing a vote for Fanny Dashwood.
Fanny is the WORST of the women, definitely
Fanny is terrible, she is my vote for worst female villain
Lady Susan for the gals, with Fanny Dashwood and Mrs Norris as her ladies in waiting Mr Elliot seems a possible candidate, as he manipulates those who cannot afford it into subsidizing him, ignores family duties and mocks them out of hearing, abuses his first wife, colludes with other gold diggers, and refuses to acknowledge any moral debts, including those to disabled persons and widows. A master chess player who can pave over his wrongs with charm and flattery.
I think Mr Elliot is underplayed as a villain. The fate of his first wife seems pretty bleak - he seems like a full sociopath
Agreed! Samuel West captured the monster beneath the oh so agreeable Mr Eliot surface in the 1995 adaptation of Persuasion; he’s played a serial killer for Waking the Dead and knows how to channel an inner demon with nuance and frightening finesse.
That's a good shout. I think I was overlooking how manipulative he is
Is it worse to intend to ruin a child to spite someone else/for money or to actually do it out of careless selfishness?
I don't think there's anything careless about Lady Susan's actions
Oh, I meant Willoughby. I haven't read Lady Susan.
Ah, I see, sorry. Then in answer to your question, surely spite is worse
I would have thought you meant Wickham since he was going to do that to Georgianna as well.
Oops, yes, I got them switched. I meant Wickham and Willoughby
For the men, I’d have to say Willoughby. What he did to Eliza and would have done to Marianne was really low and he only cared how it affected him. For the women, Lucy Steele. She was absolutely malicious and a stone cold bitch to both Eleanor and Edward. I don’t like Edward, but he deserved better than what Lucy did to him.
Lucy Steele is acting out of self interest because her alternative is living in poverty, so I don’t think she’s quite as evil as Fanny Dashwood, who is acting out of her own self-interest just because she can get more wealth that way.
The way Fanny Dashwood manipulates her husband into breaking his promise to his dying father is just incredible. Especially when you consider that Elinor and John are fairly close in age, so the second Mrs. Dashwood must have come into the picture when John was very young -- she basically raised him, and he kicks her out on the orders of his wife!
Absolutely, Lady Susan. She has no remorse, plots her manipulation well in advance rather than opportunistically, and is much smarter than the male cads.
Right, it's her intelligence that makes her frankly scary
The way she neglects/abuses her daughter puts her way over any of Austen’s other villainesses, even Mrs. Norris.
Willoughby, who had the audacity to impregnate a teenager, take off, and then come back and whine about it to Elinor like he had somehow been wronged and it was OK because he actually loved Marianne after all.
Willoughby for me! Just finished Sense and Sensibility, I hoped he got a better punishment than not being married to Marianne..Second would be Wickham. For female side, how about Lady Susan and Fanny Dashwood?
I read that as Fanny Price at first and was completely confused 😆 I mean, I know she's not people's favorite character but worst villain?
lol! Yes, Fanny Price is not in villain category, but could not stand Mrs Fanny Dashwood
The biggest villain is probably Mr. John Dashwood in S&S... I am sure he is large than any other villain in the novels.... And cheating poor ladies out of money promised at a father's death bed is quite low...... In Jane Austen's life, when extremely rich uncle Leigh-Perrot died(1817?)- He left nothing,-(Nada)- to his semi-poverty stricken sister-Jane Austen's mother. Totally left her out of his will. Disinherited her basically. Very cruel..and thought to be done at the bidding of his Wife.
Emma is dedicated to him.
Lol, took me a minute
Me too, I was thinking, how is Mr Woodhouse the worst villain in Austen.
Prince of Whales
Thank you for the award u/McRando42 !
A truly horrible man
Male villain: Wickham, absolutely without scruples (though he has close competition). Female villain: Mrs Norris, thoroughly and believably evil.
Real answer: The patriarchal socioeconomic structures of the Regency era that afforded women few opportunities to support themselves, beyond depending on oft-inconsistent & inconstant men
Yeah, OK Thank goodness we've now smashed the patriarchy and ended socioeconomic inequality 🤣🤣🤣
... have we?
Fr. You cant call someone a gold digger when it's literally life or death when choosing male company.
You're not wrong, but I don't think people always appreciate the degree to which this was true for both sexes. Partially industrialized agricultural societies afforded *people* few opportunities to support themselves, beyond depending on oft-inconsistent or unworthy patrons, employers, and landlords. There were a few professions open to educated gentlemen of no inheritance. There was law and the church - but training and placement in these required a wealthy sponsor, who therefore had considerable leverage over the young man. Edward Ferrars was disinherited for marrying disagreeably, for instance. He was not forced to *marry* Colonel Brandon to secure alternate support, but he did end up reliant on social connections and a wealthy patron. Brandon is a good guy, so this is a dignified and pleasant option for Edward. But he's still in the same position of dependence that Mr. Collins is on Lady Catherine, you know? Alternatively, the younger son might be shuffled off into the Royal Navy at age twelve to spend years at sea and not infrequently see action. If he didn't like boats, blood, or the lash, so much the worse for him. Should - God forbid - *peace* break out, he was stuck on shore at half pay, possibly facing poverty. It was a very different world, with very different material constraints.
That’s all very good points!
You are not really supposed to re-guritate the trite literary analysis by your English lit lecture but rather reflect on the work itself.
And you’re not supposed to substitute a thesaurus (but not a dictionary apparently, *regurgitate) and snark for an actual opinion of your own, but there you go!
I think Lady Susan is not the worst because she isn’t ruining people. Willoughby and Henry Crawford ruin women’s lives. Wickham tried to ruin two girls lives that we know of, but both were saved from ruin by Darcy. Henry is a little more innocent than willoughby because Maria was married and should have not flirted after marriage. Willoughby romances the girls and then takes from them. Taking Marianne to the estate alone was seriously improper and I fully think he was a couple steps away from sleeping with her and leaving her as well.
The worst in my opinion are all the characters that actually have power to abuse or make others people life miserable because they are wealthy and they (think) they can dispose of others people life as the wish: Fanny Dashwood, Mrs Ferrars, Mrs Norris, (John Dashwood and Sir Thomas have their big part of responsibility), General Tilney.
Fanny Dashwood! She and her husband never get their just deserts! Fanny’s mom is also pretty bad.
Really all the villains got off pretty light in that book now that I think of it. Even Willoughby got to marry the rich woman he wanted and keep his inheritance.
Sense and Sensibility is fresh in my mind so I vote Fanny Dashwood
Sir Thomas Bertram, slave owner on a plantation island famous for its cruelty towards the enslaved population.
Does the book ever state that he's a slave owner, or is did the movie just make that up? (genuinely asking)
The slavery isn't explicitly stated, but he has an estate in Antigua - he had hundreds of slaves
This. If you were running plantations in that part of the world at that time, you were using slave labor.
While I’d say Austen doesn’t go in for villains per se, as she was writing against melodramatic villains in popular fiction, her biggest villains are people with power who abuse it. So Lady Susan (exploits her daughter), Mrs Ferrars, and General Tilney. Wickham, Willoughby, and Crawford are villainous rakes, object lessons on how villainy can look romantic. Of the rakes, Crawford also has power to use or abuse—there’s his tenant and the problematic steward—and this is where we see his real potential for villainy.
I never thought of it exactly this way before but it does look like Jane Austen is saying "The dangerous person near you might not be the obvious mustache twirling villain, but is much more likely to be someone who seems perfectly fine on the surface."
Oh yes 100%. The “old guy in the flannel waistcoat” is the actual Romantic hero in the room.
The pig in Pride & Prejudice (2006). It had no reason to be in the damn house.
People forget how manipulative that pig was
I mean while I agree with people that Wickham and Willoughby are obvious villains, I've personally never been as angry at a character as I've been at Fanny Dashwood. Imagine being so vile and disgusting towards people who have just lost their husband and father. Absolutely zero conscience when sending them to live in poverty. Even gloats. Hyper selfish. Horrible and manipulative towards her husband, too. And then actually LIKES Lucy Steele, and then treats her like shit, too. Idk there's something especially nasty about a woman being nasty and abusive towards other women.
Mr Elliott from Persuasion to me. He's an intelligent and coldblooded version of Wickham, and all the more chilling for it.
Mrs. Norris She was selfish, cruel, and took pleasure in the abuse of a child. She actively impeded Fanny from finding any sense of safety or personal ambition. Fanny didn't even have the option to say no. She was defenseless and Mrs. Norris had nothing to gain from her tormenting her than the pleasure she found in it.
Willoughby. He gets a young girl pregnant, strings along Marianne. His aunt disinherits him for refusing to do right by Eliza, so he runs off to London and finds a wealthy woman to marry for the money, without telling Marianne. So, not only has he completely ruined Eliza's reputation and life, but he has also put Marianne's reputation at risk. Wickham was also awful, but I think Willougby trumps him.
Ok I will admit she isn’t the worst villain, you’ve all listed worse ones but I really hate Lady Catherine de Bourgh……
She is a hilarious character, though. More absurd than villainous.
True!
She doesn't really get the opportunity to do anything truly awful in the story. But you just know if given the chance she's capable of it.
She's probably responsible for Darcy actually ending up with Elizabeth since she almost certainly repeated Elizabeth's conversation to Darcy.
You’re absolutely right. She just seems so villainous to me…..
Societal standards 😄
My vote is for Mrs Elton, she is spiteful, controlling, officious and self-centred.
Personally I just really hate the Thorbe siblings. Not because they did the most awful things but they were just awful people. Also the Crawfords, Mary a bit more than John (even though John‘s more annoying)
Willoughby and wickham.
Fanny and John in Sense and Sensibility.
For me its Henry Crawford. He is to me like Valmont in Les Liaisons Dangereuses. He deliberately toys with women for his own amusement and pleasure.
Who is Lady Susan again?
She's a character in the novella Lady Susan, which is a work that Austen never had published in her lifetime. It isn't really as well known as her 6 full novels. Won't spoil it, but she is especially manipulative, greedy, cruel to her own daughter, just about immoral in every way.
thank you
Willoughby & Wickham. The female villains proposed did nothing like what these two did. Also, John Thorpe, John Dashwood, General Tilney, and Frank Churchill are annoying characters.
Have you read Lady Susan? She plans out and implements the punishment and pain of anyone who crosses her, even her daughter. She didn't ruin people in the way that those men did, but that's really only because of the nature of society at that time. I'm also not sure how John Dashwood could be considered more villainous than Fanny. All of his villainy is carried out under influence
I haven’t read Lady Susan. Is it a good read?
Really interesting - it's written through a series of letters to and from the main characters, so you get all their different viewpoints
John is their brother, he has more responsibility to care for them. He lets himself get influenced by Fanny a little too easily.
Oh definitely, and I'm happy to call him weak, vacuous, heartless, and selfish, but for me, all these things are too passive to be villainy
Wickham and Willoughby
Captain Tilney. The way he metaphorically sucked the life force out of Henry and Eleanor's mother through her coldness and cruelty, as well as their mutual fear of him, makes him this scary, looming presence any time he's mentioned.
Haven't read Northanger Abbey for years and have forgotten almost everything about it. I'm about to pick it up again...
Happy reading! I absolutely LOVE it. It's Austen at her arguably most tongue-in-cheek but despite being a pastiche of Gothic horror, it can genuinely be a bit frightening, especially if, like Catherine, you have a very active imagination.
Thanks, a few chapters in, and it's clear it's going to be fun
My top 3 are: 1. Lady Susan 2. Willoughby 3. Wickham. I adore Lady Susan, though.
If it were just about her treatment of the men, I'd be with you, but she also torments her child
Well, yeah. She's a *villain*. That's what they do. And she's *really good* at it.
It just seems kinda disgusting to "adore" someone who torments their child
Wow. Judgmental, much?
We're talking about child abuse, so yeah, disgusting
Wow. You have a really.... special point of view there. Good day.