Best Novel Antihero?

[Werthead]

So most books have heroes and villains, but what about those characters who are morally ambiguous, somewhat self-centered and capable of despicable acts, but also engage the reader's interest and occasional sympathy? To quote Arnold J. Rimmer, "Everybody loves a bastard", sometimes.

 

1. Jaime Lannister from A Song of Ice and Fire. In what is probably the greatest about-turn of a character in fantasy history, George RR Martin spent two significantly large novels painting this character as a totally reprehensible git. He has illicit liaisons with his twin sister, which single-handedly plunges the country into civil war; he betrayed his oath as a Kingsguard and murdered the previous king (who was insane, true, but it still makes him an oathbreaker); he tries to kill an eight-year-old boy in cold blood; he kills a number of minor 'good' characters; and is generally proud and sarcastic the whole time. Then GRRM made him a viewpoint character and deconstructed him expertly, revealing his (pig-headed and foolhardy) bravery, his extremely twisted sense of honour and his growing sense of responsibility for what has happened to the nation. Changing a character for the better and 'redeeming' him is a difficult thing to do, but GRRM is succeeding admirably. Jaime Lannister is still going to hell, but now there is the sense that he may achieve something more noble along the way.

 

2. Cugel from Jack Vance's Dying Earth Saga. Of course, a good antihero doesn't need any kind of redemption. Cugel is a cowardly, back-stabbing thief who takes to his heels at the first sign of danger, yet lords it over peasents and other people whenever he has the chance and has an inflated sense of his own worth. The middle two books of the Dying Earth are simply a comic masterclass as Cugel repeatedly finds and loses riches, gets embroiled in ridiculously hilarious escapades and brings around his own downfall.

 

3. Ansurimbor Kellhus from R. Scott Bakker's The Prince of Nothing Trilogy. Bakker's modern epic fantasy masterpiece tells the story of a Holy War against the infidel, but at its heart it is the story of the rise to power of the enigmatic Kellhus. A powerfully charasmatic, intensely intelligent human, Kellhus' motives are difficult to fathom (even for himself) and his ability to utterly dominate any circumstance is impressive. Kellhus is rutheless and occasionally commits acts that are treacherous or evil, yet this is the only thing that may save humanity from annihilation at the hands of the No-God and the evil Consult. Kellhus is fantasy's answer to Paul Atreides, speaking of whom...

 

4. Paul Atreides from Frank Herbert's Dune, Dune Messiah and Children of Dune. Paul has the best of intentions, striving to avenge his father's murder and free the people of Arrakis, but in doing so he unleashes a galactic jihad that kills tens of billions of people, perverts the socio-economic structure of millions of planets to serve his needs and creates a dubious religion, only to try and destroy it (and die in the process). He also disappears into the desert for a decade, leaving the fate of the Imperium hanging in the balance.

 

5. Pedron Niall from Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time. Jordan isn't known for his morally shady characters, but Niall steals every scene he is in. It would have been easy to make the commander of the Children of the Light a psychotic religious nutjob, but instead Niall is shown to be a shrewd pragmatist, a skilled battle commander and willing to admit when he is wrong. He is also utterly ruthless, condones torture and the sewing of civil war when it suits his purposes. Given that Jordan has killed only a handful of major characters in his 10,000-page gigaepic, the fact that one of them was the interesting Niall was somewhat annoying.

 

6. Theon Greyjoy from GRRM's A Song of Ice and Fire. ASoIaF is awash with antiheroes and morally shady characters, but Theon emerges from them as a particularly irritating but well-portrayed morally empty character. Theon brutally betrays his friends and adopted family to unleash a devastating war against their homeland whilst it is unguarded, then overreaches himself and ends up getting partially flayed alive for his troubles. Yet there is a twisted sense of honour at Theon's heart, hinting at his possible redemption. He's only a POV character in the second novel and is a background presence in the first. It will be interesting to see how he develops upon his promised return in the fifth volume.

 

7. Karsa Orlong from Steven Erikson's The Malazan Book of the Fallen series. Pulling off a good, brooding barbarian character is very difficult. Even Howard castrated Conan by turning him into the ruler of a proto-French country. Yet Erikson seems to be challenging Conan with his character of Karsa. Karsa is a brooding, hulking warrior who has been betrayed many times and now seeks to lead his people to domination over all the world. This is complicated by the fact that, as of the sixth book in the series, he's about five thousand miles away on another continent, and heading even further afield. Karsa can be funny, violent and has a somewhat twisted sense of honour and loyalty. He is also cruel to his (numerous) enemies and spends a huge amount of time pondering which other major character he is going to kill next.

 

8. Feanor from JRR Tolkien's The Silmarillion. Feanor, frankly, is a bit of a tool. He has unhealthy designs on his neice, Galadriel; is stuffed full of pride and hubris; and has family issues with his half-brothers. He also decides that angering the gods is a worthwhile thing to do to chase after a mystical bauble. Not content with that, he also dumps his brother and half of his army on the shores of a frozen sea and forces them to march across it. However, Feanor is also somewhat brave and his decision to stand against the evil of Morgoth when even the Valar are prevaricating is probaly the right one. He just does it the wrong way. It's obvious that Tolkien had no choice but to have Feanor pretty much torn limb-from-limb by a pack of balrogs: he'd enraged too many people for them to convincingly allow him to live.

 

9. The Marquis de Carabas from Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere. The Marquis is a morally ambiguous character who is arrogant, annoying, rude and ruthless. He is also loyal to those who give him favours, has flashes of humanity and does make the ultimate sacrifice for Door (he gets better). A great character, made even more real by Patterson Joseph's brilliant portrayal in the TV series, which he steals by a mile.

 

10. Boromir from Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. What a berk. But he comes good in the end.

 

Other thoughts, suggestions?

[Guest Karana Majin]

I do like your two ASoIaF characters, but would have to throw in Tyrion. The guy drinks way too much, whores way too much, and yet... I like him. A lot. There is good in him that has been twisted by his body and how everyone treats him.

[Kivam]

Brutus/Jack from the Troy Game series (what a pitch perfect ending that had!).

 

Probably my favorite anti-hero is the Prophet/Hunter in CS Friedman's Coldfire trilogy

[yolindamo]

My favorite author is Kurt Vonnegut who is a master at writing the anti-hero. My personal favorite? Kilgore Trout.

[the dude]

Elric of Melnibone. 'nough said. King of the Anti-Heroes.

[Hannibal King]

Artemis Entreri from Salvatore's books.

[Werthead]

I do like your two ASoIaF characters' date=' but would have to throw in Tyrion. The guy drinks way too much, whores way too much, and yet... I like him. A lot. There is good in him that has been twisted by his body and how everyone treats him.[/quote']

 

I'd say his only really bad character point is the whoring (although that is understandable from a psychological angle given his physical stature and what his father did to his first love). All of his other 'bad' habits are extremely tame compared to Jaime or Tywin's.

 

There are a couple of others I forgot to mention first time around:

 

Thomas Covenant from Stephen Donaldson's titular trilogies. He rapes a female character and refuses to believe in the existence of the Land and its people for a long time.

 

Gully Foyle from Alfred Bester's classic The Stars My Destination. Surely one of the earlier examples in the genre, although Conan occasionally evidenced antiheroic qualities as well.

[goldeneys]

Well, I havent read some of those books you mentioned, only LotR, WoT, and half way through SoS in aSoIaF.

 

I personally HATE Jaime, and a strong dislike for Theon was growing within me. I didn't get up to Feanor in Silmarillion yet, so I donno about him. I love Boromir, he's really cool, he tries to do what he thinks is right, and in the end, dies doing it. Niall...well, he's a good general, buut, not much else. The only Whitecloak I ever liked was Galad.

[The Outsider]

Elric of Melnibone. 'nough said. King of the Anti-Heroes.

 

I haven't actually read any of the Elric books yet (I do plan to), but by reputation alone I was surprised he wasn't #1 with a bullet on the above list and shocked that he wasn't in it at all!

[Werthead]

I read the first two Elric books (Stealer of Souls and Stormbringer) and was not impressed. The story was interesting, but the writing was poor and Elric came across as a whiny adolescent goth wannabe more than as the impressive character of legend he was supposed to be. Maybe in the other books he's more impressive, but those two put me off from reading them.

[I Love Semirhage]

Gollum!

 

He lies, he cheats, he steals and deceives, he spends his entire time plotting with himself to kill his companions. He's murdered his best friend over a seemingly worthless trinket and lived in a dark cave for 500 years. And yet, despite all his treachorous history, for a time he 'goes straight,' leading Frodo and Sam into Mordor, before he thinks of taking them to Shelob. It's made so much better by the fact that this is Tolkien writing, never before (or since) has the fall of a character been so brilliantly written. And then, just to piss off Hollywood, he turns evil again! And there is a lovely moment from the film as he falls into the lava, he stares at the ring still in his hand, realising it has betrayed him. Ironic really that the best acting in a film with the greatest all-star cast ever assembled came from a CG character based on an unknown actor, but there you go.

 

'Zakath, Emperor Of Mallorea - The Mallorean.

Kal Zakath is the most chilling of the villains in The Belgariad and The Mallorean, only having a small part in the former. We find out his back story early in the Mallorean, a twisted tale of love, murder, intrigue and self-loathing, and he then goes on to become one of the central characters (indeed Eddings himself remarked that Zakath carried the Mallorean completely). In the end he finds redemption and becomes happy again. That's one of the nice things about the anti-hero characters, it's much harder to predict how they'll end up.

 

Richard B Riddick - Pitch Black.

Escaped convict from a little-known Sci-Fi/Horror film, played by Vin Diesel in by far his best role to date. Although he is more of the conventional hero type in the second film, in Pitch Black he is nice and dark pretty much throughout, only turning fully 'good' at the end. Pity we don't really see the conversation that results in his conversion though.

 

Murtagh - Inheritence Trilogy.

Murtagh is a great character in the first book, and the twists that go with it are quite something. However, he is let down by his fall, explained at the end of the second book. It just seems like a bit of a cop out, to have oaths that prevent him from walking in the Light, so to speak, even if he wanted to.

 

The others worth mentioning: Krager (Elenium & Tamuli), Darth Vader, Severus Snape, and the WOT ones: Ingtar, Taim and Masema.

 

ILS

[MazrimTaim]

Artemis Entreri & the great Jarlaxle are among the best (and, if taken together THE best evil duo ever). Also, and closer to home, Mazrim Taim rules, though he is badly underdeveloped, and of course, Lanfear. The other Forsaken suck.

 

Another Forgotten Realms bad guy: Elaith Craulnober, "The Snake". Great story, great character.

[Kaznen]

Since we're on Drizzt and crew. We would be remiss if we didn't give a nod to the greatest weapons master in Mennzoberanzean....

 

 

 

Zaknafien Do'Urden

[MsDanya]

I agree with Zakath..

[circumventor]

Have you completly forgotten Roland Deschain of Gilead? Stephen King's gunslinger is a classic example of an anti-hero.

[Sirayn]

I see Roland of Gilead as being more like a straight-up hero. He has a distressing tendency to drop children off bridges and other choices of that nature, but these are acts of necessity, given the whole saving-all-universes thing. 8)

[Kaznen]

I don't remember the character's name. He was Markwort's lacky in the Demon war Trilogy. not the one who became the weretiger, the other one. He wasn't that old and Markwort made him the bishop of the "frontier" city of Honce-the-Bear.

 

He figured out what Markwort was in Demon Spirit. In Mortalis he tried to make Jilseponi(?) the Father Abbot (but I suppose it would be mother for her). He also nominated the rouge friar from Demon Awakens, the one who died in the lava and was good with the magic stones, for Sainthood.

 

But what really made him a anti-hero was in repentence for his sins earlier in life, he left the abbot during the Rosie Plague to help take care of the people dying from the plague, unitl he also died from it.

[liatildina]

Hmm can I add someone from a Series/Movie, please. Jayne, from Joss Whedon's firefly/serenity. Great character, is he going to sell you out, nope not this time, just make you laugh - but always keeps you wondering.

[details]

I think Achilles was the original anti-hero, which probably places him high in the rankings. Right?

[Stevenator]

Elric of Melnibone. 'nough said. King of the Anti-Heroes.

 

I agree just by the fact that he was designed to shatter the entirety of the Sword and Sorcery mold. But I also agree with Werthead--the craftmenship is possibly Moorcock at his lowest.

[Gentled Ben]

Blood and souls for my lord Arioch!! I enjoyed Elric.

 

Thomas Covenant, without a doubt. I grew to hate him so much that I was unable to finish the series; I just got angrier with him after each book. I made it through the first four and could stand him no more. :x

[Necrophorus]

Thomas Covenant is the most likely anti hero off them all (or at least of those I know). A leper that has only one way of living and gets put in some place where he experiences everything anew, which makes him mad. To go against his madness he tells himself that he is in a dream of some sort. A dream that is not real although everything that happens in the dream effects him still. He isnt a bad guy, he is just the most unlikely good guy you ever wanted to meet. Raping, challeging believes, uncaring, self centered and so on. But he has to be if he ever wants to stay alive when he gets thrown out of the "dream".

[Oregon]

Thomas Covenant is one of the most enigmatic fantasy characters I've ever read. He just freaked me out. I would alternately hate him and love him (and I'm all about shades of gray...it's hard to get me to commit to an extreme point of view). It's a shame that Donaldson's "Chronicles of Thomas Covenant" are nearly forgotten by the general public, since they reach some of the highest heights in epic fantasy I can imagine (though they *do* drag like Hell at times). Still, book two (The Illearth War) and parts of books three (The Power that Preserves) and five (The One Tree; especially the middle segments of this one) are almost unrivaled in fantasy fiction.

 

It's hard to fault him for the worst of his crimes, since he doesn't believe they are real, but he does commit them, so...it's a dilemma. He's a jerk, and hard to like. He dallies just a bit too long, but...it's well worth ready.

 

I think, as the series progresses, Jamie Lannister becomes the best character in ASoIaF...and Martin does an admirable job of misdirection to make us think he's even worse than he is for the first two plus books of the series. He's still a jerk, even after his "transformation", but we start to see what makes him tick...and he's quite complex. Another fantastic character.

[robalthor]

would have to agree with Thomas Covenant. Unbelief is essential in a good anti-hero

[RobertAlexWillis]

Gerrald Tarrant, from C S Friedman's Coldfire trilogy.

 

Anyone who has read it knows why.

 

Anyone who hasn't wouldn't really understand if I told you ...