Can the hero be a villian?

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clippedwolf

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A list of heroic characteristics are courageous, skilled, sacrificial, destined, decisive, loyal, selfless, convicted, humble, etc...
These are all celebrated attributes and I don't think that anyone can argue that these are not noble.
If a character had all of these characteristics but was defined by violent action, at what point would this violence and against whom would it make this almost laudable character villainous?

We think of children, for example, as a group that are to be protected. This sentiment is relatively recent in our history. What if an almost noble character killed children of one group in the belief that it would protect his group's children in the future? What if the history of that world supported his belief?

Imagine a (male) hero who acknowledges that a woman could be his equal or even superior, and he would kill a farmer in her field with as little guilt as he cuts down her husband. What if is a heroine who uses her steel against a poorly trained farming couple and their sharp farming instruments? Justify the killers anger to the point where they can retain these previously stated "heroic" characteristics and believe that their ends justify their means.

Right and wrong, good and evil are moral judgments. I believe people and their morality are products of their times, but right now I am asking you, a contemporary reader, can a character be simultaneously heroic and villainous? When does a character go from the "edgy" anti-hero to a full-fledged villain? How far is too far and why?
 
Perfume by Patrick Suskind
American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy
Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
Vanity Fair by William Thackery
to a lesser extent Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger

All the above are pretty nasty characters and the top two particularly so. As long as the character is interesting somebody will read it. Jean-Baptiste Grenouille (Perfume) is a serial killer with not really any redeeming features.

Whilst I have read all the above I have long since realised I like heroes heroic and only read books with goodies as protagonist.
 
History is written by the winners, therefore they are the heros. How many WWII movies have you seen where Germans are anything but targets? Most movies show the allies as brave heros, dispite the fact that they were mostly scared kids and were guilty of just as many battlefield attrocities as Axis forces.

Current events are written by the loudest, therefore they decide who the heros are. How many times has poor Spider Man suffered because of the ire of J Jonah Jameson?

Personally, I don't see any valid excuse for killing children and non-combatants, but the greatest heros in the Bible (David comes to mind) had entire cities butchered. David even had one of his most loyal followers killed so he could have the man's wife, yet we all learn as children that David was a great hero because he took on Goliath.

So, in answer, rotten SOB's can certainly be protagonists, and good people can be villans. It's all a matter of perspective.
 
Several of my favorite heroes are criminals, although they don't generally go so far as murder.

Harry Harrison's Slippery Jim DiGriz.
Lawrence Block's Bernie Rhodenbarr.
Donald Westlake's John Dortmunder.

A recent Lawrence Block book was about a female serial killer, and while I wouldn't precisely call her a hero (or heroine), she was the protagonist.
 
What about a character who is simply realistic in terms of good and bad? People are not black and white. You have bad people who are kind to children and animals, or devoted to their families. Equally you can have good people who do terrible things at certain times in their life. Some of them lie awake at night for years afterwards wondering if they did the right thing.

You also have the redemption character - somebody who would technically be a bad guy, but has some moral compass left and draws a line in the sand. They won't cross it and will stop anyone else who tries to. They might be a thief and a murderer, but they won't steal from an orphanage, or level a city with the Weapon of Doom.

Despite all that, after saving little orphan Annie or the world, they may go back to their life of crime afterwards. I like complex characters more than the cardboard cut-outs.
 
Isn't one of Joe Abercrombie's characters on the psycho side (or am I thinking Brent Weekes?)
Warrior type that when he reaches beserker he kills anyone standing too close, even allies and kids?

And for villain as hero

Flashman books.
 
According to the writing books I've read, the key difference between a protagonist and an antagonist is that the protagonist has changed by the end of the story, the antagonist remains the same.

In which case, it isn't whether a protagonist is "good" or "bad" but whether they have a significant emotional development arc that is the core concern.
 
Yes, although it has to be done well. For every writer with a childishly black and white view of good and evil, there is one on a mission to "subvert the genre", which usually ends up making the author look like a sulky adolescent. I would rather read the former, because it might actually be fun.
 
Montero said:
Isn't one of Joe Abercrombie's characters on the psycho side (or am I thinking Brent Weekes?)
Warrior type that when he reaches beserker he kills anyone standing too close, even allies and kids?
Click to expand...

And what about Glotka? I loved that character, really rooted for him. Yet he's a torturer...

Heroes can be villains. Heroes can be ********* too. And sometimes your hero isn't a hero at all, merely the protagonist.
 
Hi,

Personally I like my heroes heroic - but as mentioned above in the character of Slippery Jim Degrizz, I don't mind a little larcenous.

I think it comes down to how you write it. Could you make a hero do something really evil like kill children? Maybe. But could you do it in a way that will either make the act understandable to the reader, i.e. he had to do it to save his family, or else write the character so that even though he does terrible things he has their sympathy. Alternatively can you write a heroic villain that does not get the reader's sympathy / empathy, but is still interesting to read?

It's a balancing act. If you want him to be appealing, than he can't really do terrible things and still have that empathy from the reader. If you want him to be convincing then mixing the highest nobility with the basest evil acts is going to jar the reader.

But my best guess as to where you'll find these sorts of characters would be Lestat from Anne Rice, and a few other vamps. Torn between their hunger and their desire to be human? Good? Loved?

Cheers, Greg.
 
Ninety-nine per cent of the time I love the bad guys more than the good guys. I was rooting for Voldy when he came up against Harry in the Deathly Hallows, I bloody LOVE American Psycho even though it creeps me out to the highest degree. To me, the most interesting characters have had bad things happen to them that define them: the struggle between what they inherently are (which is, I believe, good people) and what that defining event has made them be is fascinating. Good guys are boring. Long live the bad guys!

Though I do have to say, the thing that will turn me off most is a 2D villain, who cackles and thwarts our hero for no particular reason other than to further the plot. I can live with a child-murderer, if what he's done has a reason, and a good one at that. I can accept most things in writing if you can convince me there's a motive behind what he's doing, and that somewhere, deep down, he's really not all rotten.
 
Just be careful with tropes. One of the most commonly used one is the bad guy protagonist that instantly grows a conscience at the end of a story and sacrifices himself/herself. It's effective, but annoying, and not terribly realistic. You don't go from heartless murderer to messiah in a few page turns.
 
Mary Gentle's Grunts. A book about the forces of dark - the Orcs. Very funny. The Orcs manage to be horrible and likeable at the same time. The forces of light tip over into prissy.
 
Montero said:
Mary Gentle's Grunts. A book about the forces of dark - the Orcs. Very funny. The Orcs manage to be horrible and likeable at the same time. The forces of light tip over into prissy.
Click to expand...

The forces of light in Grunts, in many cases, have a touch of the King David's - heroically killing innocents to get to the supposed villains.

Well worth reading.
 
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