Role Models: Literary Villainesses

You may have noticed that I took the weekend off from posting, which was nice because I didn’t have anything I very much wanted to get out.

But today I’d like to talk about some of the women in literature I find to be very inspiring- the women who are pretty much the devil incarnate.

Putting aside issues of women’s representation in literature and other arts, and how it may or may not be more connected to men’s imagination than female actuality… some of my favorite characters are strong, selfish, and mean people.

I’m not sure why this is, especially because I’d like to think that I personally am nothing like that.  But it’s also not difficult to see why their drive, anger, and uncompromising attitudes are appealing.  After all, the world is a scary place and women are frequently expected to be easy victims of it.

The Real chef d’œuvre

What is a masterpiece?  Usually there’s a general critical (or at least cultural) consensus on what the ‘best’ novel is by any given author. Maybe it’s not explicitly called the ‘best’, but everyone recognizes it- it’s the book you’re assigned in high school and again in college, the one that people namedrop (title drop?) and the one you see on book lists. Which is really unfair because there are lots of under-appreciated books that deserve more love.  And because I’m all about spreading the love ❤ here are my favorite books that I completely subjectively think are the best by some veddy important authors.