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30 most evil lines from books

By Holly Pyne

17 June 2012

It's time for some booing and hissing.

Literature has offered up an overstuffed rogue's gallery of villains and with the power of the written word, they've embedded their wickedness in our minds. To celebrate their genuine awfulness, we've assembled the 30 most evil lines from books.

As always, let us know if we've missed off one of your favourites at the bottom.

Paradise Lost (John Milton)

"Better to reign in Hell, then serve in Heav'n."

Satan

The Shining (Stephen King)

“Wendy? Darling? Light, of my life. I'm not gonna hurt ya. I'm just going to bash your brains in.”

Jack Torrance

The Killer Inside Me (Jim Thompson)

"I kissed her, a long hard kiss. Because baby didn't know it, but baby was dead, and in a way I couldn't have loved her more."

Lou Ford

East Of Eden (John Steinbeck)

"When I was half-grown I made a man kill himself."

Cathy Ames

Richard III (William Shakespeare)

"I am in so far in blood that sin will pluck on sin."

Richard III

Uncle Tom's Cabin (Harriet Beecher Stowe)

"I have none o' yer bawling, praying singeing niggers on my place; so remember. Now, mind yourself. I'm your church now! You understand - you've got to be as I say."

Simon Legree

American Psycho (Bret Easton Ellis)

"My pain is constant and sharp and I do not hope for a better world for anyone. In fact, I want my pain to be inflicted on others. I want no one to escape."

Patrick Bateman

Treasure Island (Robert Louis Stevenson)

"There's never a man looked me between the eyes and seen a good day a'terward."

Long John Silver

No Country For Old Men (Cormac McCarthy)

"When I came into your life your life was over. It had a beginning, a middle, and an end. This is the end."

Anton Chigurh

The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe (C.S. Lewis)

"You know that every traitor belongs to me as my lawful prey and that for every treachery I have a right to a kill... And so, that human creature is mine. His life is forfeit to me. His blood is my property."

The White Witch

Rebecca (Daphne Du Maurier)

"It's you that ought to be lying there in the church crypt, not her. It's you who ought to be dead, not Mrs. de Winter."

Mrs Danvers

101 Dalmatians (Dodie Smith)

"Poison them, drown them, bash them on the head. Got any chloroform? I don't care how you kill the little beasts. Just do it, and do it NOW!"

Cruella De Vil

Oliver Twist (Charles Dickens)

"Lie down, you stupid brute! Don't you know the devil when he's got a great-coat on?"

Bill Sikes

The Trial (Franz Kafka)

"No one else could ever be admitted here, since this gate was made only for you. I am now going to shut it."

The Gatekeeper

Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince (JK Rowling)

"I can make bad things happen to people who annoy me. I can make them hurt if I want to."

Voldemort

Dracula (Bram Stoker)

"My revenge has just begun! I spread it over centuries and time is on my side."

Count Dracula

The Amber Spyglass (Philip Pullman)

"I wanted him to find no good in me and he didn't. There is none."

Marisa Coulter

Lord Of The Flies (William Golding)

"Kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood!"

Jack

Blood Meridian (Cormac McCarthy)

"War is the ultimate game because war is at last a forcing of the unity of existence. War is god."

Judge Holden

The Return Of The King (JRR Tolkien)

"Do not expect me to wish you health and long life. You will have neither. But that is not my doing. I merely foretell."

Saruman

Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)

"I'd like to see the government get out of war altogether and leave the whole field to private industry."

Milo Minderbinder

Ripley Under Ground (Patricia Highsmith)

"Honestly, I don't understand why people get so worked up about a little murder!"

Tom Ripley

Tess of the d'Urbervilles (Thomas Hardy)

"Remember my Lady I was your master once! I will be your master again."

Alec d'Urberville

The Silence Of The Lambs (Thomas Harris)

"A census taker tried to quantify me once. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a big Amarone."

Hannibal Lecter

The Jew Of Malta (Christopher Marlowe)

"Fornication: but that was in another country; And besides, the wench is dead."

Barabas

The Revenger's Tragedy (Thomas Middleton)

"As fast as they peep up, let's cut 'em down."

Vindice

Alice In Wonderland (Lewis Carroll)

"Off with his head!"

The Queen Of Hearts

1984 (George Orwell)

"Power is not a means, it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power."

O'Brien