anti-villain
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English[edit]
Alternative forms[edit]
Etymology[edit]
Noun[edit]
anti-villain (plural anti-villains)
- (fiction) An antagonist who has or may have noble or honorable aims, but pursues them destructively.
- 1994, Alistair M. Duckworth, The Improvement of the Estate: A Study of Jane Austen's Novels[1], Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, page 95:
- As much the anti-hero initially as Thorpe is anti-villain, Tinley's function in the first volume is to expose to Catherine various modes of triviality and affectation.
- 2019, Martin Jay, “Sociology and the Heroism of Modern Life”, in Warren Breckman, Peter E. Gordon, editors, The Cambridge History of Modern European Thought: Volume II, The Twentieth Century, Cambridge University Press, page 19:
- The rise of the anti-hero as the protagonist of much of modern fiction was accompanied by the rise of what one might call the “anti-villain,” ironically understood as more interesting than his heroic counterpart.
Derived terms[edit]
Translations[edit]
antagonist who have noble goals
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