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Dec. 1st, 2014 08:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
the_rckDo you have a favorite villain to write? If so, who? (for wyldbutterflies)
Looking at my fic, I haven't written villains very often. There's Nagi in Rheotaxis, Schuldig in Rheotaxis and Snare, and Jadis in Faded Colors. Well, maybe Crawford in The Road Taken, but he doesn't see himself as the villain of the piece, and I co-wrote that withhopeofdawn, so I'm not sure it counts. Possibly Prunaprismia from In Exile counts, but she really doesn't view herself as a villain, and the way the story goes, she doesn't feel like a villain to me. I almost forgot Cain in Impedimenta; he definitely counts. That's seven villains (counting Schuldig twice), not very many for fifty-three fics.
I think my favorite of the lot, in terms of being fun to write, was Jadis. She's definitely a villain even though she doesn't view herself as one. In Faded Colors, I wanted to explore Jadis' life on Charn and her time in the Narnian world before she conquered Narnia. I thought there were some interesting gaps there that could illuminate her character. Jadis doesn't view herself as a villain; she just assumes that the universe owes her everything she wants, and she'd rather see everything destroyed than see it go to someone else. That last is explicit in Lewis' portrayal of her. No one who didn't feel that way could use the Deplorable Word and be proud of it.
In Faded Colors, I wanted to understand Jadis as a person without making her necessarily less monstrous. She does truly terrible things in canon, and her only regret about them is that they don't gain her what she wants. What she wants is power without end, the ability to satisfy her every whim. I don't think she starts out enjoying cruelty for cruelty's sake. She just can't imagine that anyone else matters and sees no reason not to be cruel-- It is, to her mind, a better demonstration of power than kindness which might be taken for weakness.
Faded Colors on AO3 in case anybody's interested. Warning for non-con and underage for Jadis having (completely not explicit) sex with an OC slave when she's fourteen. Rated T.
wyldbutterflies)Looking at my fic, I haven't written villains very often. There's Nagi in Rheotaxis, Schuldig in Rheotaxis and Snare, and Jadis in Faded Colors. Well, maybe Crawford in The Road Taken, but he doesn't see himself as the villain of the piece, and I co-wrote that with
hopeofdawn, so I'm not sure it counts. Possibly Prunaprismia from In Exile counts, but she really doesn't view herself as a villain, and the way the story goes, she doesn't feel like a villain to me. I almost forgot Cain in Impedimenta; he definitely counts. That's seven villains (counting Schuldig twice), not very many for fifty-three fics.I think my favorite of the lot, in terms of being fun to write, was Jadis. She's definitely a villain even though she doesn't view herself as one. In Faded Colors, I wanted to explore Jadis' life on Charn and her time in the Narnian world before she conquered Narnia. I thought there were some interesting gaps there that could illuminate her character. Jadis doesn't view herself as a villain; she just assumes that the universe owes her everything she wants, and she'd rather see everything destroyed than see it go to someone else. That last is explicit in Lewis' portrayal of her. No one who didn't feel that way could use the Deplorable Word and be proud of it.
In Faded Colors, I wanted to understand Jadis as a person without making her necessarily less monstrous. She does truly terrible things in canon, and her only regret about them is that they don't gain her what she wants. What she wants is power without end, the ability to satisfy her every whim. I don't think she starts out enjoying cruelty for cruelty's sake. She just can't imagine that anyone else matters and sees no reason not to be cruel-- It is, to her mind, a better demonstration of power than kindness which might be taken for weakness.
Faded Colors on AO3 in case anybody's interested. Warning for non-con and underage for Jadis having (completely not explicit) sex with an OC slave when she's fourteen. Rated T.
