Maktgalna häxor och hänsynslösa psykopater: En studie av de antagonistiska karaktärerna Circe och Warner

Sammanfattning: This thesis is a study of two antagonistic characters: Circe from the Gemma Doyle trilogy by Libba Bray, and Warner from the dystopia about Juliette Ferrars by Tahereh Mafi. The two characters represent something new in young adult literature, since they, although they are both viewed as the villains of their stories, also have become very popular and loved by their readers. In this thesis I study Circe and Warner respectively as characters, to try to establish why they gain so much sympathy from the readers, in the quest of answering what that might say about the ethics of our time and how we view the concept of evil and evil deeds today. I also aspire to prove my hypothesis that sympathy for evil or morally ambigous characters comes from the fact that we as readers can, and also feel the need to, identify ourselves with these characters rather than with the heroic ones since we have grown tired of never being good enough.