T5W: Anti-heroes

So its been a few weeks since I posed a T5W as life got a teeny bit crazy this month but thankfully things have calmed down again and my schedule should be back to normal. Top 5 Wednesday is hosted by GingerReadsLainey over on youtube, and each week we pick our top 5 favorite books that fall under a certain topic. This weeks topic is our top 5 anti-heroes in literature. Anti-heroes are my personal favorite type of character as they feel the most real to me: I like my characters dark and twisty. Flawed characters are so much more relatable than shiny happy perfect ones and all of my favorite books have characters that despite their character faults, do the right thing and save the day in the end. So here are my top 5 anti-heroes and as usual they are in no particular order. 

Severus Snape - Harry Potter Books by J. K. Rowling

Lets be honest here, everyone is going to have Snape on their list. Snape has always been character that I have loved since finishing the Harry Potter series, in the beginning I didn't like him mainly down to the simple fact that I didn't understand the motives behind his actions but when you finish the series the pieces all fit together and you can't help but love him.

Hamlet - Hamlet by William Shakespeare

In Shakespeare's Hamlet, the protagonist, Hamlet, is depicted as an antihero. One main factor which gives Hamlet such a label is that he draws sympathy, as well as admiration, from the reader as a result of the pain he feels from losing his father along with the burden of the obstacles in avenging his murder.

Jay Gatsby - The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald

Another obvious one here. Yes, he was a liar and a crook and a pretender and, eventually, an accomplice to manslaughter, but he did all of those thinks because of love. There was a time when that seemed kind of noble to me. Yes, now it seems pathetic but it's still impossible to hate him because of how goddamned hard he tries. Sure, he does terrible things and ultimately dies as a result but in the meantime he was striving in an earnest way that makes me uncomfortable to think about.

Javert - Les Miserables by Victor Hugo 

Javert is the ultimate agent of The Law, the true villain of Les Mis, propelled by his own dark past into becoming an uncompromising man. Born to criminals in a prison he feels that it is a man's nature to either break or uphold the law. He is such a believable character because we all know people who adhere to rigis beliefs, and we can see how these beliefs can become twisted in the face of reality, turning an otherwise admirable person into a fearsome foe.

Elphaba - Wicked by Gregory Maguire

Elphaba is the villain as she is the wicked witch of the west but when you read the book you can see how she can actually be considered a hero in her own right.