1. Hannibal

It's hard to forget Anthony Hopkins' portrayal of Dr Hannibal Lecter in the film Silence of the Lambs. The cultured and sophisticated Hannibal was first introduced in the 1981 novel Red Dragon, written by Thomas Harris. There is now a whole franchise of films and TV series based on the cannibalistic serial killer, who often tops polls as the number one villain.

"I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti.” Dr Hannibal Lecter

2. Frankenstein's creature

Mary Shelley was only nineteen when she wrote the gothic novel Frankenstein. The strange, haunting story of Dr Frankenstein and his monster came to Mary Shelley in a dream-like vision. The crucial scene in the novel is when Victor Frankenstein examines his living creation for the first time and realises that it isn’t the beautiful exemplar of humanity that he’d originally envisaged.

3. Heathcliff

Since its publication in 1847, Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights has become one of the most admired and popular of all English novels. Heathcliff is more often thought of as a romantic hero, because of his love for Cathy than for his later years of retribution. In the second part of the novel he grows into a vicious, haunted man. His complicated, mesmeric and peculiar nature makes him a rare character, with components of both the hero and villain.