@Snoink - actually, I was going to mention Voldemort but the thing is, I can't decide if I like him or not as a villain! To be honest I never found him particularly menacing - because Harry beat him every single time! And I actually wrote a whole paragraph out about how I didn't like him as a villain, and then I thought of all the reasons why I did like him, and then I got stuck and deleted it all. He is a very well formed villain - with a background, a clear motive and plans that aren't just "I'm going to take over the world!" I kind of loved the Ministry scene in Book 7 for showing us how on a very mundane, bureaucratic level, things were changing. And I think that that is pretty cool.
Umbridge as well is pretty amazing and on that theme Rowling used her to show how evil comes through really banal sources. It's not all magic rings and world domination. And this isn't really something I've thought of before!
@Blackwood - but what about stories where there are no villains?
Desire is very important and that is something that I've personally noticed I fall down a lot on - I come up with something the villain is doing, but I can't understand their motivation for doing it. Having a very clear cut "this is what I want" makes that so much easier to translate over.
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