October 8, 2013

Evil Mothers in Movies or Books - My Ongoing Character List (Narcisstic Mothers, Sociopath Mothers)

This is interesting -- someone (actually, a woman named Kimberly Turner) has published an article entitled "Literature's Ten Most Disturbing Sociopaths."  The Top 10 of Villains, in a way, I guess.

Got me to thinking -- specifically about mothers.  Evil mothers.  On film, in books.  Maybe they are sociopaths (like Turner's inclusion of Cathy from East of Eden) or maybe they're narcissists.  Ask a daughter who served as narcisstic supply to her mother and she's probably not going to debate that her parent might have a bit of evil ribboning through her soul.

So, I thought I would start my own list of Evil Mothers - be they narcisstic or something else.

Here goes.  I'll come back and update this post as I think of more entries, and I welcome any suggestions you may have in the comments.

In no particular order:

The Grifters by Jim Thompson
book and movie (screenplay by Donald E. Westlake)
mother = Lilly Dillon

White Oleander by Janet Fitch
book and movie
mother = Ingrid Magnussen

Now, Voyager by Olive Higgins Prouty
book and movie
mother = Mrs. Windle Vale

Ordinary People by Judith Guest
book and movie
mother = Beth Jarrett

Mommie Dearest by Christina Crawford
book and movie
mother = Joan Crawford

Hamlet by William Shakespeare
play and movies
mother =Queen Gertrude

Suddenly, Last Summer by Tennessee Williams
play and movie
mother = Violet Venable