Richard III

So this has little to do with the play itself, but I find it interesting that most of the current posts on the blog about this play are using the wrong title, saying Richard the II instead of Richard the III. It's just odd, and it made me go back and double check that I had read the right play.

Anyways, in act 1 we see a little of Richards absolute menace come out, but I still feel like Voldemort was the better villain. Even after discussing the whole play in class, I'm on the side of Voldemort.

Richard never killed people while loved ones were present. Richard also tended to have other people kill off competitors for him, while Voldemort killed people himself. This leads me to believe that Richard might have actually been a little bit weak, especially considering his disabilities. Voldemort was clearly more ruthless in that respect.

Richard did kill two children, but Voldemort attempted to kill a baby (Young Harry Potter) and did kill at least one teenager in the series (Fred Weasley)

Lets also go to sheer numbers. Richard killed 7 (that I count) people. In the Harry Potter series, Voldemort kills 28 people, including himself. He also controls a large number of people that do his bidding in addition to killing people himself. The Death Eaters kill many more people in battle.

I'll only briefly mention that Voldemort's intention in life is not to merely rule a country, but to wipe out two entire races of people: muggles, who have no magical powers, and mudbloods, people that are half-wizard and half muggle. Of course Voldemort is not actually a pure blood, but similar to Hitler he is part of the race he is trying to defeat.

Voldemort is simply the better villain. he does more plotting in general. His conquests last over 4000 pages, while Richard's lasts only 300 pages (Signet Classics version) even when switched to years, Voldemort wins. This I don't have actual dates for, but I am sure that it is longer after having done a bit of research on both.

I might make this into an actual argumentative paper. Hmm.