History FatBastard / Literature

** That's got to be [[JustifiedTrope justified]]. The man weighed 200 kilograms (441 pounds) but could only support 1/4 of that by muscle-power without anti-gravity suspensors. While there are certainly active people who reach that weight, they also develop the body/muscular structure to support it. To be immobilized by his fat at that size, he would probably have needed to eat SO much that he gained weight too quickly for his body to adapt, for a long period of time, and intentionally compensated for it with antigravs rather than making any effort to carry his own bulk.
** It is also implied that the excessive weight gain is a symptom of a hereditary disease common to the Harkonnen. Rabban is stated to be approaching the Baron's girth, while Feyd-Rautha keeps it in check through his... rigorous physical training program. Neither of these is any less of a monster, though.
** The prequels explained that [[FormerlyFit the Baron was originally an exceptionally fit man]], in fact fairly obsessive and vain about it. But then one day he was blackmailed into siring a child (Jessica) with a Bene Gesserit and decided to have a little fun with it at her expense. [[LaserGuidedKarma She in turn took the opportunity to tweak his body chemistry a bit.]]

* Early in the ''Franchise/StarWarsExpandedUniverse'', Warlord Zsinj was an enemy of the New Republic and one of the very few humans in Star Wars described as overweight at all. His portrayal in ''Literature/TheCourtshipOfPrincessLeia'' showed him as venal, highly evil, self-important, and very, very [[FatIdiot stupid]]. His successes seem to be all related to the size of his fleet and the programs his scientists set up. The ''Literature/XWingSeries'' {{Ret Con}}s this, making Zsinj still fat and faintly ridiculous, still highly evil, but also very, very smart, and deliberately cultivating a [[ObfuscatingStupidity slightly absurd image]] that he knows smart people can see past, but he likes playing to an audience.

** Robert Baratheon isn't exactly an evil man, but he's still a morbidly obese [[TheHedonist hedonist]], [[PuppetKing an incompetent king]], [[ParentalNeglect a neglectful father]], and a [[DomesticAbuse terrible]] [[YourCheatingHeart husband]] (though his wife is just as vicious to him in return). [[IWasQuiteALooker Robert was a better man in his youth]], but he really let himself go physically and morally [[HeartbrokenBadass after losing Lyanna Stark]] and being stuck with a [[TheChainsOfCommanding throne]] and a [[UnwantedSpouse wife]] he didn't want.

* Bruno Jenkins from ''Literature/TheWitches'', an entitled little jerk who enjoys frying ants with his magnifying glass and bragging about his wealthy father. The eponymous antagonists lure him with food and transform him into a mouse. Even in this state, Bruno continues his gluttonous ways and is no help to the narrator. He does tend to get portrayed as an AdaptationalNiceGuy in other versions, where he's more friendly and simply lets his greed get the best of him at times.

* Bruno Jenkins from ''Literature/TheWitches'', an entitled little jerk who enjoys frying ants with his magnifying glass and bragging about his wealthy father. The eponymous antagonists lure him with food and transform him into a mouse. Even in this state, Bruno continues his gluttonous ways and is no help to the narrator.

* ''Literature/{{Thinner}}'': [[DeconstructedTrope Deconstructed.]] Billy Halleck is a seemingly nice guy with a good marriage and is a doting father (his daughter in fact [[DaddysGirl prefers Billy to her mother]]). However, he is clearly aware of his firm's tie to TheMafia, and is in fact good friends with a man who may be the head of the local mob family. After the accident, he doesn't deliberately use his connections to get him out of trouble, but he does nothing to dissuade them either. [[SomeAnvilsNeedToBeDropped There is blame enough to go around, but no one is willing to accept the consequences for their actions.]]

* Terry Pratchett lampshades this in ''Literature/GoingPostal'', where one of the chairmen at the Grand Trunks Company is described as fat, multi-chinned and having a grating voice and an expression like a piglet, and a footnote says that it's stereotypical to say that someone like that couldn't be a kind and generous man, like it's stereotypical to say a man in a striped shirt coming in through your window in the middle of the night is a burglar.

* ''Literature/AnimalFarm'' may have Napoleon be this, as he uses his position of power to exploit the other farm animals and grows fat off his exploits (it's noted that all of his inner circle gained significant weight since they took over). It does make sense since he's a pig.
* Basu, Literature/TheMorbidlyObeseNinja from the novel of the same name by Creator/CarltonMellickIII. when he was lean he was the deadliest ninja in town, after he reached 700 pounds of weight, he also became the meanest. [[spoiler: post-character development he's more a Fat Bastard [[JerkWithAHeartOfGold with a heart of gold]].]]
* ''Literature/{{Dune}}'': Baron Harkonnen's girth is used alongside his [[DepravedBisexual sexual deviancy]] and torture of slaves to emphasize how disgusting a person he is.
** That's got to be [[JustifiedTrope justified]]. The man weighed 200 kilograms (441 pounds) but could only support 1/4 of that by muscle-power without anti-gravity suspensors. While there are certainly active people who reach that weight, they also develop the body/muscular structure to support it. To be immobilized by his fat at that size, he would probably have needed to eat SO much that he gained weight too quickly for his body to adapt, for a long period of time, and intentionally compensated for it with antigravs rather than making any effort to carry his own bulk.
** It is also implied that the excessive weight gain is a symptom of a hereditary disease common to the Harkonnen. Rabban is stated to be approaching the Baron's girth, while Feyd-Rautha keeps it in check through his... rigorous physical training program. Neither of these is any less of a monster, though.
** The prequels explained that [[FormerlyFit the Baron was originally an exceptionally fit man]], in fact fairly obsessive and vain about it. But then one day he was blackmailed into siring a child (Jessica) with a Bene Gesserit and decided to have a little fun with it at her expense. [[LaserGuidedKarma She in turn took the opportunity to tweak his body chemistry a bit.]]
* Augustus Gloop from ''Literature/CharlieAndTheChocolateFactory''. Like all the kids in the book he's an {{Anvilicious}} {{Aesop}}, in his case about gluttony. Alongside [[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotSymbolic greed, sloth, and...]] [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking gum-chewing]]. Hmm.
** Same with Bruno Jenkins from ''Literature/TheWitches'', an entitled little jerk who enjoys frying ants with his magnifying glass and bragging about his wealthy father. The titular antagonists lure him with food and transform him into a mouse. Even in this state, Bruno continues his gluttonous ways and is no help to the narrator.

** Literature/SplinterOfTheMindsEye has a villain whose physical description includes this line.

* ''Literature/MasksOfAygrima'' has [[NoNameGiven The Fat Man]] who is in charge of kids who fail their masking, he forces the girls to pose while he draws them so he can sell the drawing later, ironically out of the villains that don't pull a HeelFaceTurn, he's the second nicest.
* This trope is closely examined in Creator/RobinHobb's ''Literature/TheSoldierSon'' trilogy. After [[spoiler:Nevare]] grows extremely fat as a side effect of a disease, he notices how people's attitudes towards him have changed drastically to the worse. People who haven't even talked to him make fun of his size in his presence, and some are even openly hostile. He has to prove to those he meets that he ''isn't'' a bastard, because they tend to assume he is.
* Inverted by Harold Lauder in ''[[Creator/StephenKing The Stand]]'', at least in the novel. Harold is a sympathetic character while a fat nerd--it's only after he loses weight, becomes moderately attractive, and gains a few levels of competence outside of bookish pursuits that he does a FaceHeelTurn.
* ''Literature/TheBible'' [[http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Judges%203:12-28&version=KJV describes]] the assassination of a [[AdiposeRex very fat king]] named Eglon who leaks excrement when he is stabbed. He oppressed the Israelites for eighteen years, which perhaps explains why this particular detail was included by those who wrote the account.
** On the Israelites' side, there was Eli the priest, who did not restrain his sons Hophni and Phinehas from their abuse of their priestly duties regarding the sacrifices and their sleeping with women who assembled at the door of the Temple of the Lord, but merely gave them a slap on the wrist for doing so. Regarded as a heavy man who got fat from the sacrifices that his sons have taken from the altar, he died when news was brought to him that his two sons died in a battle against the Philistines and that the Ark of the Covenant was taken.
** In the Literature/BookOfAmos, the wealthy women of Samaria, which was part of the northern kingdom of Israel during the two-kingdoms part of Israel's existence as a nation, were referred to as "cows of Bashan" for using their self-indulgent lifestyles to oppress the poor, crush the needy, and demand that their husbands always bring them drinks.
* The Ancestress, an early villain in ''Literature/BridgeOfBirds.'' Li Kao recalls her as a beautiful, scheming concubine who butchered all of her rivals and their children, then had the Emperor murdered and set herself up as a regent over her weak-willed son for years, where her extravagance ran the empire into the ground; her son got blamed and subsequently executed in a coup, while she retired to a life of luxury. By the time we see her, however, she has gained two hundred pounds out of overindulgence. When she finally meets her end, in a gruesome manner typical to this series, she is described as blundering around the room crushing her own guards with her monstrous weight while [[spoiler:Henpecked Ho]] pursues her with an axe.
* Creator/TimPowers uses this villain archetype in several of his novels -- Leo Friend in ''Literature/OnStrangerTides'' and Loretta deLarava in ''Literature/ExpirationDate'' are both described as extremely, grotesquely fat. The villain of ''Literature/DinnerAtDeviantsPalace'', who hasn't stirred from his sanctum in years, is so fat that on first sight the protagonist mistakes him for a leather beanbag chair.
* In Creator/RobertEHoward's Literature/ConanTheBarbarian story "Literature/ThePhoenixOnTheSword", Ascalante sneers at one of the nobles who thought they had hired him as "the fat baron of Attalus."
* A few of the antagonists from the Literature/SherlockHolmes short stories such as Jephro Rucastle from "The Copper Beeches", Charles Augustus Milverton from the story witht the same name, and Blessington (or Sutton) from "The Resident Patient".
* ''Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire'':
** Strong Belwas, who is a fat ex-gladiator. Although he's a stone cold killer on Dany's side, so that arguably makes him Grey in a world of EvilVersusEvil.
** A Song of Ice and Fire is filled with this trope. There's Yezzan zo Qaggaz, an extremely wealthy slave owner who is called (behind his back) the Yellow Whale for his yellow eyes and the fact that he is so obese that he cannot stand unassisted. Ser Amory Lorch isn't as fat as him, but still quite fat. Magister Illyrio is morbidly obese and seems to be decidedly amoral.
** However, this trope is subverted with Lord Wyman Manderly, who is another morbidly obese person and while he's on the side of the Starks, he's moraly ambiguous to say the least.
*** This trope is also somewhat subverted by the above-mentioned Yezzan zo Qaggaz. Although one of the foremost slavers in an extremely brutal slaver society, he also happens to be one of the lesser evils among the slavers, arguing that Yunkai should not break a peace treaty while others hope for the riches that will come with sacking Meereen and apparently taking better care of his slaves than most. Well, aside from occasionally sending them out to be fed to lions or having his slave girls raped by giants for his amusement. [[CrapsackWorld Yeah.]]
** Ramsay Bolton teeters on the edge of this (only for the "fat" part, as he fits every definition of "bastard") - he's a huge, big-boned brute with a thick, fleshy face, and is described as looking like he will be fat in later life. It appears the only reason he isn't obese is that he's still young enough and leads an active enough lifestyle that his metabolism keeps his weight down.
** Robert Baratheon isn't exactly an evil man, but he's still a morbidly obese [[TheHedonist hedonist]], [[PuppetKing an incompetent king]], [[ParentalNeglect a neglectful father]], and a [[DomesticAbuse terrible]] [[YourCheatingHeart husband]] (though his wife is just as vicious to him in return). [[IWasQuiteALooker Robert was a better man in his youth]], but he really let himself go physically and morally [[HeartbrokenBadass after losing Lyanna Stark]] and being stuck with a [[TheChainsOfCommanding throne]] and a [[UnwantedSpouse wife]] he didn't want.
* The BigBad of book 1 and 2 of ''Literature/DetectivesInTogas''.
* ''Literature/AConfederacyofDunces'': Ignatius Jacques Reilly is a fat, [[JerkAss obnoxious]], [[KnowNothingKnowitAll over-educated]] Manchild who still [[BasementDweller lives with his widowed mother at age thirty.]]

* In the original ''Sleepover Club'' books, one of the girls' enemies was an overweight school bully named Amanda Porter, known to them as "Fatty Bum-Bum." They explained that although they usually disapproved of calling people cruel names, they make an exception for Amanda because she was so cruel to everyone else.
* Vassily Zhukovsky, head of the Russian Mob in Los Angeles, in ''Literature/MrBlank'' and [[Literature/GetBlank its sequel]] is nicknamed "The Whale." He is not a svelte man.
* Laman Griffin in ''Literature/AngelasAshes''. He is Angela's overweight cousin who forces her to sleep with him, makes Frank empty his piss pot and sloppily eats chips while refusing to share them with any of Angela's kids — they have to lick the newspaper he throws out because they are so hungry.
* ''Literature/JourneyToChaos'': Tahart Ligo is an orc so "heavily muscled" that he can't bend over and clip his own toenails. He's not NiceToTheWaiter, or anyone else for that matter. [[spoiler: In fact, he attempts to rape his temporary maid and then bribe her rescuer into looking the other way. When Eric refuses, Tahart decides to eat him instead]]
* Dennis Nedry in ''Literature/JurassicPark'', who [[spoiler: sabotages the park's security system, releasing several very dangerous dinosaurs while he steals embryos to sell to a rival company...until he [[LaserGuidedKarma gets eaten by a Dilophosaurus]]]]. He's not too different in [[Film/JurassicPark the movie]].

* In ''Literature/TheDivineComedy'', the soul of Peter Damian contrasts the lean and scrappy apostles with the contemporary, corrupt cardinals who have grown so plump that they need a beast and three attendants to move anywhere.
* Zigzagged in ''Literature/{{Ratburger}}'': Sheila the stepmother plays this trope straight: she's evil and described as "spherical". Tina Trotts has a fat tummy and starts off TheBully but [[spoiler: eventually reforms]] and Raj is also quite chubby but he's a very nice man.

* [[AristocratsAreEvil Lord Infante]] from ''Literature/{{Twig}}'' is a morbidly obese, FauxAffablyEvil man who's also the highest-ranking representative of the [[TheEmpire Crown]] in the Crown States. His preferred method of dealing with enemies is to either BreakThemByTalking or calmly walk up to them while their attacks bounce off the [[BioAugmentation augmentations]] hidden in his body and then brutally murder them. When he gets bored of fighting the rebellion he's supposed to be dealing with, he decides to spread GreyGoo throughout the entire continent, let it consume both rebel and loyal Crown citizen alike, and then come back later with new citizens to repopulate the wasteland.
* Alicia from ''Literature/THeWorstThingAboutMySister'' is a bit chubby and she's mean, being one of the three [[TheBully bullies]].
* Dong Zhuo, the StarterVillain of ''Literature/RomanceOfTheThreeKingdoms''; he deposed the rightful heir to the Han Empire and set up the boy's cousin in his place, and proceeded to do little to hide how ObviouslyEvil he was. Dong Zhuo openly disrespected the Emperor and court decorum, gave high-ranking positions to unworthy men, pillaged his subjects to sate his appetites, and had anyone that spoke out against him executed. When he was assassinated by [[TheStarscream Lu Bu]], the conspirators decapitated his body and threw it out into the street to be burned, the records saying it took days for the flames to die out from all the fat.

* Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire'':

* Dong Zhuo, the StarterVillain of ''Literature/RomanceOfTheThreeKingdoms''; he deposed the rightul heir to the Han Empire and set up the boy's cousin in his place, and proceeded to do little to hide how ObviouslyEvil he was. Dong Zhuo openly disrespected the Emperor and court decorum, gave high-ranking positions to unworthy men, pillaged his subjects to sate his appetites, and had anyone that spoke out against him executed. When he was assassinated by [[TheStarscream Lu Bu]], the conspirators decapitated his body and threw it out into the street to be burned, the records saying it took days for the flames to die out from all the fat.

* Literature/AConfederacyofDunces: Ignatius Jacques Reilly is a fat, [[JerkAss obnoxious]], [[KnowNothingKnowitAll over-educated]] Manchild who still [[BasementDweller lives with his widowed mother at age thirty.]]

* Dennis Nedry from ''Literature/JurassicPark''. Arnold even refers to him as such.

* ''Literature/AnimalFarm'' may have Napoleon be this. It does make sense since he's a pig.

* Terry Pratchett lampshades this in ''Discworld/GoingPostal'', where one of the chairmen at the Grand Trunks Company is described as fat, multi-chinned and having a grating voice and an expression like a piglet, and a footnote says that it's stereotypical to say that someone like that couldn't be a kind and generous man, like it's stereotypical to say a man in a striped shirt coming in through your window in the middle of the night is a burglar.

** Strong Belwas, who is a fat ex-gladiator. Although he's a stone cold killer on Dany's side, so that arguably makes him Grey in a world of BlackAndBlackMorality.

* ''Literature/TheBible'' [[http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Judges%203:12-28&version=KJV describes]] the assassination of a [[AdiposeRex very fat king]] who leaks excrement when he is stabbed. He oppressed the Israelites for eighteen years, which perhaps explains why this particular detail was included by those who wrote the account.

** Umbridge is described as squat and toadlike.

* In Creator/RobertEHoward's ConanTheBarbarian story "The Phoenix on the Sword", Ascalante sneers at one of the nobles who thought they had hired him as "the fat baron of Attalus."

* [[ASongOfIceAndFire Strong Belwas]], who is a fat ex-gladiator. Although he's a stone cold killer on Dany's side, so that arguably makes him Grey in a world of BlackAndBlackMorality.

* Creator/TimPowers uses this villain archetype in several of his novels -- Leo Friend in ''Literature/OnStrangerTides'' and Loretta deLarava in ''Expiration Date'' are both described as extremely, grotesquely fat.

* A few of the antagonists from the {{Sherlock Holmes}} short stories such as Jephro Rucastle from The Copper Beeches,Charles Augustis Milverton from the story witht the same name, and Blessington (or Sutton) from The Resident Patient.

** Ramsay Bolton teeters on the edge of this- he's a huge, big-boned brute with a thick, fleshy face, and is described as looking like he will be fat in later life. It appears the only reason he isn't obese is that he's still young enough and leads an active enough lifestyle that his metabolism keeps his weight down.

** However, this trope is subverted with Lord Wyman Manderly, who is another morbidly obese person who at first seems to be this trope, but it turns out this was a ploy and he is actually a pretty good guy.

* The BigBad of book 1 and 2 of ''DetectivesInTogas''.