Hannibal

Clarice Starling is the central figure in Hannibal. While the novel might be titled after the man she pursues, her investigation into his whereabouts and her transformation that results from it are the foundation of the plot. Over the course of the novel, Starling battles not only the difficulty of tracking a man who does not want to be found but also the patriarchal institutions that make her pursuit of Lecter harder than necessary. She specifically encounters sexism that enables people like Paul Krendler to derail her career over petty slights. The FBI as a whole is shown as a misogynistic institution that believes there is “an emotional element in women that [does not] fit in with the Bureau” (423). Starling’s investigation is also disrupted by Mason Verger, whose misogyny enables him to use her as bait to capture Lecter. In this sense, Starling's biggest enemies are the self-important men who have weaponized and institutionalized misogynistic worldviews to preserve their own power. Starling may be searching for a psychopathic serial killer, but her biggest threats are often the same men who are allegedly pillars of society. The representatives of law and order are as corrupt, as bitter, and as spiteful as any killer in the novel, and Starling must fight back against their power if she is to succeed.

Despite the aggression toward her, Starling reveres institutions. Her father was a law enforcement officer who was killed in the line of duty, and her substitute father figures—such as John Brigham and Jack Crawford—are both law enforcement agents. For Starling, law enforcement was idealized as a surrogate paternal figure in her life. She wanted to be a law enforcement officer so that she could win the approval of a father who left her too soon. By working for Brigham or Crawford, she strives for this same validation. But Starling always seems to suffer the loss of fathers. The careers of all three end in ignominious fashion; Brigham and her father are killed while Crawford is driven into retirement. Coupled with the institutional sexism that she is confronted with, Starling is gradually disillusioned with law enforcement. She is forced to confront the reality that the same FBI she once believed embody law and order is actually a spiteful, misogynistic, poorly run operation that primarily benefits the interests of the rich and powerful rather than serving justice. This slow realization causes a psychic shock in Starling, forcing her to confront the foundations of her personality and reconsider her identity.

As part of her transformation, Starling eventually rebels against authority. Acting against orders, she goes to Muskrat Farm to apprehend Lecter on her own. She becomes the “warrior” that Lecter told her she always was (37). Lecter eventually rescues her physically and, through a series of drastic therapy sessions, also psychologically. Lecter helps to transform Starling into a new person, investing her with new ideas and ideals that are independent of social institutions. Lecter rebuilds Starling's personality around the new ideal of nurturing her good taste into something refined and exquisite. The moment Starling agrees to share Krendler's brain with Lecter, she becomes complicit in his crimes. She is a party to murder but also a fellow warrior in the war against bad taste. To her, the sexism and disillusionment are now enemies, representatives of a tasteless lifestyle that she can no longer accept, rather than indignities to be endured for law and order.

Even in a novel where Hannibal Lecter murders many people, often in a theatrical, brutal fashion, Mason Verger is the novel's clear antagonist. He is a sexual abuser, a pedophile, and a corrupt, rich member of the elite. He boasts about his friendship with murderous dictators like Idi Amin and orchestrates his own personal torturous vendetta against the man who encouraged him to rip up his own face and feed it to his starving dogs. Despite his long list of crimes, Mason has no fear of repercussion. He is safe in the knowledge that his vast fortune insulates him from any form of punishment. Even when he did get in trouble with the law, his father's expensive lawyers argued decades of pedophilic abuse down to an agreement to perform community service and attend therapy sessions. Mason is the villain of the novel not just because of his many crimes but because he is a member of the elite, part of the inner circle of powerful, wealthy men who know that they can do whatever they like without fear of any kind of legal reprisal.

Because Mason considers himself to be free from repercussion, his relationship with Lecter is particularly galling. Mason was sent to undergo therapy with Lecter, and the spoiled, abusive, childish Mason believed that he could manipulate him. Instead, Mason found someone who could not be bought or bribed. For the first time, Mason found himself powerless against someone who could not be bought. Lecter convinced Mason to shred his own face and then left him hospitalized for the rest of his life. Lecter harmed Mason physically, but he also shattered Mason's elitist assumption that he was untouchable. For the first time in his life, Mason was made to feel vulnerable. Revenge against Lecter is not just about torture or violence, but about reestablishing a paradigm of power. If Lecter represents something that money cannot buy, then Mason can defeat him by investing large sums of money in executing him in a theatrical manner. By capturing and killing Lecter, Mason is trying to assert power over him.

Mason dedicates his entire life to his pursuit of Lecter. He seems ambivalent about the day-to-day running of his business empire and more concerned with the details of his hunt. Mason is consumed by his pursuit to the point where he refuses to think about what will happen after he succeeds, as he knows that his life will be empty without a man like Lecter onto whom he can focus so much of his loathing. When his plan ultimately fails, he becomes vulnerable again and is killed. His sister, Margot, who he sexually and psychologically abused for years, turns the tables on him when she retrieves his sperm and murders him. Mason is forced to confront repercussions of his actions. Everything Mason built falls apart, from his elaborate revenge scheme to the Verger empire. Mason loses everything, showing that privilege means nothing when compared to a more intelligent force of evil like Hannibal Lecter.