Top 10 imaginary friends in fiction

All characters in fiction are imaginary friends to some extent, but here AF Harrold chooses his favourite imaginary friends from children’s books and beyond as characters in their own right, from Calvin’s friend Hobbes to Skellig

• AF Harrold - theguardian.com, Thursday 23 October 2014 

Tim Roth plays Skellig in the film version of David Almond’s classic. But it’s open to debate whether Skellig is imaginary or really there! Photograph: Imagenet

All characters in fiction are imaginary friends. We spend time with them, listen to them, laugh with them, sometimes fall in love with them. No one else knows them like we do. It can be embarrassing to talk to them when other people are in the room.

But they’re not what this list is about.This list is about imaginary friends characters in books have had, so the imaginary friends of my imaginary friends, you might say.
It runs the gamut, from characters who are clearly imaginary to some who are much more ambiguous, to some for whom it really depends which way the wind’s blowing when you think about them. Some aren’t as nice as others, but all are memorable in their own ways

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