How to bear a grudge

Grudges stemming from broken love affairs are one of the most popular to bear, especially in music. When Nina Simone sang, "I hold no grudge", she didn't mean it – the song ends, "But a gal who's been forgotten may forgive, But never once forget." Alanis Morissette's This Grudge is an extended, self-aware meditation on a long-held grudge and the realisation that the person most harmed is the person holding the grudge: "But who's it hurting now? Who's the one that's stuck? Who's it torturing now, With an antique knot in her stomach?" Her ultimate conclusion is, "I want to be big and let go... I wanna forgive for the both of us."

Grudges in politics

Veteran parliamentary commentator Julia Langdon says grudges are immensely common in politics. "Politicians are very ambitious and if they are thwarted in any way, they are going to resent the person who stopped their rise further up the greasy pole."

Recent political grudges include Gordon Brown's against Tony Blair. But the longest running political grudge was between former prime minister Edward Heath and Margaret Thatcher. Heath resented her because she took his job from him and harboured this grudge for 30 years until his death, sitting on the back benches "grumping and growling, and taking every opportunity to declare how much he despised her, despite her efforts at appeasement." Heath earned himself the epithet, "The Incredible Sulk".

But perhaps the most devastating consequence of a grudge was the downfall of Margaret Thatcher herself, precipitated by a resignation speech which triggered a leadership contest (listen to the clip). "Geoffrey Howe, deputy prime minister in the Thatcher Cabinet, had borne Mrs Thatcher a grudge for years; she had been lambasting him in Cabinet, making him look foolish, nagging him, and he bit back. She didn't think he was going to, but boy, did he get his revenge."

Dinah Birch, Professor of English Literature at Liverpool University, says that grudges are often the mainspring of the 19th-century novel. Charles Dickens writes persistently about grudge-bearers: Daniel Quilp's grudge against Kit Nubbles in The Old Curiosity Shop pushes the action forwards; Dolge Orlick in Great Expectations holds a grudge so enormous against Pip's sister that it ends – as they sometimes do – in violence, as he attempts to murder her.

In George Eliot's The Mill on the Floss, Mr Tulliver holds a persistent grudge against the lawyer, Wakem, a grudge which damages him far more than the grudgee. In Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë there is even a huge grudge against an inanimate object – Lowood School – which is founded in Charlotte's own memories of the clergy daughters' school; this institutional grudge finds focus in the monstrous individual Mr Brocklehurst, who embodies the values of the school.

Anthony Trollope said that, after money in the bank, a grudge is the next best thing – his novels are full of grudge-bearers: Mrs Proudie in the Barchester novels, with her great grudge against the Archdeacon's wife Mrs Grantly; and George Vavasor in Can you Forgive Her, holding a grudge against his grandfather for disinheriting him.

Grudges – some of them historical – are also reflected in contemporary literature: Hilary Mantel's novels Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies are a fictionalised biography documenting the career of Thomas Cromwell, chief minister in the court of Henry VIII. Cromwell's grudge against the young aristocrats who brought about the downfall of Cardinal Wolsey plays itself out over an extended series of actions and is an important driving force in the story.

How to hold a grudge responsibly

A verse from the Koran states that "holding a grudge against someone brings nothing but only misery to the person holding the grudge: you hurt no-one but yourself." The Bible and other religious texts also issue such warnings. Brett Kahr says that people can derive a secret pleasure from having a grudge, privately triumphant at killing off the enemy in the mind; but overall he is inclined to agree that grudge-bearing harms the self.

But Sophie Hannah finds some positives: "If you hold grudges correctly you experience less ill-will and less resentment." You need to hold a grudge for the right reason, not as a "false grudge" – a deflection of anger against some other cause. "It's not ideal to hold a grudge which makes you less happy because you are spending time in an angry or bitter state. The right way is to think, 'This happened, I want to remember it, to look at it as a story, to find out what I can learn, to process this and allow the negative feelings to pass so that a lesson can be learned.'"

Bearing Grudges: Marcel Berlins reveals what grudges are and why we often hold on to them. Listen now.