Character quotes

Character

14.8K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.

14.8K quotes

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Browse quotes that often appear alongside character — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.

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Character quotes (page 154 of 739)

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Friedrich Nietzsche Philosopher, Writer
Character

"I can tell by my own reaction to it that this book is harmful." But let him only wait and perhaps one day he will admit to himself that this same book has done him a great service by bringing out the hidden sickness of his heart and making it visible.— Altered opinions do not alter a man’s character (or do so very little); but they do illuminate individual aspects of the constellation of his personality which with a different constellation of opinions had hitherto remained dark and unrecognizable."

Heart Book Character
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Mark Russell Political Satirist
Character

"I think even the characters that are fundamentally evil and wrong, I want people to really love them. I think that's important to writing believable characters. They don't have to be likable but they have to be loved, at least by the author."

Thinking Writing Character
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Mark Russell Political Satirist
Character

"You have to imbue the characters with their own sort of feeling of justification and morality. Everyone has that, whether we see them as evil or not. So I try to bring the characters to life by making them likable or lovable, in the sense that they can be, at least to themselves."

Character Feelings Evil
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Kevin Smith Filmmaker
Character

"I've always kind of ripped from real life to some degree or at least how I'm feeling in the moment. In fact, maybe that's really it. In anything I've ever written, all the characters sound like me, which I don't think is a bad thing."

Thinking Real Character
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Khaled Hosseini Author, Physician
Character

"The things that have always drawn me to the craft of writing is character, it's story, it's something that becomes like a pebble in my shoe, a voice that I just can't get rid of, and I've got to see it through."

Writing Character Shoes
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Mark Twain Writer, Humorist
Character

"Surely the test of a novel's characters is that you feel a strong interest in them and their affairs the good to be successful, the bad to suffer failure. Well, in John Ward, you feel no divided interest, no discriminating interest you want them all to land in hell together, and right away."

Character Strong Successful
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Lily King Author
Character

"I had lived in France before graduate school, but because of Spain, I had a lot of the characters go and spend a good bit of time in Spain."

Character School Spain
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Lily King Author
Character

"Usually, the creating of the book happens while I'm writing the book. I start with Chapter One, with a few ideas and a handful of characters, and the book grows from there."

Writing Book Character
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Lin Shaye Actress
Character

"I may be the only actress in Hollywood who won't need a face lift, because when I take off my makeup, I look so great compared to my characters!"

Character May Makeup
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Linda Conrad Author, Educator
Character

"I love creating stories, dreaming up characters and breathing life into them. From several generations of Irish storytellers, I think that's what I was born to do."

Thinking Character Dream
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Kiki Smith Artist
Character

"You start with a generic body, but I think the first wall you hit with portraiture is comprised of history and storytelling and the nature of characters - whether they are historical or coming from literature or documentation. Those are the references we have to people, besides your family, and the intimacy of portraiture is in the specifics of individuals. For me, it came out of doing things about animals."

Thinking Character Wall
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Kim Harrison Author
Character

"I've found that when I'm having trouble solidifying a character or a scene, that music will often free my subconscious just that last little bit to allow me to move forward, and often it's in a direction that I didn't expect, but is 100 percent true to the character."

Character Moving Littles
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Jane Austen Novelist
Character

"May I ask you what these questions tend?' 'Merely to the illustration of your character,' said she, endeavouring to shake off her gravity. 'I am trying to make it out.' 'And what is your success?' She shook her head. 'I do not get on at all. I hear such different accounts of you as puzzle me exceedingly."

Trying Character Illustration
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