Character famous quotes

There is nothing ugly in art except that which is without character, that is to say, that which offers no outer or inner truth.
-- Auguste Rodin

#Art #Truth #Character

In short, Beauty is everywhere. It is not that she is lacking to our eye, but our eyes which fail to perceive her. Beauty is character and expression. Well, there is nothing in nature which has more character than the human body. In its strength and its grace it evokes the most varied images. One moment it resembles a flower: the bending torso is the stalk; the breasts, the head, and the splendor of the hair answer to the blossoming of the corolla. The next moment it recalls the pliant creeper, or the proud and upright sapling.
-- Auguste Rodin

#Flower #Character #Eye

The poetics of the oppressed is essentially the poetics of liberation: the spectator no longer delegates power to the characters either to think or to act in his place. The spectator frees himself; he thinks and acts for himself! Theatre is action!
-- Augusto Boal

#Character #Thinking #Theatre

The power of faith will often shine forth the most when the character is naturally weak.
-- Augustus Hare

#Faith #Character #Shining

What a person praises is perhaps a surer standard, even than what he condemns, of his own character, information and abilities.
-- Augustus Hare

#Character #Information #Praise

The effects of human wickedness are written on the page of history in characters of blood: but the impression soon fades away; so more blood must be shed to renew it.
-- Augustus William Hare

#Character #Blood #History

O natal star, thou producest twins of widely different character. [Lat., Geminos, horoscope, varo Producis genio.]
-- Aulus Persius Flaccus

#Stars #Character #Fate

Retire within thyself, and thou will discover how small a stock is there. [Lat., Tecum habita, et noris quam sit tibi curta supellex.]
-- Aulus Persius Flaccus

#Character #Retiring #Thyself

Thou art moist and soft clay; thou must instantly be shaped by the glowing wheel. [Lat., Udum et molle lutum es: nunc, nunc properandus et acri Fingendus sine fine rota.]
-- Aulus Persius Flaccus

#Art #Character #Glowing

I love playing different characters and things that are challenging. I'm not interested in safety at all. That's what makes me get up in the morning.
-- Aunjanue Ellis

#Morning #Character #Safety

I'm really curious about the memory of Nixon for people who grew up under Clinton. What do people remember of him? In his day, the definition of a conservative right-wing president is more like a centrist in our own time. He's also one of our funnier presidents - just a really good character to write about.
-- Austin Grossman

#Memories #Writing #Character

Delicious... Everything I'd hoped for in a new Wild Cards book. The character interactions and plot twists have exactly the complexity, surprise, and unsentimental realism I'd expect out of a George R. R. Martin project.
-- Austin Grossman

#Book #Character #Twists

I would like to have opportunities in my career to do parts that people would remember - either the whole character or certain moments that they personally could really connect to or were really affected by it deeply.
-- Austin Peck

#Character #Opportunity #Careers

Great communication, Character, Competitive drive, Consistency, Compassion, Confidence -- skills successful leaders share.
-- Avery Johnson

#Communication #Character #Successful

Once we got over the origin story, we could really delve deeper into their lives and characters and angst. So this movie actually has more heart, more humor.
-- Avi Arad

#Heart #Character #Stories

I think I am a pretty good judge of character in general and try to surround myself with the best people I can.
-- Avicii

#Character #Thinking #People

Love should be treated like a business deal, but every business deal has its own terms and its own currency. And in love, the currency is virtue. You love people not for what you do for them or what they do for you. You love them for the values, the virtues, which they have achieved in their own character.
-- Ayn Rand

#Business #Character #People

Love is the expression of one's values, the greatest reward you can earn for the moral qualities you have achieved in your character and person, the emotional price paid by one man for the joy he receives from the virtues of another.
-- Ayn Rand

#Love #Life #Character

Love, friendship, respect, admiration are the emotional response of one man to the virtues of another, the spiritual payment given in exchange for the personal, selfish pleasure which one man derives from the virtues of another man’s character.
-- Ayn Rand

#Spiritual #Selfish #Character

When intellectual leaders fail to foster the best in the mixed, unformed, vacillating character of people at large, the thugs are sure to bring out the worst. When the ablest men turn into cowards, the average men turn into brutes.
-- Ayn Rand

#Character #Men #Thug

It is fairly easy to grasp abstract moral principles; it can be very difficult to apply them to a given situation, particularly when it involves the moral character of another person..
-- Ayn Rand

#Character #Principles #Moral

The main thing is to be yourself and not allow people to disturb you to be different, because they want you to be different. You gotta be yourself. Many times you throw a mistake due to your own personality or your own character or from interference that you get along the way then you learn, and the main thing is to learn from your mistakes and get better.
-- Ayrton Senna

#Being Yourself #Mistake #Character

A novel is not an allegory.... It is the sensual experience of another world. If you don't enter that world, hold your breath with the characters and become involved in their destiny, you won't be able to empathize, and empathy is at the heart of the novel. This is how you read a novel: you inhale the experience. So start breathing.
-- Azar Nafisi

#Heart #Character #Destiny

The Indian community in Canada has integrated much better than the Indian community in United States. They've become really Canadian at the same time as keeping all their Indian characters and customs and social groups.
-- Azim Premji

#Character #Community #Groups

Character is one factor that will guide all our actions and decisions. We invested in uncompromising integrity that helped us take difficult stands in some of the most difficult business situations.
-- Azim Premji

#Inspirational #Integrity #Character

Honesty is the cornerstone of character.
-- B. C. Forbes

#Honesty #Character #Belief

The Seer Stone referred to here was a chocolate-colored, somewhat egg-shaped stone which the Prophet found while digging a well in company with his brother Hyrum,... It possessed the qualities of Urim & Thummim, since by means of it - as described above - as well by means of the Interpreters found with the Nephite record, Joseph was able to translate the characters engraven on the plates.
-- B. H. Roberts

#Brother #Character #Mean

I think sometimes I'm more fond of doing the research for the character because you learn so much. Sometimes shooting is really difficult because you wake up early and you're always hurrying. And sometimes I don't know what I'm doing. I'm here and there.
-- Bai Ling

#Character #Thinking #Wake Up

You can cultivate taste, as you can the intellect. Full understanding whets the appetite and desire, and, later, sharpens the enjoyment of possession.
-- Baltasar Gracian

#Character #Understanding #Desire

When you go in and do a cool, small character, it feels less like work and more like fun.
-- Balthazar Getty

#Fun #Character #Feels

Empathy is a quality of character that can change the world.
-- Barack Obama

#Character #Empathy #Quality

Number one, it is important that we fix the legal immigration system, because right now we've got a backlog that means years for people to apply legally. And what's worse is, we keep on increasing the fees, so that if you've got a hard working immigrant family, they've got to hire a lawyer; they've got to pay thousands of dollars in fees. They just can't afford it. And it's discriminatory against people who have good character, we should want in this country, but don't have the money. So we've got to fix that.
-- Barack Obama

#Country #Character #Mean

Learning to stand in somebody else's shoes, to see through their eyes, that's how peace begins. And it's up to you to make that happen. Empathy is a quality of character that can change the world.
-- Barack Obama

#Character #Eye #Shoes

One would think that it would be very easy, with an iconic character like James Bond, to keep making the films, but it hasn't been. But, it sure has been entertaining and rewarding.
-- Barbara Broccoli

#Character #Thinking #Would Be

I think Bond the character is distinct: He's British, he has a certain code that he lives by, he's incorruptible... he's a classical hero, but he's also fallible. He has inner demons, inner conflicts, and he's a romantic.
-- Barbara Broccoli

#Hero #Character #Thinking

Weather creates character.
-- Barbara Grizzuti Harrison

#Character #Weather

I like the sensibility of Australian film a lot and the crews are fantastic. Great characters, wonderful people and no line between - I think in Hollywood they have this line between actors and crew a lot, and that just didn't exist, which I really appreciated.
-- Barbara Hershey

#Character #Thinking #People

The imperative is to define what is right and do it.
-- Barbara Jordan

#Inspirational #Character #Philanthropy

I concentrate on character, theme, language, structure, voice. It actually surprises me that no matter what I write, people declare it "intently political." I'm just writing about the world I know, as it is. Wounds and griefs included.
-- Barbara Kingsolver

#Grief #Writing #Character

I can count all the ways in which being a mother has enriched my understanding of the world, of character, my sense of the future and my attachment to it. I can't imagine what kind of writer I'd be if I didn't have my kids.
-- Barbara Kingsolver

#Mother #Kids #Character

Sometimes the characters develop almost without your knowing it. You find them doing things you hadn't planned on, and then I have to go back to page 42 and fix things. I'm not recommending it as a way to write. It's very sloppy, but it works for me.
-- Barbara Mertz

#Writing #Character #Knowing

I dont see myself only as a Somali character. I think of myself as an actor, and if the job fits me and I like the story, I will go for it.
-- Barkhad Abdi

#Jobs #Character #Thinking

We ought to be very cautious in the prosecution of magic and heresy. The attempt to put down these two crimes may be extremely perilous to liberty, and may be the origin of a number of petty acts of tyranny if the legislator be not on his guard; for as such an accusation does not bear directly on the overt acts of a citizen, but refers to the idea we entertain of his character.
-- Baron de Montesquieu

#Character #Law #Ideas

In the birth of societies it is the chiefs of states who give it its special character; and afterward it is this special character that forms the chiefs of state.
-- Baron de Montesquieu

#Leadership #Character #Giving

Everyone can do a character the way they want to do it, unless the director tells them not to, which isn't very common. I like to do my characters, if it's not specific in the script, as myself.
-- Barret Oliver

#Character #Way #Scripts

Time is what makes good stories. Much has been cooking for a long time, and at last finds an out in narration one day. That's a supreme joy. And why the characters keep showing up.
-- Barry Hannah

#Character #Long #Joy

The fun for me is knowing what the other person is saying and what my character would be thinking at that time. On the stage you get the chance to do all that, to analyze and build a part, to react, to contribute something no one else can-not the author, not even the director.
-- Barry Nelson

#Fun #Character #Thinking

In most horror films, you don't really get to understand why this character is the way he is.
-- Barry Watson

#Character #Way #Horror

The life story of the five main characters and the secondary characters around them allows Jonathan Franzen to present the full impetus and extent of the world picture of the West at the end of the 20th century.
-- Batya Gur

#Character #Stories #World

Twenty-five, 30 years ago, the barometer of human rights in the United States were black people. That is no longer true. The barometer for judging the character of people in regard to human rights is now those who consider themselves gay, homosexual, lesbian.
-- Bayard Rustin

#Character #Gay #Rights

Fame is what you have taken, / Character's what you give; / When to this truth you waken, / Then you begin to live.
-- Bayard Taylor

#Taken #Character #Giving

I didn't see my character, Core, as a cannibal but as somebody who is extremely passionate and who doesn't have any conscience. She takes her passion to its complete extreme.
-- Beatrice Dalle

#Passion #Character #Cannibal

I don't act in the way other actresses act, in terms of building or creating a character. I don't transform myself into the role, I invest myself in the role.
-- Beatrice Dalle

#Character #Creating #Roles

I like to try to make the characters I play be as human as possible.
-- Beau Bridges

#Character #Play #Trying

I think that by now, in the very beginning when I first joined the show, General Landry was like a new kid in school. I was coming into a situation I didn't really know much about, and now, after a couple of years, the character's kind of mellowed and gotten comfortable working at the command center and very comfortable with his troops. What they always do with these shows is they always leave them open-ended. The SG-1 franchise has been so successful for the network, that they always want to keep it open, an option to do it again in some way, whether that's a movie or a series, or whatever.
-- Beau Bridges

#Couple #School #Character

My favorite roles usually have to do with the story, if it's a good story I usually enjoy doing the character.
-- Beau Bridges

#Character #Roles #Stories

The musical stuff I'd go up for was always funny, sexy, tough-as-nails, heart-of-gold characters.
-- Bebe Neuwirth

#Sexy #Heart #Character

Part of the success of the show is that the audience sees themselves in the characters, becomes the characters. The more they inhabit the characters, the more they see
-- Bebe Neuwirth

#Character #Shows #Audience

Every actor's greatest ambition is to create his own, definite and original role, a character with which he will always be identified. In my case, that role was Dracula.
-- Bela Lugosi

#Ambition #Character #Roles

The vampire was a complete change from the usual romantic characters I was playing, but it was a success.
-- Bela Lugosi

#Character #Romantic Love #Ghouls

I do not set myself up as an advocate of the woman's right doctrine, but would rather appear in the character of a quiet lady expressing her sentiments, not so much to the public as to her immediate friends.
-- Belle Boyd

#Character #Doctrine #Quiet

This is a wonderful world for women. The richness, the hope, the promise of life today, particularly for women, are exciting beyond belief. Nonetheless, we need stout hearts and strong characters; we need knowledge and training; we need organized effort to meet the future.
-- Belle S. Spafford

#Strong #Heart #Character

You put a spell on the dog," I said as we left the house. "Just a small one," said Nightingale. "So magic is real," I said. "Which makes you a...what?" "A wizard." "Like Harry Potter?" Nightingale sighed. "No," he said. "Not like Harry Potter." "In what way?" "I'm not a fictional character," said Nightingale.
-- Ben Aaronovitch

#Dog #Real #Character

The Metropolitan Police Service is still, despite what people think, a working-class organisation and as such rejects totally the notion of an officer class. That is why every newly minted constable, regardless of their educational background, has to spend a two-year probationary period as an ordinary plod on the streets. This is because nothing builds character like being abused, spat at and vomited by members of the public.
-- Ben Aaronovitch

#Educational #Character #Thinking

Jen came first, and then they wanted to cast somebody that would... Kevin liked the idea of having a kind of The Ghost of That Character kind of haunt the movie in a way throughout, by having Raquel look so much like her. And also, it was sort of serendipity. I mean, she was also the best actress. I mean, as you can see Raquel has a pretty appealing, engaging kind of precocious, sparkly quality that's... it was just luck really that she happened to the film.
-- Ben Affleck

#Character #Mean #Ideas

THE HOT (AND SERIOUSLY COOL) ENERGY that comes from the musical gospel preached by the title character of FELA! feels as if it could stretch easily to the borders of Manhattan and then across a river or two. There should be dancing in the streets!
-- Ben Brantley

#Character #Two #Rivers

You get thought of in terms of your last job. So if my last job is that of a meat cleaver-wielding character, I will hardly be cast as some benign, older gentleman.
-- Ben Cross

#Jobs #Character #Gentleman

One woman reads another's character Without the tedious trouble of deciphering
-- Ben Jonson

#Women #Character #Trouble

I think that you can fall into bad habits with comedy... It's a tightrope to stay true to the character, true to the irony, and allow the irony to happen.
-- Ben Kingsley

#Fall #Character #Thinking

The trick is to try and justify every word on the page and make sure my character is the man who would say that.
-- Ben Kingsley

#Character #Men #Trying

All the great writers root their characters in true human behaviour.
-- Ben Kingsley

#Character #Roots #Behaviour

I always try to find something I admire about every character I play.
-- Ben Kingsley

#Character #Play #Trying

It's very hard to play a hyperactive character all the time, I try my best, but I end up collapsing at the end of the day.
-- Ben Nicholas

#Character #Play #The End Of The Day

Literature doesn't have a country. Shakespeare is an African writer. His Falstaff, for example, is very African in his appetite for life, his largeness of spirit. The characters of Turgenev are ghetto dwellers. Dickens characters are Nigerians.
-- Ben Okri

#Country #Character #Ghetto

Reading, therefore, is a co-production between writer and reader. The simplicity of this tool is astounding. So little, yet out of it whole worlds, eras, characters, continents, people never encountered before, people you wouldn’t care to sit next to in a train, people that don’t exist, places you’ve never visited, enigmatic fates, all come to life in the mind, painted into existence by the reader’s creative powers. In this way the creativity of the writer calls up the creativity of the reader. Reading is never passive.
-- Ben Okri

#Reading #Creativity #Character

I love doing comedy. One of my favorite things in the world is to do Parks and Recreation; a big fun character.
-- Ben Schwartz

#Fun #Character #Parks

You have to stay in character in between takes.
-- Ben Stiller

#Character

I don't think it's ever easy to be funny. I find it easy to amuse myself with a certain sort of cynical dark humor that tends toward the meaner side, like my character in Happy Gilmore. Those kinds of characters come easily to me.
-- Ben Stiller

#Character #Dark #Thinking

I'm always willing to endure humiliation on behalf of my characters.
-- Ben Stiller

#Character #Endure #Humiliation

Keats himself spoke about how Shakespeare was capable of erasing himself completely from the characters he had created. As an actor, that is what I'm trying to do.
-- Ben Whishaw

#Character #Trying #Actors

I love the characters I've had the opportunity to play.
-- Ben Whishaw

#Character #Opportunity #Play

The thing I love about acting is that you can bring something very personal into the open and at the same time remain hidden because you're always playing a character in a story that someone else has imagined. You're always protected.
-- Ben Whishaw

#Character #Acting #Stories

When you have a character to work with, you carry them around in a strange way - they make you look at the world in a different way.
-- Ben Whishaw

#Character #Different #Looks

I don’t think that actors are necessarily any more uncomfortable in their skin than anyone else. I suppose I feel more comfortable in my skin now, but you’re always playing a character, aren’t you? You tell different versions of yourself to different people and vice versa. Here, or in the photo shoot or wherever, it’s a representation of you. It’s not you-you. That’s how you get through it.
-- Ben Whishaw

#Character #Thinking #People

I always get self-conscious about what I look like in a film, but less so if I'm a character very far removed from who I am. Then I just worry about the performance, and that's equally an odd experience.
-- Benedict Cumberbatch

#Character #Self #Who I Am

I've been very lucky at what's happened in my career to date, but playing something as far from me as possible is an ambition of mine - anything from a mutated baddy in a comic book action thriller, to a detective. If anything, I'd like Gary Oldman's career: he's the perfect example of it. I've love to have a really broad sweep of characters - to be able to do something edgy, surprising and unfashionable.
-- Benedict Cumberbatch

#Book #Ambition #Character

It depends, because sometimes an action role can be very demanding, and sometimes a dialogue-driven character can be very demanding, and vice versa. It depends.
-- Benicio Del Toro

#Character #Vices #Roles

I wasn't terribly aware of Catwoman. She was a DC comics character and as a kid, I wasn't terribly fond of the DC comics characters. I was a Marvel boy.
-- Benjamin Bratt

#Character #Kids #Boys

The heroic hours of life do not announce their presence by drum and trumpet, challenging us to be true to ourselves by appeals to the martial spirit that keeps the blood at heat. Some little, unassuming, unobtrusive choice presents itself before us slyly and craftily, glib and insinuating, in the modest garb of innocence. . . . Then it is that you will be summoned to show the courage of adventurous youth.
-- Benjamin Cardozo

#Character #Blood #Choices

Characters do not change. Opinions alter, but characters are only developed.
-- Benjamin Disraeli

#Respect #Character #Reality

Patriotism depends as much on mutual suffering as on mutual success; and it is by that experience of all fortunes and all feelings that a great national character is created.
-- Benjamin Disraeli

#Character #Feelings #Patriotism

The character of a woman rapidly develops after marriage, and sometimes seems to change, when in fact it is only complete.
-- Benjamin Disraeli

#Character #Facts #Sometimes

It takes many good deeds to build a good reputation, and only one bad one to lose it.
-- Benjamin Franklin

#Leadership #Character #Deeds

The great difficulty is first to win a reputation; the next to keep it while you live; and the next to preserve it after you die, when affection and interest are over, and nothing but sterling excellence can preserve your name. Never suffer youth to be an excuse for inadequacy, nor age and fame to be an excuse for indolence.
-- Benjamin Haydon

#Character #Winning #Names

There is a great deal of hard lying in the world; especially among people whose characters are above suspicion.
-- Benjamin Jowett

#Truth #Lying #Character

I am aware that many regard me as an anti-sports character person, but the truth is that the country's economy by then was in bad shape. Tanzania being among the highly indebted countries, I had to give sports the least prominence during my first term, while setting priorities in revitalising our economy.
-- Benjamin Mkapa

#Sports #Country #Character

Religion may become a fashion as well as anything else; and, when it does become so, it has as little to do, in those who thus hold it, with the heart and the character as any other fashion.
-- Benjamin Robbins Curtis

#Fashion #Heart #Character

Patriotism is as much a virtue as justice, and is as necessary for the support of societies as natural affection is for the support of families. The Amor Patriae love of ones country is both a moral duty and a religious duty. It comprehends not only the love of our neighbors but of millions of our fellow creatures, not only of the present but of future generations. This virtue we find constitutes a part of the first characters of history.
-- Benjamin Rush

#Country #Religious #Character

Most people are middle class. Most people do wish their lives were better than they are. And I think by making my main characters ordinary, average guys, it helps readers identify with their problems. It also helps ground the supernatural events that follow in a recognizable reality and perhaps gives some of my wilder scenarios a little verisimilitude.
-- Bentley Little

#Character #Reality #Thinking

I write what I want to write. Period. I don't write novels-for-hire using media tie-in characters, I don't write suspense novels or thrillers. I write horror. And if no one wants to buy my books, I'll just keep writing them until they do sell--and get a job at Taco Bell in the meantime.
-- Bentley Little

#Jobs #Book #Character