Character Quotes - Page 27

• But what man does out of despair, is not necessarily a key to his character. I have always thought that the real key is in that which he seeks for his enjoyment.

  Ayn Rand

  Real, Men, Keys

  Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.375, Hamilton Books

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• It is only when our characters and events begin to disobey us that they begin to live.

  John Fowles

  Events

  JOHN FOWLES (1969). “THE FRENCH LIEUTENTANT'S WOMAN”

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• A sum of money is a leading character in this tale about people, just as a sum of honey might properly be a leading character in a tale about bees.

  Kurt Vonnegut

  People, Might, Honey

  "God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater". Book by Kurt Vonnegut. Opening line, 1965.

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• As many know, the Chinese expression for "crisis" consists of two characters side by side. The first is the symbol for "danger," the second the symbol for "opportunity."

  Al Gore

  Opportunity, Expression, Two

  Al Gore (2006). “An Inconvenient Truth: The Planetary Emergency of Global Warming and What We Can Do About It”, p.10, Rodale

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• If you have never wept bitter tears because a wonderful story has come to an end and you must take your leave of the characters with whom you have shared so many adventures, whom you have loved and admired, for whom you have hoped and feared, and without whose company life seems empty and meaningless. If such things have not been part of your own experience, you probably won't understand what Bastian did next.

  Michael Ende

  Adventure, Tears, Stories

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• Once in an age God sends to some of us a friend who loves in us, not a false-imagining, an unreal character, but looking through the rubbish of our imperfections, loves in us the divine ideal of our nature,--loves, not the man that we are, but the angel that we may be.

  Harriet Beecher Stowe

  Angel, Men, Imperfection

  Harriet Beecher Stowe (1982). “Uncle Tom's Cabin, Or, Life Among the Lowly ; The Minister's Wooing ; Oldtown Folks”, p.606, Library of America

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• But wise is the man who disdains no character, but with searching glance explores him to the root and cause of all.

  Nikolai Gogol

  Wise, Men, Roots

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• If a man has character, he has also his typical experience, which always recurs.

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Men, Typical, Ifs

  Friedrich Nietzsche “Writings of Nietzsche: Volume 1”, Lulu.com

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• All morning I struggled with the sensation of stray wisps of one world seeping through the cracks of another. Do you know the feeling when you start reading a new book before the membrane of the last one has had time to close behind you? You leave the previous book with ideas and themes -- characters even -- caught in the fibers of your clothes, and when you open the new book, they are still with you.

  Diane Setterfield

  Morning, Book, Reading

  Diane Setterfield (2007). “The Thirteenth Tale: A Novel”, p.289, Simon and Schuster

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• Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.

  Kurt Vonnegut

  Writing, Glasses, Want Something

  "Uncovering the secrets of storytelling" by Paul Willis, www.cnn.com. December 19, 2008.

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• Misfortunes one can endure--they come from outside, they are accidents. But to suffer for one's own faults--ah!--there is the sting of life.

  Oscar Wilde

  Failure, Suffering, Faults

  Oscar Wilde (2007). “The Collected Works of Oscar Wilde”, p.496, Wordsworth Editions

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• Every time I've built character, I've regretted it.

  Bill Watterson

  Built

  "The Indispensable Calvin and Hobbes: A Calvin and Hobbes Treasury". Book by Bill Watterson, October 1992.

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• Scar tissue has no character. It's not like skin. It doesn't show age or illness or pallor or tan. It has no pores, no hair, no wrinkles. It's like a slip cover. It shields and disguises what's beneath. That's why we grow it; we have something to hide.

  Susanna Kaysen

  Wrinkles, Hair, Girl Interrupted

  FaceBook post by Susanna Kaysen from Mar 08, 2016

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• Ideas are, in truth, forces. Infinite, too, is the power of personality. A union of the two always makes history.

  Henry James

  Ideas, Two, Personality

  Henry James (1930). “Charles W. Eliot: President of Harvard University, 1869-1909”

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• Few men realize that their life, the very essence of their character, their capabilities and their audacities, are only the expression of their belief in the safety of their surroundings.

  Joseph Conrad

  Art, Philosophy, Men

  Joseph Conrad (2014). “Joseph Conrad The Dover Reader”, p.155, Courier Corporation

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• I believe that an author who cannot control her characters is, like a mother who cannot control her children, not really fit to look after them.

  Margery Allingham

  Mother, Children, Believe

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• These are the times in which a genius would wish to live. It is not in the still calm of life, or the repose of a pacific station, that great characters are formed. The habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. Great necessities call out great virtues. When a mind is raised, and animated by scenes that engage the heart, then those qualities which would otherwise lay dormant, wake into life and form the character of the hero and the statesman.

  Abigail Adams

  Hero, Heart, Carpe Diem

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• There is a time in every life when paths are chosen, character is forged. I could have chosen a different path. But I didn’t. I failed myself.

  Libba Bray

  Different, Path, Chosen

  Libba Bray (2010). “A Great and Terrible Beauty”, p.214, Simon and Schuster

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• Good name in man and woman, dear my lord, Is the immediate jewel of their souls: Who steals my purse steals trash; ’tis something, nothing; ’twas mine, ’tis his, and has been slave to thousands; But he that filches from me my good name Robs me of that which not enriches him, And makes me poor indeed.

  William Shakespeare

  Men, Jewels, Names

  'Othello' (1602-4) act 3, sc. 3, l. 155

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• If men do not comprehend the character of God, they do not comprehend themselves..." If the veil were rent today, and the great God who holds the world in its orbit, and who upholds all worlds and all things by His power, was to make Himself visible, - I say, if you were to see Him today, you would see Him like a man in form - like yourself in all the person, image, and very form as a man.

  Joseph Smith, Jr.

  Men, Orbit, Veils

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• Don't separate the mind from the body. Don't separate even character - you can't. Our unit of existence is a body, a physical, tangible, sensate entity with perceptions and reactions that express it and form it simultaneously. Disease is one of our languages. Doctors understand what disease has to say about itself. It's up to the person with the disease to understand what the disease has to say to her.

  Susanna Kaysen

  Doctors, Perception, Mind

  Susanna Kaysen (2001). “The Camera My Mother Gave Me”, p.126, Vintage

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• There were times in school when a person had to do things fast, cheap, and without character.

  E. L. Konigsburg

  School, Persons

  E.L. Konigsburg (2010). “The View from Saturday”, p.12, Simon and Schuster

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• My main disappointment was always that a book had to end. And then what? But I don't think I was ever disappointed by the books. I must have been what any author would consider an ideal reader. I felt every pain and pleasure suffered or enjoyed by all the characters. Oh, but I identified!

  Eudora Welty

  Pain, Disappointment, Book

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• 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.

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Book, Heart, Dark

  Friedrich Nietzsche, R. J. Hollingdale (1996). “Nietzsche: Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits”, p.227, Cambridge University Press

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• Reputation is what other people know about you. Honor is what you know about yourself.

  Lois McMaster Bujold

  Success, Divorce, Army

  "A Civil Campaign: A Comedy of Biology and Manners". Book by Lois McMaster Bujold, 1999.

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