Protagonists Quotes - Page 3

• In the modern era, it isn't enough to write, you must also be the Writer, with a capital 'W,' and play your part as the protagonist in the cautionary narrative in which you will fail or triumph, be in or out, hot or cold, ride the wheel of fortune.

  Tony Kushner

  Writing, Play, Triumph

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

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• Since so many romantic comedies vary little in their storyline, the success or failure of such movies depends largely on whether we believe in the relationship of the protagonists.

  Mariella Frostrup

  Believe, Littles, Comedy

  "Why we're still seduced by the romcom' by Mariella Frostrup, www.theguardian.com. September 17, 2011.

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• Can Protagonist think of a single film that interests him as much as the three-hundredth best book he ever read?

  David Markson

  Book, Thinking, Three

  David Markson (1996). “Reader's Block”

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• Treefingers is important, it's the point in which our protagonist crosses the icy tundra that is how to disappear completely to reach the island of Optimistic. But seriously, kill yourself.

  Thom Yorke

  Optimistic, Islands, Disappear Completely

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• To me there's no difference between writing YA and adult except that in YA I make the book a little shorter and the protagonists are teens. The difference is in the readers.

  Charles de Lint

  Book, Writing, Differences

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• In the history of enterprise, most of the protagonists of major new products and companies began their education - not in the classroom, where the old ways are taught, but in the factories and labs where new ways are wrought ... nothing has been so rare in recent years as an Ivy League graduate who has made a significant innovation in American enterprise.

  George Gilder

  Years, Ivy, League

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• The Greeks were the first intellectualists. In a world where the irrational had played the chief role, they came forward as the protagonists of the mind.

  Edith Hamilton

  Greek, Mind, Firsts

  Edith Hamilton (1987). “The Greek way ; The Roman way”, Random House Value Pub

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• It seems to me that most good protagonists are both clever and resourceful. They are intelligent and can fix things, both little and big. They can come up with inventive solutions others would never think of.

  Keren Woodward

  Clever, Character, Intelligent

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• I hate the whole übermensch, superman temptation that pervades science fiction. I believe no protagonist should be so competent, so awe-inspiring, that a committee of 20 really hard-working, intelligent people couldn't do the same thing.

  David Brin

  Hate, Believe, Hard Work

  "David Brin: Dialog With the Future". Locus Magazine Interview, www.locusmag.com. March 1997.

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• Once you have a situation that is fresh, then you sort of believe in it and it becomes normal. So you do end up with protagonists that haven't been in other movies before.

  Paul Schrader

  Believe, Normal, Ends

  Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

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• The adolescent protagonist is one of the hallmarks of American literature.

  Tayari Jones

  Literature, Hallmark, American Literature

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• Think 'Game of Thrones.' In the old days, this sort of show might be considered bad writing. It doesn't really seem to be moving toward a crisis or climax, it has no true protagonist, and it's structured less like a TV show or a movie than a soap opera.

  Douglas Rushkoff

  Moving, Writing, Thinking

  "Living In The Present Is A Disorder". Interview with R.U. Sirius, www.wired.com. April 8, 2013.

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• Because the writer must be a participant in the scene, while he's writing it — or at least taping it, or even sketching it. Or all three. Probably the closest analogy to the ideal would be a film director/producer who writes his own scripts, does his own camera work and somehow manages to film himself in action, as the protagonist or at least a main character.

  Hunter S. Thompson

  Writing, Character, Cameras

  "The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales from a Strange Time".

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• The novel form is about the protagonist's struggle to transform his arbitrary, fragmented, given experience into a narrative as meaningful as his favorite books.

  Elif Batuman

  Meaningful, Struggle, Book

  Elif Batuman (2011). “The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them”, p.84, Granta Books

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• When I first began writing In the Country of Men all I had was the voice of the protagonist. He intrigued me and my desire to want to know him and his world became almost compulsive.

  Hisham Matar

  Country, Writing, Men

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• When does a session of The Theatre of the Oppressed end? Never - since the objective is not to close a cycle, to generate a catharsis, or to end a development. On the contrary, its objective is to encourage autonomous activity, to set a process in motion, to stimulate transformative creativity, to change spectators into protagonists. And it is precisely for these reasons that the Theatre of the Oppressed should be the initiator of changes the culmination of which is not the aesthetic phenomenon but real life.

  Augusto Boal

  Real, Creativity, Theatre

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• You don't need to like your protagonists.

  Anson Mount

  Needs, Like You

  "Anson Mount Talks Hell on Wheels Season 2, the Best Part of the Job, Walking the Line Between Hero and Villain and More". Interview with Christina Radish, collider.com. August 19, 2012.

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• The protagonist of folktale is always, and intensely, a young person moving through ordeals into adult life. . . . and this is why there are no wicked stepchildren in the tales.

  Jill Paton Walsh

  Moving, Wicked, Adults

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• Most literary critics agree that fiction cannot be reduced to mere falsehood. Well-crafted protagonists come to life, pornography causes orgasms, and the pretense that life is what we want it to be may conceivably bring about the desired condition. Hence religious parables, socialist realism, Nazi propaganda. And if this story likewise crawls with reactionary supernaturalism, that might be because its author longs to see letters scuttling across ceilings, cautiously beginning to reify themselves into angels. For if they could only do that, then why not us?

  William T. Vollmann

  Religious, Angel, Letters

  William T Vollmann (2005). “Europe Central”, p.36, Penguin

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• In fact, some reviewers have said that as they got into the story they forgot that the protagonist is a black woman. They were moved by the story - by the people as a whole - and not by the little things.

  Christopher Darden

  People, Black, Stories

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• Just as women supplement men in private life, so they will supplement men in public life by concentrating their organized efforts on those objects which men are likely to ignore. There is a tremendous field for women as active protagonists of new ideas and new methods of political and social housekeeping. When organized and conscious of their power to influence their surroundings, women can use their newly acquired freedom in a great many ways to mold the world into a better place to live in.

  Edward Bernays

  Freedom, Men, Ideas

  "Propaganda".

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• Terry Farish seems to breathe the reader into the emotional spaces of war, exile, and refugee life. The Good Braider is a delicate stunning exploration of its young protagonist's life and heart.

  Uma Krishnaswami

  War, Heart, Emotional

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• Black music has always known, and not been afraid to acknowledge just how high the stakes of Black thought are. To summarize the final soliloquy of Clay, the protagonist in LeRoi Jones’ (aka Amiri Baraka’s) play Dutchman. You’d better be glad Charlie Parker could play him some horn and Bessie Smith could sing, because if they didn’t make music they might murder you. One would be hard pressed to find another group of people on this planet whose music is a surrogate for murder. One would be hard pressed to another group of people on this planet whose life is a proxy for death.

  Frank B. Wilderson III

  Aka, Play, People

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• Open Secret boasts a nifty plot and, in Coroner Fortin, a fascinating protagonist who will likely be around for a long time. Deryn Collier is a talent to watch.

  Giles Blunt

  Long, Secret, Watches

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• Dreams have consequences. There is no turning back. A revolution is not a painless march to the gates of freedom and justice. It is a struggle between rage and hope, between the temptation to destroy and the desire to build. Its temperament is desperate. It is a tormented response to the past, to all that has happened, the recalled and unrecalled injustices - for the memory of a revolution reaches much further back than the memory of its protagonists.

  Hisham Matar

  Dream, Memories, Struggle

  "The Consequences of Dreams" by Hisham Matar, www.newyorker.com. July 31, 2014.

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