Famous Quotes & Sayings

Edward Hirsch

That is many poets don't know how to tell a story and they don't have a sense of how to put things in order to tell a story and we thought the poets could learn from fiction writers something about developing a character over time who wasn't just you and also creating a narrative structure.

Edward Hirsch

The poets needed to learn to pay greater attention to character and to narrative.

Edward Gibbon

A nation ignorant of the equal benefits of liberty and law, must be awed by the flashes of arbitrary power: the cruelty of a despot will assume the character of justice; his profusion, of liberality; his obstinacy, of firmness.

Edward Gibbon

Majorian presents the welcome discovery of a great and heroic character, such as sometimes arise, in a degenerate age, to vindicate the honor of the human species.

Edward Gibbon

To the love of pleasure we may therefore ascribe most of the agreeable, to the love of action we may attribute most of the useful and respectable, qualifications. The character in which both the one and the other should be united and harmonised would seem to constitute the most perfect idea of human nature.

Edward Gibbon

But the human character, however it may be exalted or depressed by a temporary enthusiasm, will return by degrees to its proper and natural level, and will resume those passions that seem the most adapted to its present condition.

Edith Stein

Woman's soul is present and lives more intensely in all parts of the body, and it is inwardly affected by that which happens to the body; whereas, with men, the body has more pronoucedly the character of an instrument which serves them in their work and which is accompanied by a certain detachment.

Eddie Marsan

I've never played a gay character on screen, so that would be interesting. I've never played a gay character, and that would fascinate me because I'm not gay, so that would interest me.

Earl Warren

The man of character, sensitive to the meaning of what he is doing, will know how to discover the ethical paths in the maze of possible behavior.

Dean Acheson

Greatness is a quality of character and is not the result of circumstances.

David Henry Hwang

To me to write well is to battle stereotypes. To write well is to create three-dimensional characters that seem human.

David Duchovny

I'll instinctively know that I identify with a character.

David Duchovny

People are really much more respectful than they're made out to be and much more discerning about the fact that I'm not the character I play.

David Brin

My first duty to write a gripping yarn. Second is to convey credible characters who make you feel what they feel. Only third comes the idea.

David Brin

Seldom does a storytelling talent come along as potent and fully mature as Mike Brotherton. His complex characters take you on a voyage that is both fiercely credible and astonishingly imaginative. This is Science Fiction.

Ben Whishaw

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 Stiller

You have to stay in character in between takes.

Benedict Cumberbatch

I had to imagine myself into certain aspects of [Julian Assange] character for our version of events. That involved extrapolating based on clues in his biography, his public persona, photographs, and other accounts of him by people who encountered him during that extraordinary period from 2007 to 2010 that we charted in the film [The Fifth Estate ]. So, it involved a lot of research but, sadly, no contact with the man himself.

August Strindberg

A man with a so-called character is often a simple piece of mechanism; he has often only one point of view for the extremely complicated relationships of life.

Arnold Palmer

I try to deign golf courses that are individual in character and individual in their own standing.

Denzel Washington

I think we're fascinated by gangsters and that whole lifestyle and crossing the line. We get sort of stuck in our normal lives, if you will, and you want to be bigger than life and I think people somehow live through these sorts of characters.

Denzel Washington

I just try to be honest and true to the character and play the part.

Denis O'Hare

I received a phone call; my agent got a phone call from Ryan Murphy saying he wanted to talk to me... And he basically outlined 'American Horror Story' for me and said that there's a character named Larry the Burn Guy, and I'd like you to play it.

Denis Leary

Doing the same character over and over, it gets boring.

Denis Leary

Crisis doesn't create character; it reveals it.

Deepa Mehta

One of the things that I really love about doing a film is working with actors and the whole casting process. I feel I'm not looking for actors. I feel I'm looking for characters. If the characters come from Bollywood, fine. If they come from Indian theater, perfect.

Deepika Padukone

Naina is one of the most special films & special characters that I've played in recent times

Connie Willis

When you've written your characters into a corner, you just hand the manuscript over to your partner and make her fix it.

Mark Billingham

When you think of a great twist or a red herring or a way of misdirecting the reader, it is good, but you know that they are just tricks at the end of the day, and the way to keep interest is to write characters that people care about.

Hayden Schlossberg

A lot of times in movies, especially in sequels, the characters become caricatures and just sort of improv machines and joke machines, rather than people you can actually connect to.

Benjamin Haydon

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.

Bernard Baruch

During my eighty-seven years I have witnessed a whole succession of technological revolutions. But none of them has done away with the need for character in the individual or the ability to think.

Cassandra Peterson

If I retire doing the character, I don't think the character has to retire. There will still be caricatures of Elvira. You know, Dracula still works, and he's dead.