Character Quotes - Page 156

Character isn't what we think it is or, rather, what we want it to be. It isn't a stable, easily identifiable set of closely related traits, and it only seems that way because of a glitch in the way our brains are organized. Character is more like a bundle of habits and tendencies and interests, loosely bound together and dependent, at certain times, on circumstance and context.

If you have no character to lose, people will have no faith in you.

The truest test of civilization, culture and dignity is character and not clothing.

A man has more character in his face at forty than at twenty - he has suffered longer.

Life for women in ancient Greece was hard - you had to fight for every inch of ground you got. Both Thetis and Briseis are strong, passionate women and in another time and place their lives would have been very different. Part of the tragedy of their characters is how much they have to offer - and how little of that they get to realize. Thetis spends the whole novel fighting the limitations placed on her, desperately trying to eke out the best she can from a bad situation. This makes her fierce and terrifying.

In Hollywood I thought I was large and klutzy, like the characters I played.

And my father was a comic. He could play any musical instrument. He loved to perform. He was a wonderfully comedic character. He had the ability to dance and sing and charm and analyze poetry.

The highest qualities of character...must be earned.

We often pray for purity, unselfishness, for the highest qualities of character, and forget that these things cannot be given, but must be earned.

When a character is born, he acquires at once such an independence, even of his own author, that he can be imagined by everybody even in many other situations where the author never dreamed of placing him; and so he acquires for himself a meaning which the author never thought of giving him.

The character of the artist doesn't enter into the nature of the art

You must rouse into people's consciousness their own prudence and strength, if you want to raise their character.

You say often you wish a library; here I gif you one; for between these two lids (he meant covers) is many books in one. Read him well, and he will help you much; for the study of character in this book will help you to read it in the world, and paint it with your pen.

There's a fashion, or maybe you could call it a necessity, in French cinema to make social films, which is to say films in which the characters are defined by their social context.

I felt like I was flying without a net. But once I realized that the audience was my partner, I was flying a jet, because the people would allow me to develop the character on stage.

Keep carefully not of all scrapes and quarrels. They lower a character extremely; and are particularly dangerous in France, wherea man is dishonoured by not resenting an affront, and utterly ruined by resenting it.

Mankind is made up of inconsistencies, and no man acts invariably up to his predominant character. The wisest man sometimes acts weakly, and the weakest sometimes wisely.

You must be respectful and assenting, but without being servile and abject. You must be frank, but without indiscretion, and close, without being costive. You must keep up dignity of character, without the least pride of birth, or rank. You must be gay, within all the bounds of decency and respect; and grave, without the affectation of wisdom, which does not become the age of twenty. You must be essentially secret, without being dark and mysterious. You must be firm, and even bold, but with great seeming modesty.

My video game character is a bit better looking than me, actually. I don't think he has to worry about his hair getting messed up.

I don't think I've ever been a huge target for the press, and I value that to a degree, because there's a certain value for actors staying beneath the radar so they can play characters.

There seems to be more opportunities for old guys like me to do a little fighting and running because the lead characters also require a bit of depth and maturity and gravitas that one is likely to acquire doing drama all those years.

Some people ask who they are and expect their feelings to tell them. But feelings are flickering flames that fade after every fitful stimulus. Some people ask who they are and expect their achievements to tell them. But the things we accomplish always leave a core of character unrevealed. Some people ask who they are and expect visions of their ideal self to tell them. But our visions can only tell us what we want to be, not what we are

Our character is determined by what we do if every restraint were removed.

When I first started acting, I started in opera and had a great desire to play grand, tragic characters. I got sidetracked in musical theater and ended up doing a lot of comedy.

And I thought, you know, a little gender confusion makes a better person. A little adversity in life at an early age. It's character building.