In every first novel the hero is the author as Christ or Faust. — Oscar Wilde
Figure out what you need to do to be the heroine of your own story. — Ava DuVernay
Every villain is a hero in his or her own mind. — Allison Brennan
Stop being a supporting player in the movie that is your life. Become the movie star. This is a hero's journey you have embarked upon. It's high time you start acting like it. — Rich Roll
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show. — Charles Dickens
Character may almost be called the most effective means of persuasion. — Aristotle
The true hero is one who conquers his own anger and hatred. — Dalai Lama
A villain is just a victim whose story hasn’t been told. — Chris Colfer
Short Protagonist Quotes
Dogma not only blinds its protagonist, but it muzzles all other opposition. — Maajid Nawaz
I'm drawn to characters who bear similarities to the protagonists in myths and legends. (...) — Alan Lee
I'm drawn particularly to stories that evolve out of the character of the protagonist. — David McCullough
Once a newspaper touches a story, the facts are lost forever, even to the protagonists. — Norman Mailer
Protagonists are always loners, almost by definition. — Pauline Kael
But protagonists are protagonists and heroes are heroes. — David Baldacci
I'm interested in flawed protagonists. I was raised on them. — Laura Dern
It is the objective of the protagonist that keeps us in our seats. — David Mamet
People are drawn deeper into tragedy not by their defects but by their virtues. — Haruki Murakami
Once a newspaper touches a story the facts are lost forever, even to the protagonists. — Norman Mailer
Protagonist Image Quotes
Female Protagonist Quotes
I had a list of things that science fiction, particularly American science fiction, to me seemed to do with tedious regularity. One was to not have strong female protagonists. One was to envision the future, whatever it was, as America. — William Gibson
My female protagonist will not be this promiscuous, beautiful, dark-haired, thin lady. It will be a plump, blond, healer and so forth. — Isabel Allende
We "chicks" have munched our popcorn while romantic comedies became just comedies, and then each female protagonist got recast for Mathew McConaughey or Seth Rogan. — Emma McLaughlin
I really get fired up with female protagonists. I can really feel the difference in myself when I am writing a script that has a woman at the center. — Linda Woolverton
Crime is a very hard genre to feminise. If you have a female protagonist she is going to be looking after her mum when she gets older; she is going to be worried about her brother and sister; she will be making a living while bringing up kids. — Denise Mina
I'm not interested in making movies only with female protagonists. I think it's ridiculous to think that a female director can't direct men. That makes no sense to me. — Elizabeth Banks
We've all seen lots of stories about a young protagonist having adventures, and usually they're all boys, [and] there is sometimes a token female, or two. — Brian K. Vaughan
I think boys don't always like to read books with female protagonist - I don't even know what to say about this. — Jacqueline Woodson
For the blockbusters, people were always telling me that if you write female protagonists, the boys won't go, so you have to put the boys' stuff in it to get everybody. I write for people from 8 to 80, and that's not easy. — Linda Woolverton
It's not my business to remedy deaths! It's my business to tell stories. Lyra and the other heroines didn't come with placards saying, "Make this a feminist story!" I'm glad people enjoy seeing a female protagonist in a big adventure story, but I didn't do it for political reasons. — Philip Pullman
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
The black person is the protagonist in most of my paintings. I realized that I didn't see many paintings with black people in them. — Jean-Michel Basquiat
A stage play is basically a form of uber-schizophrenia. You split yourself into two minds - one being the protagonist and the other being the antagonist. The playwright also splits himself into two other minds: the mind of the writer and the mind of the audience. — David Mamet
Respect your characters, even the minor ones. In art, as in life, everyone is the hero of their own particular story; it is worth thinking about what your minor characters' stories are, even though they may intersect only slightly with your protagonist's. — Sarah Waters
I have confronted theoretical positions whose protagonists claim that what I take to be historically produced characteristics of what is specifically modern are in fact the timelessly necessary characteristics of all and any moral judgment, of all and any selfhood. — Alasdair MacIntyre
The depth of any story is proportionate to the protagonist's commitment to their goal, the complexity of the problem, and the grace of the solution. — Steve House
Employing women as my primary protagonists has allowed me to step outside of myself, to distance myself from my own personality, far more easily than were I to look at events from a masculine perspective. — Tom Robbins
Free will is something that people struggle with so much, but it's very simple to me. Carl Jung said at the same moment you're a protagonist in your own life making choices, you also are the spear carrier, or the extra, in a much larger drama. You've got to live with these two opposite ideas at the same time. — Wayne Dyer
A lot of crime fiction writing is also lazy. Personality is supposed to be shown by the protagonists taste in music, or were told that the hero looks like the young Cary Grant. Film is the medium these writers are looking for. — Peter Temple
Is it unprecedented for two goalkeepers employed in a match comprising seven goals to be the fixture's most competent protagonists? — Pete Gill
If there's a character type I despise, it's the all-capable, all-knowing, physically perfect protagonist. My idea of hell would be to be trapped in a four-hundred page, first-person, first-tense, running monologue with a character like that. I think writers who produce characters along those lines should graduate from high school and move on. — Craig Johnson
It's pretty easy to think of the idea of a story, and maybe even to write a scene or two, but understanding the ebb and flow of a narrative, where to leave the little clues your protagonist (and reader) need, while playing fair, takes a lot more skill and patience than you might think. — Dennis Green
American and Vietnamese characters alike leap to life through the voice and eyes of a tenyearold girl-a protagonist so strong, loving, and vivid I longed to hand her a wedge of freshly cut papaya. — Mitali Perkins
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
I couldn't imagine what Fox thought they were doing, contemplating such a jagged protagonist for a prime-time drama. I only knew that I wanted the role very much. — Hugh Laurie
Look at the Coen brothers. All their minor characters are as interesting as their protagonists. If the smaller characters are well-written, the whole world of the film becomes enriched. It's not the size of the thing, but the detail. — Brendan Gleeson
The idea in The Man that Would Be King was that the music should recreate all that majestic surrounding and emphasize the adventure, but also speak about the frustration or, rather said, the curse of both protagonists, even before happened what happens them. — Maurice Jarre
Also, getting the chance to play a supporting part meant that I didn't have to do as much as the protagonist, such as running around telling the story. [As the protagonist] you push the story whereas, paradoxically, as a character part, you have a chance to explore some of the nuance and some of the more complicated aspects of a character. — Ben Affleck
I don't judge in my books. I don't have to have the antagonist get shot or the protagonist win. It's just how it comes out. I'm just telling a story. — Elmore Leonard
Perfect heroines, like perfect heroes, aren't relatable, and if you can't put yourself in the protagonist's shoes, not only will they not inspire you, but the book will be pretty boring. — Cassandra Clare
Quite often my narrator or protagonist may be a man, but I'm not sure he's the more interesting character, or if the more complex character isn't the woman. — Ann Beattie
In the average European oil painting of the nude the principal protagonist is never painted. He is the spectator in front of the picture and he is presumed to be a man. — John Berger
With the crime novels, its delightful to have protagonists I can revisit in book after book. Its like having a fictitious family. — John Banville
We may be the protagonists of tragedy, but we are also the heroes of our most beautiful and thrilling experiences. — Shin Kyung-sook
In the history of enterprise, most of the protagonists of major new products and companies began their education — George Gilder
This dazzling, unput-downable debut novel proves beyond a doubt that Dan Wells has the gift. His teenage protagonist is as chilling as he is endearing. More John Wayne Cleaver, please. — F. Paul Wilson
You have to go out of your way as a suspense novelist to find situations where the protagonists are somewhat helpless and in real danger. — Nelson Demille
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
As Jane Austen might have put it: It is a truth universally acknowledged that young protagonists in search of adventure must ditch their parents. — Philip Pullman
Tunisia's responsibility, and especially that of its political and intellectual elites, is enormous. All the protagonists of the nation's social, cultural, economic and political life must work to overcome useless and counterproductive polarisation, and to find solutions to domestic, regional and international problems. — Tariq Ramadan
It would have been easier to have a male protagonist, but I didn't want people to assume that Nikki Hill was me in her entirety because a lot of people just don't like me and I don't think they would be interested in reading about me, even in the fictional context. — Christopher Darden
Lars von Trier is very, very, very clever about women. He gives the woman a space that I don't know any filmmaker does. Because in Breaking The Waves, protagonist Emily Watson is the Christ. Which man is doing that? I don't know any man giving that space to a woman. No one. — Chantal Akerman
A lot of narrative films leave you no space for anything else but eating popcorn. I want to go in the complete opposite direction. I have to evacuate all psychology, to be less a protagonist and more a presence. — Elia Suleiman
In Conclusion
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