Quotes / The Hero

"I don’t just think I’m a hero. I will be the hero."

— Touma Kamijou, A Certain Magical Index

He knows a hero when he sees one. Too few characters out there, flying around like that, saving old girls like me. And Lord knows, kids like Henry need a hero. Courageous, self-sacrificing people. Setting examples for all of us. Everybody loves a hero. People line up for them, cheer them, scream their names. And years later, they'll tell how they stood in the rain for hours just to get a glimpse of the one who taught them to hold on a second longer. I believe there's a hero in all of us, that keeps us honest, gives us strength, makes us noble, and finally allows us to die with pride, even though sometimes we have to be steady, and give up the thing we want the most. Even our dreams.

— Aunt May, Spider-Man 2

"What am I giving people by running around in tights and punching crooks? What am I showing them? Am I showing them that good wins out that crime does not pay...or am I showing them that any idiot with fists for brains can get his way if he's fast enough and strong enough and mean enough? Am I fighting violence — or teaching it?"

— Daredevil, #191 "Roulette", written by Frank Miller.

But down these mean streets a man must go who is not himself mean, who is neither tarnished nor afraid. The detective in this kind of story must be such a man. He is the hero, he is everything. He must be a complete man and a common man and yet an unusual man. He must be, to use a rather weathered phrase, a man of honor, by instinct, by inevitability, without thought of it, and certainly without saying it. He must be the best man in his world and a good enough man for any world. I do not care much about his private life; he is neither a eunuch nor a satyr; I think he might seduce a duchess and I am quite sure he would not spoil a virgin; if he is a man of honor in one thing, he is that in all things. He is a relatively poor man, or he would not be a detective at all. He is a common man or he could not go among common people. He has a sense of character, or he would not know his job. He will take no man's money dishonestly and no man's insolence without a due and dispassionate revenge. He is a lonely man and his pride is that you will treat him as a proud man or be very sorry you ever saw him. He talks as the man of his age talks, that is, with rude wit, a lively sense of the grotesque, a disgust for sham, and a contempt for pettiness. The story is his adventure in search of a hidden truth, and it would be no adventure if it did not happen to a man fit for adventure. He has a range of awareness that startles you, but it belongs to him by right, because it belongs to the world he lives in.
If there were enough like him, I think the world would be a very safe place to live in, and yet not too dull to be worth living in.

— Raymond Chandler, from "The Simple Art of Murder"

"Now about Lankhmar. She's been invaded, her walls breached everywhere and desperate fighting is going on in the streets, by a fierce host which out-numbers Lankhamar's inhabitants by fifty to one — and equipped with all modern weapons. Yet you can save the city."
"How?" demanded Fafhrd.
Ningauble shrugged. "You're a hero. You should know."

— Fritz Leiber

Andrea: "Unhappy is the land that breeds no hero."

Galileo: "No. Unhappy is the land that needs a hero."

— Galileo by Bertolt Brecht

It is an odd thing that the words hero and heroine have in their constant use in connection with literary fiction entirely lost their meaning. A hero now means merely a young man sufficiently decent and reliable to go through a few adventures without hanging himself or taking to drink.

— G. K. Chesterton

Then out spake brave Horatius,
The Captain of the Gate:
"To every man upon this earth
Death cometh soon or late.
And how can man die better
Than facing fearful odds,
For the ashes of his fathers,
And the temples of his Gods?"

— Thomas Babington Macaulay

And they ask, "What is a Hero?"
though the answer's very clear,
He's the one who faces danger
when the darkness hovers near.

He will face the fiercest foe
when another needs his aid,
He will dare to defy Death
even though he is afraid,
He works not just for glory
and he does it not for gain,
But because he knows that others
will be spared a greater pain.

He won't always follow orders,
for he dares to answer, "Why?"
And unless he likes the reason,
he refuses to comply,
He will brave the battle boldly
even though he may not win,
He will face his fate unflinching,
for he is a Paladin.

And they ask "What is a Hero?"
though the answer's evident,
He's the one who faces death
knowing that his life's well spent.

— Quest for Glory II: Trial By Fire

"Then what is magic for?" Prince Lír demanded wildly. "What use is wizardry if it cannot save a unicorn?" He gripped the magician's shoulder hard, to keep from falling.

Schmedrick did not turn his head. With a touch of sad mockery in his voice, he said, "That's what heroes are for."

— Peter S. Beagle, The Last Unicorn

"I remember when you were young and I used to tell you stories about your father; what was it you'd say to me?"

"Teach me to be a Hero!"

— Walter Beck & The Hero, Fable 3

True Heroism is alike positive and progressive.It sees in right the duty which should dominate and in truth the principle which should prevail.And hence it never falters in the faith that always and everywhere Sin must be repressed and Righteousness exalted.

— John McClellan Holmes

"I have been Roland, Beowulf, Achilles, Gilgamesh. I have been called a hundred names and will be called a thousand more before the world goes dim and cold. I am hero."

— Marathon 2: Durandal

Someone’s looking for a lead

In his duty to a king or to a creed

Protecting what he feels is right

Fights against wrong with his life

—Robert Palmer, Every Kinda' People

"If the lake should disappear, they must find the hole through which the water ran. But it would be useless to try to stop it by any ordinary means. There was but one effectual mode.—The body of a living man could alone stanch the flow. The man must give himself of his own will; and the lake must take his life as it filled. Otherwise the offering would be of no avail. If the nation could not provide one hero, it was time it should perish."

— George MacDonald, The Light Princess

"About 20 years ago I did a program for some “Eurotrash” TV show, and they actually had me on a program about heroes. They showed me a clip of the very brave man in Tiananmen Square and they asked if I considered him a hero, and I had to answer yes. Anyone who is willing to stand in front of a tank is obviously extraordinarily courageous. But he, along with for instance Jan Pallach, the young Czech who immolated himself in 1968 in Wencezslav Square in protest against the Soviet Invasion, are heroes that we are allowed; because they are anti-communist heroes. Around the same time, when Thatcher was in power, a guy who was from the North, out of work, and in protest against the hopelessness of his life and the hopelessness in which his community found itself, drove his car to the gates of Number 10 Downing Street, and set himself on fire. There was a mention of it on the 6 o’clock news; a brief mention of it on the news at 10, and a few weeks later, some photos of his widow in the papers. An anti-capitalist hero it seems is not quite so acceptable for our roster of champions."

— Alan Moore

The true secret in being a hero lies in knowing the order of things. The swineherd cannot already be wed to the princess when he embarks on his adventures, nor can the boy knock on the witch's door when she is already away on vacation. The wicked uncle cannot be found out and foiled before he does something wicked. Things must happen when it is time for them to happen. Quests may not simply be abandoned; prophecies may not be left to rot like unpicked fruit; unicorns may go unrescued for a very long time, but not forever. The happy ending cannot come in the middle of the story.

—Peter S. Beagle, The Last Unicorn

Shinji:“You want a hero? I can be one. You want the Shinji who eats Angels for breakfast? That can be me. That will be me. I can do anything now. Now that I have a cause, a reason to start over new.”

—Shinji to Asuka, A Crown of Stars, chapter 54

"My father, the king of Mykos, always talked about a certain kind of person. That person does not listen. They act. They do not accept complacency, or what everyone tells them is possible... but rather, they do what they believe is right. They are terribly cursed. But they are the only ones who can break the wheel of suffering. Even though they struggle against fate itself - even when they seem foolish, or uninhibited - even though the outcome may, for a while, bring ruin, pain and misfortune the world - that person alone can break the Wheel, for better or for worse, and allow the stagnant blood of history to flow again. A hero."

—Nyave Anyadis, Kill Six Billion Demons

Jaller: Whether or not it was our destiny to find the Mask of Life when we got here, I think it's our destiny now. There's no one else to do it.

Hahli: Is that what heroes are I wonder? Beings who do what they have to because they have no choice?

Kongu: Turaga Nuju once speak-said that no one would ever choose to be a Toa. No one except a crazy Le-Matoran that is.

Nuparu: Maybe you don't choose a destiny like that. Maybe it chooses you.

— BIONICLE Legends 3: Power Play

"Eventually, one day, someone will pray for a miracle. Pray for something to save them, to whatever gods are nearby... And that prayer will be answered because you will show up. That's how it works, that's what a champion is."

—Caduceus to Fjord, Critical Role, Campaign 2 episode 75

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