20 Quotes from literature that show what it really means to be a hero

Here are 20 quotes from literature that show what it really means to be a hero.

1. “To be heroic does not have to mean possessing the ability to stand against the evils of the world, either well or successfully, but just that one is willing to stand.”
― Mike Alsford, Heroes and Villains

2. “That’s why you can’t give up. Heroes don’t give up.”
― Kiera Cass, Happily Ever After

3. “To be heroic may mean nothing more than this then, to stand in the face of the status quo, in the face of an easy collapse into the madness of an increasingly chaotic world and represent another way.”
― Mike Alsford, Heroes and Villains

4. “Great heroes need great sorrows and burdens, or half their greatness goes unnoticed. It is all part of the fairy tale.”
― Peter S. Beagle, The Last Unicorn

5. “Anyway, if you need your heroes to be perfect, you won’t have very many. Even Superman had his Kryptonite. I’d rather have my heroes be more like me: trying to do the right thing, sometimes messing up. Making mistakes. Saying you’re sorry. And forgiving other people when they mess up, too.”
― Madeleine George, The Difference Between You and Me

6. “Heroes don’t have the need to be known as heroes, they just do what heroes do because it is right and it must be done.”
― Richelle E. Goodrich, Slaying Dragons

7. “A heroic act is not always followed by glory and parades and forever freedom,” she said. “It’s often small, disregarded, or forgotten. But it matters.”
― Shannon A. Thompson, July Lightning

8. “Heroes aren’t always the ones who win,” she said. “They’re the ones who lose, sometimes. But they keep fighting, they keep coming back. They don’t give up. That’s what makes them heroes.”
― Cassandra Clare, City of Heavenly Fire

9. “People will say it’s sad that she leaves a lesser scar, that fewer remember her, that she was loved deeply but not widely. But it’s not sad. It’s triumphant. It’s heroic. Isn’t that the real heroism?
The real heroes anyway aren’t the people doing things; the real heroes are the people NOTICING things, paying attention.”
― John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

10. “Heroes didn’t leap tall buildings or stop bullets with an outstretched hand; they didn’t wear boots and capes. They bled, and they bruised, and their superpowers were as simple as listening, or loving. Heroes were ordinary people who knew that even if their own lives were impossibly knotted, they could untangle someone else’s. And maybe that one act could lead someone to rescue you right back.”
― Jodi Picoult, Second Glance

11. “Our mother used to say that a hero doesn’t always have to slay a dragon to save the day.” She swept a lock of hair behind her ear in an honest gesture, then pursed her lips and looked back at him, her gaze endearing. “Sometimes he just walks through the fire alongside you, and that’s enough.”
― Kristy Cambron, The Illusionist’s Apprentice

12. “Heroes aren’t heroes because they worship the light, but because they know the darkness all to well to stand down and live with it.”
― Ninya Tippett, The Mischievous Mrs. Maxfield

13. “It takes strength to remember, it takes another kind of strength to forget, it takes a hero to do both. People who remember court madness through pain, the pain of the perpetually recurring death of their innocence; people who forget court another kind of madness, the madness of the denial of pain and the hatred of innocence; and the world is mostly divided between madmen who remember and madmen who forget. Heroes are rare.”
― James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room

14. “As the Great Magician says, there will always be trouble in the world. That’s why I say, there will always be a time for heroes.”
― Mark Andrew Poe, Halloween Nightmares

15. “The hero isn’t the one who is right, but the one who steps forward to take the blame—deserved or not—and apologize to save a relationship.”
― Richelle E. Goodrich, Slaying Dragons

16. “Heroes became extinct when saving the world became more important to rescue a damsel in distress.”
― L.A. Serröt, Gris

17. “Not every girl can be Isabelle Lightwood or Katniss Everdeen. I think the true measure of a hero is what a person does with what they have, how hard they are willing to fight, and how far they are willing to go to set things right.”
― Sarah Cross, Shadowhunters and Downworlders: A Mortal Instruments Reader

18. “Yes, there are plenty of heroes and heroines everywhere you look. They are not famous people. They are generally obscure and modest people doing useful work, keeping their families together and taking an active part in the health of their communities, opposing what is evil (in one way or another) and defending what is good. Heroes do not want power over others.”
― Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast

19. “Friends are the real superheroes. They battle our worst enemies—loneliness, grief, anxiety, depression, fear, and doubt—every time they come around.”
― Richelle E. Goodrich, Slaying Dragons

20. “But heroes, at times, had to be fools.”
― Steve Berry, The Venetian Betrayal