“In an ideal world I ought to have gone with him to observe their reactions, but in an ideal world heroes never get tired or depressed; what's more, heroes are paid more than me.”

“See, heroes never die. John Wayne isn't dead, Elvis isn't dead. Otherwise you don't have a hero. You can't kill a hero. That's why I never let him get older.”

Mickey Spillane (1918–2006) American writer

“Extracting out, extracting out, thousands of literary heroes until you get to the one that embodies that which is most heroic in all the rest. That's a religious deity. That's what Christ is. The extracting out is exactly what the Scriptures were doing previously. The extracting out is the process of scriptural development and prophesy. The prophets extracted, extracted, extracted until they saw the ideal. The saw the ideal that had never before been seen before. In seeing the ideal, they called for it. They prophesied that it would come. And then it did. And then it changed the world.”

Jordan Peterson (1962) Canadian clinical psychologist, cultural critic, and professor of psychology

“The bottom line is the American people are capable of determining their own heroes — ideals for heroes — and they don't need to be told elaborate lies.”

Jessica Lynch (1983) Recipient of the Purple Heart medal

“More often than not, a hero’s most epic battle is the one you never see; it’s the battle that goes on within him or herself.”

Kevin Smith (1970) American screenwriter, actor, film producer, public speaker and director

“The lover who kills himself for a girl has an experience which is more complete and much more profound than the hero who overturns the world.”

Emil M. Cioran (1911–1995) Romanian philosopher and essayist

“So many really divine individuals humanity has not already produced! Heros in the moral sense, who never got tired to practice renouncement and charity; bright intelligences who opened to the mind new ways and horizons; poets and wonderful artists, who created for him the image of an ideal world, the reflect of perfection. These are as many proofs of the presence of the absolu in the midst of humanity, for him that does not discover the immediate proof of that in himself.”

African Spir (1837–1890) Russian philosopher

“Jack was embarrassed — never hero more,
And as he knew not what to say, he swore.”

George Gordon Byron (1788–1824) English poet and a leading figure in the Romantic movement

“It's a shame that pantyless party girls get more attention than the real heroes, the nurses and teachers and moms.”

Laura Penny (1975) Canadian journalist

“Heroes in books should be so much better than heroes got up for the world's common wear and tear”

Anthony Trollope Framley Parsonage