Noun

Singular character

Plural characters

character (plural characters)

1. A being involved in the action of a story.
2. A written or printed symbol, or letter
3. A distinguishing feature; characteristic; A complex of mental and ethical traits marking a person or a group.
4. A moral strength.

   "You may not like to eat liver," said Calvin's father, "but it builds character."

5. A person with many notable or eccentric features.
6. (mathematics) A complex number representing an element of a finite Abelian group.
7. (computing) One of the basic elements making up a text file or string: a code representing a printing character or a control character.
8. (informal) A person or individual, especially one who is unknown or raises suspicions.

   We saw a shady character slinking out of the office with some papers.

Character(s) may refer to:

Art & entertainment

• Character (arts), an agent in a work of art, including literature, drama, cinema, opera, etc.
• Character (1997 film), based on the novel by Dutch author Ferdinand Bordewijk
• Character (album), by Dark Tranquillity
• Characters (album), by Stevie Wonder
• Character Options, a toy company
• The Characters, a book by the Greek philosopher Theophrastus

Math, science, and technology

• Character (biology), the abstraction of an observable physical or biochemical trait of an organism
• Character (mathematics), a type of function used in algebra
• Character structure, a psychological system of personal traits
• Moral character, an evaluation of a particular individual's moral qualities
• Game character, a fictional character in a video game or role playing game
  • Player character, as above but who is controlled or whose actions are directly chosen by a player
    • Non-player character, as above but not player-controlled

Moral character or character is an evaluation of a person's moral and mental qualities. Such an evaluation is subjective — one person may evaluate someone's character on the basis of their virtue, another may consider their fortitude, courage, loyalty, honesty, or piety.

Contents

• 1 Sourced
  • 1.1 Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895)
• 2 Unsourced
• 3 External links

Sourced

• Our characters are the result of our conduct.
  • Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics (c. 335 B.C.)

• There are many counterfeits of character, but the genuine article is difficult to be mistaken.
  • Samuel Smiles, 19th C Scottish author and reformer. ‘Character: The True Gentleman’, Self-Help (1856), Ch 13

• Character is the inhabited habit.
  • Leonid S. Sukhorukov, All About Everything (2005)

• Just because you are a character doesn't mean you have character.
  • Winston Wolfe (a character played by Harvey Keitel) in the film, Pulp Fiction (1994)

Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895)

Reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895).

• A good character is the best tombstone. Those who loved you, and were helped by you, will remember you when forget-me-nots are withered. Carve your name on hearts, 'and not on marble.
  • , p. 44.

From Wikiquote under the GNU Free Documentation License.
Tue Jan 26 13:59:17 2010