Peter Straub Quotes

I find it most remarkable that we who are so intimately involved in the battle between good and evil are even more involved with the shades of gray in between them.

All of the films I have made, that I have chosen to make, are all about the thin line between good and evil. And also the thin line that exists in each and every one of us. That's what my films are about.

Everyone spends their lives trying to balance their world between good and evil.

I think I am more attracted to characters with a subtext, whatever that is and they don't necessarily have to be virtuous, but they have to at least be human.

The battleline between good and evil runs through the heart of every man.

The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either – but right through every human heart – and through all human hearts. This line shifts. Inside us, it oscillates with the years. And even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained. And even in the best of all hearts, there remains…an unuprooted small corner of evil. Since then I have come to understand the truth of all the religions of the world: They struggle with the evil inside a human being (inside every human being). It is impossible to expel evil from the world in its entirety, but it is possible to constrict it within each person.

We should not be simply fighting evil in the name of good, but struggling against the certainties of people who claim always to know where good and evil are to be found.

I think the challenge for me in this role is going to be, is there any heart in Negan? For me, I look at that as a challenge as an actor, and that's the kind of thing that I embrace and really look forward to.

People love talking about the banality of evil and the fact that ordinary people do bad things. I actually want to stay away from that.

Our actions are neither so good nor so evil as our impulses.

There is good and evil in each of us, and you can easily be led to the dark side.

Snape is vindictive, he's cruel. He's not a big man. But he loves. I like him, but I'd also like to slap him hard.

Being against evil doesn't make you good. Tonight I was against it and then I was evil myself. I could feel it coming just like a tide... I just want to destroy them. But when you start taking pleasure in it you are awfully close to the thing you're fighting.

What were good and evil, really, but stupid categories? Stupid categories that restricted people and punished or rewarded them based on how they responded to their own natures, natures they really didn't have any way to control.

You know how confusing the whole good-evil concept is for me.

He has a spirit-a soul- and therfore a choice. I will belive that Aurox will chose Light, even if Darkness resides within him. None of us is entirely good. Or evil.

I am unwilling to be wholly good—and please don't regard me as wholly evil!

In other films and TV shows, we might say, "Well, they're just evil." In our show [Daredeval], we're trying to say, "There's bad actions, but not necessarily bad people."

There's always the question of what is good and evil and the gray area in between where that most people live. In everyday life, things aren't black or white, but rather there's a lot of coping and really tough decision making.

People with the purest souls are capable of the greatest evils.

Our best works are shot through with sin and contain something for which we need to be forgiven.

The good and the bad mix themselves so thoroughly in our thoughts, even in our aspirations, that we must look for excellence rather in overcoming evil than in freeing ourselves from its influence.

The only boring part of it is finding the fact that got you from point A to point B. Most actors, if they're being honest, are not going to say that that's the most stimulating acting work they've ever done. But the dynamics of staring into the face of evil and it looking back at you, and seeing yourself in that or not, is interesting.

The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either - but right through every human heart - and through all human hearts. This line shifts. Inside us, it oscillates with the years. And even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained.

Beware 'good' main characters who have a limited repertory of culturally acceptable feelings, while your evil bastards have a full range of vivid, passionate feelings.