Literary notes about braggart (AI summary)
Literature often employs the term "braggart" to characterize characters whose boastfulness exposes their vanity, incompetence, or moral shortcomings. Writers use it both to deride inflated self-importance and to foreshadow a character’s inevitable downfall. In dramatic dialogues, the braggart is depicted as excessively proud or foolhardy, as when scorn is met with a biting rebuke [1] or when lofty claims are linked to underlying ignorance and hypocrisy [2]. At times, the label functions as a subtle commentary on society's disdain for self-aggrandizement—portraying such figures as both laughable and pitiable, whether in grand narratives of epic betrayal and tragedy [3, 4] or in satirical reflections on vanity and folly [5, 6].
- "See what a braggart thou art!" said the fox.
— from Household Tales by Brothers Grimm by Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm - You stubborn ancient knave, you reverent braggart, We’ll teach you.
— from The Tragedy of King Lear by William Shakespeare - Vibhishaṇ now will curse my name, And Ráma as a braggart blame, Who promised—but his word is vain— That he in Lanká's isle should reign.
— from The Rámáyan of Válmíki, translated into English verse by Valmiki - And yet, dear lady, Rating myself at nothing, you shall see How much I was a braggart.
— from The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare - Who knows himself a braggart, Let him fear this, for it will come to pass That every braggart shall be found an ass.
— from Shakespeare's Lost Years in London, 1586-1592 by Arthur Acheson - shall I quit thee For huffing, braggart, puffed nobility?
— from An Essay on Man; Moral Essays and Satires by Alexander Pope