Question

What is a “grotesque” character? What is an example of a grotesque character from a movie or book?

Answer 1

Hint: The term "grotesque" refers to a conceptual art direction identified by fictitious and spectacular animal and human figures frequently interlinked by foliage and other figures that manipulate the actual into ugliness, absurdity, or maybe even in caricature. Then if we are to describe what a character is, we can do it for a person as well as a place. Here the character of anything is made up of all of the features that distinguish one from several others be it individuals or locations.

Complete answer:
In simple words, “a grotesque character” would mean to be someone demeaned due to looks because of some kind of unpleasant incident. A role or setting in literature which is unusual, excessive, or extraordinary in appearance. Whenever the "grotesque" is used as a medium, it is almost always done using the expressionism style, with the grotesque serving as a satire of human attributes or a distorted representation of a familiar location.

In certain cases, grotesque characters do have societal problems, such as a soldier who has lost a leg in battle and is attempting to reintegrate into normal society, or something which they consider abnormal in the society. To put it another way, a personality whose actions and, further significantly, looks are bizarre, unusual, abnormal or ugly.

Quasimodo is perhaps one among the most popular examples for this category. A character found in Victor Hugo's novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Quasimodo translates to "as in the shape of a human." Behind his hideous nature, he is indeed a tragic and pathos-filled protagonist who is trapped in his affection towards Esmeralda.

Note: Grotesque is defined as repulsively ugly or shocking. A very ugly, scary mask is an example of a grotesque mask. When someone tells a really ridiculous lie, this is an example of a grotesque lie. Synonyms for grotesque are distorted, deformed, weird, antic, wild.