English Characters Midterm Exam

A Boy (Much Ado about Nothing)

serving Benedick.

Dogberry (Much Ado about Nothing)

the Constable in charge of the Watch. He is a buffoon but still manages to capture Borachio and Conrad and make them tell about the plot to ruin Hero's reputation.

Verges (Much Ado about Nothing)

the Headborough, Dogberry's partner

Don John (Much Ado about Nothing)

the bastard brother of Don Pedro. He plots against Claudio, first making Claudio think that Don Pedro is wooing Hero for himself, and later making Claudio believe that Hero has committed infidelity.

Antonio (Much Ado about Nothing)

the brother of Leonato, an old man. He is furious when Claudio shames Hero and challenges the younger man to a duel. He later pretends to be Hero's father at the final wedding at the end.

Francisco (Hamlet)

A soldier and guardsman at Elsinore.

Helmsman (HOD)

A young man from the coast trained by Marlow's predecessor to pilot the steamer. He is a serviceable pilot, although Marlow never comes to view him as much more than a mechanical part of the boat. He is killed when the steamer is attacked by natives hiding on the riverbanks.

Russian trader (HOD)

A Russian sailor who has gone into the African interior as the trading representative of a Dutch company. He is boyish in appearance and temperament, and seems to exist wholly on the glamour of youth and the audacity of adventurousness. His brightly patched clothes remind Marlow of a harlequin. He is a devoted disciple of Kurtz's.

Kurtz's African mistress (HOD)

A fiercely beautiful woman loaded with jewelry who appears on the shore when Marlow's steamer arrives at and leaves the Inner Station. She seems to exert an undue influence over both Kurtz and the natives around the station, and the Russian trader points her out as someone to fear. Like Kurtz, she is an enigma: she never speaks to Marlow, and he never learns anything more about her.

Chief accountant (HOD)

An efficient worker with an incredible habit of dressing up in spotless whites and keeping himself absolutely tidy despite the squalor and heat of the Outer Station, where he lives and works. He is one of the few colonials who seems to have accomplished anything: he has trained a native woman to care for his wardrobe.

Elizabeth Lavenza (Frankenstein)

Both Victor's sister and his bride. Elizabeth is presented as being angelically good and incomparably beauty: she represents ideal womanhood and its promises of love and comfort.

Screwtape (The Screwtape Letters)

Devil, uncle of wormwood, "high" demon

Leonato (Much Ado about Nothing)

Governor of Messina. His daughter Hero is promised in marriage to Claudio and his niece Beatrice ends up loving Benedick at the end.

Horatio (Hamlet)

Hamlet's close friend, who studied with the prince at the university in Wittenberg. Horatio is loyal and helpful to Hamlet throughout the play. After Hamlet's death, Horatio remains alive to tell Hamlet's story.

Victor Frankenstein (Frankenstein)

He is the main character, a man driven by ambition and scientific curiosity. His quest for absolute knowledge and power will eventually end in his own ruin.

Kurtz's Intended (HOD)

Kurtz's naïve and long-suffering fiancée, whom Marlow goes to visit after Kurtz's death. Her unshakable certainty about Kurtz's love for her reinforces Marlow's belief that women live in a dream world, well insulated from reality.

Aunt (HOD)

Marlow's doting relative, who secures him a position with the Company. She believes firmly in imperialism as a charitable activity that brings civilization and religion to suffering, simple savages. She, too, is an example for Marlow of the naïveté and illusions of women.

The men aboard the Nellie (HOD)

Marlow's friends, who are with him aboard a ship on the Thames at the story's opening. They are the audience for the central story of Heart of Darkness, which Marlow narrates. All have been sailors at one time or another, but all now have important jobs ashore and have settled into middle-class, middle-aged lives. They represent the kind of man Marlow would have likely become had he not gone to Africa: well meaning and moral but ignorant as to a large part of the world beyond England. The narrator in particular seems to be shaken by Marlow's story. He repeatedly comments on its obscurity and Marlow's own mysterious nature.

Cannibals (HOD)

Natives hired as the crew of the steamer, a surprisingly reasonable and well-tempered bunch. Marlow respects their restraint and their calm acceptance of adversity. The leader of the group, in particular, seems to be intelligent and capable of ironic reflection upon his situation.

Ophelia (Hamlet)

Polonius's daughter, a beautiful young woman with whom Hamlet has been in love. Ophelia is a sweet and innocent young girl, who obeys her father and her brother, Laertes. Dependent on men to tell her how to behave, she gives in to Polonius's schemes to spy on Hamlet. Even in her lapse into madness and death, she remains maidenly, singing songs about flowers and finally drowning in the river amid the flower garlands she had gathered.

Reynaldo (Hamlet)

Polonius's servant, who is sent to France by Polonius to check up on and spy on Laertes.

Laertes (Hamlet)

Polonius's son and Ophelia's brother, a young man who spends much of the play in France. Passionate and quick to action, Laertes is clearly a foil for the reflective Hamlet.

Don Pedro (Much Ado about Nothing)

Prince of Aragon, a military commander who brings his troops to Messina. He woos Hero for Claudio and later plots to bring Benedick and Beatrice together.

Claudius (Hamlet)

The King of Denmark, Hamlet's uncle, and the play's antagonist. The villain of the play, Claudius is a calculating, ambitious politician, driven by his sexual appetites and his lust for power, but he occasionally shows signs of guilt and human feeling—his love for Gertrude, for instance, seems sincere.

Polonius (Hamlet)

The Lord Chamberlain of Claudius's court, a pompous, conniving old man. Polonius is the father of Laertes and Ophelia.

Hamlet (Hamlet)

The Prince of Denmark, the title character, and the protagonist. About thirty years old at the start of the play, Hamlet is the son of Queen Gertrude and the late King Hamlet, and the nephew of the present king, Claudius.

Gertrude (Hamlet)

The Queen of Denmark, Hamlet's mother, recently married to Claudius. Gertrude loves Hamlet deeply, but she is a shallow, weak woman who seeks affection and status more urgently than moral rectitude or truth.

Safie (Frankenstein)

The betrothed of Felix. She is presented as exotically beautiful, and is racially fetishized for her Turkishness. The de Lacey family wishes to marry her to Felix and convert her to Christianity.

Brickmaker (HOD)

The brickmaker, whom Marlow also meets at the Central Station, is a favorite of the manager and seems to be a kind of corporate spy. He never actually produces any bricks, as he is supposedly waiting for some essential element that is never delivered. He is petty and conniving and assumes that other people are too.

Pilgrims (HOD)

The bumbling, greedy agents of the Central Station. They carry long wooden staves with them everywhere, reminding Marlow of traditional religious travelers. They all want to be appointed to a station so that they can trade for ivory and earn a commission, but none of them actually takes any effective steps toward achieving this goal. They are obsessed with keeping up a veneer of civilization and proper conduct, and are motivated entirely by self-interest. They hate the natives and treat them like animals, although in their greed and ridiculousness they appear less than human themselves.

General Manager (HOD)

The chief agent of the Company in its African territory, who runs the Central Station. He owes his success to a hardy constitution that allows him to outlive all his competitors. He is average in appearance and unremarkable in abilities, but he possesses a strange capacity to produce uneasiness in those around him, keeping everyone sufficiently unsettled for him to exert his control over them.

Kurtz (HOD)

The chief of the Inner Station and the object of Marlow's quest. Kurtz is a man of many talents—we learn, among other things, that he is a gifted musician and a fine painter—the chief of which are his charisma and his ability to lead men. Kurtz is a man who understands the power of words, and his writings are marked by an eloquence that obscures their horrifying message. Although he remains an enigma even to Marlow, Kurtz clearly exerts a powerful influence on the people in his life. His downfall seems to be a result of his willingness to ignore the hypocritical rules that govern European colonial conduct: Kurtz has "kicked himself loose of the earth" by fraternizing excessively with the natives and not keeping up appearances; in so doing, he has become wildly successful but has also incurred the wrath of his fellow white men.

Agatha (Frankenstein)

The daughter of De Lacey, she is yet another example of selfless womanhood, caring for her brother and her father despite their poverty and her own sadness.

Osric (Hamlet)

The foolish courtier who summons Hamlet to his duel with Laertes.

De Lacey (Frankenstein)

The head of the household observed by the creature, de Lacey has been robbed of his fortunes as a result of his own kindness. His blindness makes him capable of recognizing the creature's sincerity and goodness despite his hideous appearance.

Marcellus and Bernardo (Hamlet)

The officers who first see the ghost walking the ramparts of Elsinore and who summon Horatio to witness it. Marcellus is present when Hamlet first encounters the ghost.

Marlow (HOD)

The protagonist of Heart of Darkness. Marlow is philosophical, independent-minded, and generally skeptical of those around him. He is also a master storyteller, eloquent and able to draw his listeners into his tale. Although Marlow shares many of his fellow Europeans' prejudices, he has seen enough of the world and has encountered enough debased white men to make him skeptical of imperialism.

Robert Walton (Frankenstein)

The reader's representative in the novel, he is the person to whom Victor relates his story. He has much in common with Victor: ambition, drive, and the desire for glory.

Felix (Frankenstein)

The son of de Lacey, he is devoted to his family and his mistress, Safie. Though noble, he drives the creature from the family cottage with stones. He thereby symbolizes one of the basic flaws in the human character: the hatred of difference.

The Ghost (Hamlet)

The specter of Hamlet's recently deceased father. The ghost, who claims to have been murdered by Claudius, calls upon Hamlet to avenge him. However, it is not entirely certain whether the ghost is what it appears to be, or whether it is something else. Hamlet speculates that the ghost might be a devil sent to deceive him and tempt him into murder, and the question of what the ghost is or where it comes from is never definitively resolved.

The Creature (Frankenstein)

The work of Frankenstein's hands, he is his double, his persecutor, and his victim. The lives of him and his creator are inextricably entwined.

Fortinbras (Hamlet)

The young Prince of Norway, whose father the king (also named Fortinbras) was killed by Hamlet's father (also named Hamlet). Now Fortinbras wishes to attack Denmark to avenge his father's honor, making him another foil for Prince Hamlet.

William (Frankenstein)

The youngest son of the Frankenstein family. His death at the hands of the monster renders him a symbol of lost and violated innocence.

Justine (Frankenstein)

Though a servant in the Frankenstein household, she is more like a sister to Victor and Elizabeth. She is executed for William's murder, and thus becomes yet another martyr to lost virtue and innocence.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern (Hamlet)

Two slightly bumbling courtiers, former friends of Hamlet from Wittenberg, who are summoned by Claudius and Gertrude to discover the cause of Hamlet's strange behavior.

Henry Clerval (Frankenstein)

Victor's best friend since childhood. Fascinated with the history of mankind, he is Victor's intellectual opposite. He, too, will be murdered by the monster; he is perhaps a symbol of the destruction of Victor's own goodness and potential.

Alphonse (Frankenstein)

Victor's father; yet another shining example of kindness and selflessness. His happiness depends on the happiness of his children. If they fail, he does as well; thus, their deaths precipitate his own.

Caroline (Frankenstein)

Victor's mother; a paradigm of motherly concern and generosity. Her death provides the catalyst for Victor's desire to transcend death. It is her last wish that Victor and Elizabeth be married.

Patient (The Screwtape Letters)

Wormwood is trying to lead him away from christianity, becomes Christian at end of novel

Borachio (Much Ado about Nothing)

a follower of Don John. He creates the second plot against Claudio. He meets Margaret in Hero's chambers, causing Claudio to think he is seeing Hero and Borachio together and that Hero is therefore being unfaithful to him. He is arrested by Dogberry's watchmen and forced to tell the truth at the end.

Conrad (Much Ado about Nothing)

a follower of Don John. He listens to Borachio tell how Don John paid him a thousand ducats to pretend to meet Hero in her chambers, when instead he meets with Margaret. He is arrested with Borachio by the watchmen.

Ursula (Much Ado about Nothing)

a waiting-gentlewoman who attends to Hero. She and Hero make up a story about how Benedick loves Beatrice in the garden where Beatrice can overhear them.

Margaret (Much Ado about Nothing)

a waiting-gentlewoman who attends to Hero. She unwittingly is thought to be Hero when she meets with Borachio in Hero's chambers.

Beatrice (Much Ado about Nothing)

an orphan, the niece of Leonato. She talks a great deal and is very witty but determined not to marry. However, Don Pedro concocts a plot that brings her together with Benedick and they marry at the end.

Balthasar (Much Ado about Nothing)

attendant on Don Pedro and also a singer.

Wormwood (The Screwtape Letters)

demon that has the job of leading the "patient" away from christianity

Watchmen (Much Ado about Nothing)

guards who roam the city of Messina keeping order and peace.

Claudio (Much Ado about Nothing)

of Florence, a lord and companion of Don Pedro. He falls in love with Hero and allows Don Pedro to woo her for him. He later incorrectly believes that Hero has committed infidelity and calls her a ***** in the church where they are about to get married. As penance, Leonato makes Claudio agree to blindly marry his niece in disguise, and then gives him Hero in marriage anyway.

Benedick (Much Ado about Nothing)

of Padua, a lord and companion of Don Pedro, he talks far too much. He is forced to marry Beatrice after Don Pedro concocts a plot and makes him think she loves him.

Hero (Much Ado about Nothing)

the daughter of Leonato. She is publicly disgraced by Claudio on the day of their wedding and faints. After pretending to be dead until she is proven innocent, Leonato allows her to marry Claudio.

Friar Francis (Much Ado about Nothing)

the man meant to marry Hero and Claudio, he tells Leonato to let everyone believe that Hero is dead so her reputation can be salvaged after Claudio accuses her of infidelity.

A Sexton (Much Ado about Nothing)

the man who interrogates Borachio and Conrad, he makes them write down everything that he is told before going to Leonato and revealing that Hero is innocent.