# All’s Well That Ends Well — Character guide

> Key figures in All’s Well That Ends Well by William Shakespeare.

- [Helena](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters/helena.md): A physician's orphan who cures a dying king, then claims the husband she loves — and must outwit his contempt to keep him.
- [Bertram](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters/bertram.md): A young count newly orphaned of his father, sent to court as the king's ward, who bristles at the bride chosen for him.
- [Parolles](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters/parolles.md): Bertram's swaggering hanger-on, all drum and no soldier, whose boasts grow louder the less he has to boast about.
- [Countess of Rousillon](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters/countess.md): Bertram's mother, twice widowed in one farewell, who loves her son and her dead physician's daughter with equal clear sight.
- [Lafeu](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters/lafeu.md): An old lord with a tooth still in his head, fond of plain speech, plain truth, and any maid who can dance.
- [King of France](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters/king_of_france.md): A monarch who has abandoned his physicians and waits to die, until a dead man's daughter offers him a cure.
- [Diana](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters/diana.md): Diana moves through Florence as a young woman of respectable family, courted by Bertram with the same reckless appetite he brings to everything he wants. Her wariness of his flattery and her loyalty to her mother's house
- [Widow Capilet](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters/widow.md): Diana's mother who shelters Helena in Florence.
- [Lavache](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters/clown.md): The Countess's witty and foolish servant.
- [Steward](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters/steward.md): The Countess's steward who reports Helena's love for Bertram.
- [First Lord Dumain](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters/first_lord_dumain.md): A French lord serving with Bertram in the Florentine wars.
- [Second Lord Dumain](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters/second_lord_dumain.md): Another French lord and brother to the first, also in Florence.
- [Gentleman A Stranger](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters/gentleman_a_stranger.md): A French gentleman who aids Diana's petition to the King.

HTML index: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/all_s_well_that_ends_well_se/characters