# Almayer’s Folly — Character guide

> Key figures in Almayer’s Folly by Joseph Conrad.

- [Dain Maroola](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/dain.md): Dain Maroola arrives in Sambir as a trader with a brig and an easy generosity that buys him friends on both sides of the river. His love for Nina is total and undisciplined, offered with a fervor that ignores race, rank,
- [Kaspar Almayer](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/almayer.md): Almayer is the white trader at the mouth of the Pantai, tolerated by Malays and Arabs alike, sustained by a fortune he has never seen and a return to Europe he will never make. He dotes on Nina as the vessel of his ambit
- [Nina Almayer](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/nina_almayer.md): Nina moves through Sambir as the white Mem, neither fully European nor fully Malay, and the settlement's tedium presses on her like a cell. Her father's gold schemes bore her; her mother's savage talk of white men and po
- [Babalatchi](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/babalatchi.md): Babalatchi serves as Lakamba's advisor and eyes, moving between the Rajah's stockade and the white man's compound with the ease of a man who belongs to neither. He suspects Dain's visits to Almayer's household long befor
- [Lakamba](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/lakamba.md): Lakamba rules Sambir from a plank house behind a stockade, surrounded by armed relations and a household of wives, more interested in comfort than in statecraft. He receives Dain at night in a hastily tied sarong, lettin
- [Ali](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/ali.md): Ali serves Almayer with a loyalty that survives his master's failures, standing by him in the compound and on the river while others drift toward Lakamba or Abdulla. He is the quiet witness to Almayer's hopes and Nina's 
- [Syed Abdulla](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/abdulla.md): Abdulla commands the Arab trading faction in Sambir, the rival power to Almayer's decaying white-man's compound, and his name is the first weapon Almayer reaches for when warning off strangers. His quiet dignity and long
- [Captain Ford](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/captain_ford.md): Ford moves through the Dutch East Indies as a familiar, weathered presence, the kind of sailor who calls a master 'old pirate' as a courtesy and knows every anchorage worth knowing. He belongs to the same rough maritime 
- [Taminah](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/taminah.md): Taminah walks the settlement with a tray balanced on her head, invisible to the men who buy from her and useful to those like Reshid and Abdulla who want eyes in Almayer's campong. Beneath her practiced indifference she 
- [Tom Lingard](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/tom_lingard.md): Lingard is the old sea king of the archipelago, a trader of titanic appetites who brawls over profits with Hudig and plucks Almayer from a clerk's stool to make him supercargo and, later, son-in-law. His affection for Al
- [Mahmat Banjer](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/mahmat_banjer.md): A local trader and occasional ally of Almayer.
- [Bulangi](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/bulangi.md): A Malay boatman and minor character in Sambir.
- [Reshid](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/reshid.md): A nephew of Abdulla, involved in trade and local politics.
- [Mrs. Vinck](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/almayer_s_folly_se/characters/mrs_vinck.md): A Dutch colonial wife, briefly mentioned in social contexts.

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