# The Messenger — Darkwater character guide

> The Messenger in Darkwater by W. E. B. Du Bois.

**Role:** supporting

**Also known as:** The messenger, himself

**First appearance:** 0006-ii-the-souls-of-white-folk

## Snapshot

A herald of the natural world—the mountain, the sea, the pine—delivering the news that beauty and grief share the same coast.

## Who they are

He speaks in the voice of Mount Desert's rock-ribbed silence and the sail-flecked sea, announcing that men should come to these shores to renew their spirit. Yet his message curdles when the narrator asks why the scarred and battle-hurt do not travel there, and the answer arrives as a Jim Crow waiting room with no heat and no air. He matters because he carries the book's central prophecy: that the same nation which carves such sublime coastlines also carves such humiliating rooms, and the two cannot be kept apart.

## Relationships

### [The Woman](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/darkwater_se/characters/the_woman)

_social_

A clandestine or intermediary connection, often carrying messages between the Woman and others.

### [The Woman](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/darkwater_se/characters/the_woman)

_social_

A clandestine or intermediary connection, often carrying messages between the Woman and others.

## In the story

### [II: The Souls of White Folk](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/darkwater_se/chapters/ii-the-souls-of-white-folk)

Implied as the one who brings news of racial atrocities and the global condition of darker peoples.

### [The Princess of the Hither Isles](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/darkwater_se/chapters/the-princess-of-the-hither-isles)

The black beggar man, who represents the sun's understanding and leads the procession.

### [The Call](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/darkwater_se/chapters/the-call)

The herald who calls the servants of the King three times.

### [X: The Comet](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/darkwater_se/chapters/x-the-comet)

A Black man who survives the comet and searches the city for other survivors, grappling with fear and the burden of being alone with a white woman.

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/darkwater_se/characters/the_messenger
- Book: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/darkwater_se
- All characters: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/darkwater_se/characters