# Clara Durrant — Jacob's Room character guide

> Clara Durrant in Jacob's Room by Virginia Woolf.

**Role:** supporting

**Also known as:** Clara, Miss Clara

**First appearance:** 0002-iii

## Snapshot

A refined young woman from a wealthy family, introduced in drawing rooms and watched by Bonamy, who reads Jacob's silence as being about her.

## Who they are

Clara Durrant moves through the well-mannered world of the Durrants' parties, presented to visitors and gently admired. Bonamy's sarcasm at the height of the season is aimed at her — at what he suspects she means to Jacob, and at Jacob's unreadable quiet. She represents the marriageable, socially sanctioned possibility Jacob never quite pursues, sharpening the sense of a life that drifts rather than chooses.

## Relationships

### [Jacob Flanders](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/characters/jacob_flanders)

_romantic_

Clara is a refined, quiet woman for whom Jacob feels a restrained attraction, but their relationship remains unfulfilled and socially constrained.

### [Betty Flanders](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/characters/betty_flanders)

_social_

Betty Flanders views Clara as a suitable, genteel match for Jacob, fostering a polite but hopeful connection between their families.

### [Mr. Bowley](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/characters/mr_bowley)

_social_

Mr. Bowley is an older, platonic admirer of Clara, representing the safe, conventional suitor she is expected to accept.

### [Timmy Durrant](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/characters/timmy_durrant)

_family_

Timmy is Clara's brother, and their relationship is one of polite, upper-class sibling affection with little emotional depth shown.

### [Jacob Flanders](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/characters/jacob_flanders)

_romantic_

Clara is a refined, quiet woman for whom Jacob feels a restrained attraction, but their relationship remains unfulfilled and socially constrained.

### [Betty Flanders](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/characters/betty_flanders)

_social_

Betty Flanders views Clara as a suitable, genteel match for Jacob, fostering a polite but hopeful connection between their families.

### [Timmy Durrant](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/characters/timmy_durrant)

_family_

Timmy is Clara's brother, and their relationship is one of polite, upper-class sibling affection with little emotional depth shown.

### [Mr. Bowley](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/characters/mr_bowley)

_social_

Mr. Bowley is an older, platonic admirer of Clara, representing the safe, conventional suitor she is expected to accept.

### [Jacob Flanders](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/characters/jacob_flanders)

_romantic_

Clara is a refined, quiet woman for whom Jacob feels a restrained attraction, but their relationship remains unfulfilled and socially constrained.

### [Timmy Durrant](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/characters/timmy_durrant)

_family_

Timmy is Clara's brother, and their relationship is one of polite, upper-class sibling affection with little emotional depth shown.

### [Betty Flanders](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/characters/betty_flanders)

_social_

Betty Flanders views Clara as a suitable, genteel match for Jacob, fostering a polite but hopeful connection between their families.

## In the story

### [Chapter IV](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/chapters/iv)

Clara shyly asks Jacob if he quarreled with Timothy, and later appears on the terrace crushing a verbena leaf.

### [Chapter VI](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/chapters/vi)

Sleeps buried in her pillows with dishevelled roses and long white gloves on her dressing-table.

### [VII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/chapters/vii)

Hosts the party, directs guests, sings with Elsbeth Siddons, procures stockings for Mrs. Page, and is courted by Edwin Mallett and Richard Bonamy.

### [Chapter X](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/chapters/x)

Mentioned as a woman Jacob honors, contrasted with Fanny's perceived deceitfulness.

### [XII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/chapters/xii)

Mentioned as having left Jacob at a party to talk to an American called Pilchard.

### [XIII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/chapters/xiii)

Yearns for Jacob while performing social duties, confides in Mr. Bowley but holds back.

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/characters/clara_durrant
- Book: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se
- All characters: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/jacobs_room_se/characters