# Ben Gant — Look Homeward, Angel character guide > Ben Gant in Look Homeward, Angel by Thomas Wolfe. **Role:** major **Also known as:** Benjamin Harrison, Ben, Harry, Sometimes Ben, Sideways Ben, Benjamin Gant, Good old Ben, B - B - B - Ben **First appearance:** 0003-look-homeward-angel ## Snapshot A moody newspaperman with a wild Scotch gift for seeing through time, closest to Eugene and quietly burning himself out in the town's smoky pressrooms. ## Who they are Ben Gant is the older brother Eugene loves best, a chain-smoking reporter who paces Altamont's streets at night and stares at his own baby picture with a fear of change he cannot name. He feels life as a ghostly ticking, a train-window vision where the slattern in the doorway freezes and vanishes, and he carries that unreality like a private wound. His tenderness toward Eugene, hidden under sarcasm and cigarettes, gives the novel its sharpest image of love that cannot save anyone. ## Relationships ### [Eugene Gant](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/characters/eugene_gant) _family_ Ben is Eugene's older brother and closest confidant, offering fierce protection and intellectual kinship, but also a tragic, doomed intimacy. ### [Eliza Gant](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/characters/eliza_gant) _family_ Ben and Eliza share a strained mother-son relationship marked by Ben's resentment of her materialism and emotional coldness. ### [Helen Gant](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/characters/helen_gant) _family_ Ben and Helen share a close sibling bond, with Helen often nursing and worrying over Ben's fragile health. ### [Eliza Gant](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/characters/eliza_gant) _family_ Ben and Eliza share a strained mother-son relationship marked by Ben's resentment of her materialism and emotional coldness. ### [Eugene Gant](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/characters/eugene_gant) _family_ Ben is Eugene's older brother and closest confidant, offering fierce protection and intellectual kinship, but also a tragic, doomed intimacy. ### [Eugene Gant](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/characters/eugene_gant) _family_ Ben is Eugene's older brother and closest confidant, offering fierce protection and intellectual kinship, but also a tragic, doomed intimacy. ### [Helen Gant](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/characters/helen_gant) _family_ Ben and Helen share a close sibling bond, with Helen often nursing and worrying over Ben's fragile health. ### [Eliza Gant](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/characters/eliza_gant) _family_ Ben and Eliza share a strained mother-son relationship marked by Ben's resentment of her materialism and emotional coldness. ### [Helen Gant](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/characters/helen_gant) _family_ Ben and Helen share a close sibling bond, with Helen often nursing and worrying over Ben's fragile health. ## In the story ### [Part I](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/look-homeward-angel) Appears as a quiet, enigmatic older brother whose presence looms over Eugene's childhood. ### [II](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-i-ii) One of the twin boys born in 1892, named Benjamin Harrison. ### [III](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-i-iii) Mentioned as sometimes joining the neighborhood children in chanting outside the house during Oliver's drunken episodes. ### [Chapter IV](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-i-iv) Eugene's brother, who maintains a proud dignity while waiting for Sunday dinner. ### [Chapter V](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-i-v) Present at the family's return from Grover's death and later works at the Fair Grounds. ### [VIII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-i-viii) Protects Eugene from other siblings, spends his paper-carrier earnings on gifts for him, plays roughly but affectionately, and shares a bawdy song with him. ### [The Paradox of Generosity and the Burden of Family](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-i-x) Ben is a silent, solitary figure who works from early morning delivering papers. He is deeply generous in a quiet, unassuming way, giving Eugene money and gifts without seeking gratitude. He is a stranger in his own home, and his isolation and impending death are foreshadowed. ### [Chapter XI](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-i-xi) Left floating in limbo after family separation. ### [XIV](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-ii-xiv) Ben is depicted prowling the night streets, scowling and cynical, interacting with paper-carriers and pressmen at the newspaper office, and later returning to Dixieland. ### [XVIII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-ii-xviii) Ben now serves as Eugene's guardian, moving among the family like a shadow, remote from their passionate partisanship. ### [Chapter XXI](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-ii-xxi) Ben lopes in scowling, snickers contemptuously at the family chaos, and moves quietly about the house. ### [XXII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-ii-xxii) Gets Eugene the job as a paper carrier, acting as a supportive but distant figure. ### [Chapter XXIII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-ii-xxiii) Described as secretive and uncommunicative, seen late at night with Mrs. P. ### [XXV](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-ii-xxv) Visits Dr. Coker to ask about enlisting in Canada, expresses existential despair and anger about life's purpose. ### [XXVI](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-ii-xxvi) Defends Eugene's right to spend his own money and secretly slips him a ten-dollar bill. ### [XXVII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-ii-xxvii) Attends the wedding; teases Eugene about the Shakespeare scrawl; arranges the wedding suite at Battery Hill. ### [XXVIII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-iii-xxviii) Grows closer to Eugene, speaking bitterly about their parents and urging Eugene to take all the money he can. ### [XXIX](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-iii-xxix) Ben is rejected by the enlistment board due to weak lungs, appearing thinner and more alone. ### [The Moonlit Vigil](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-iii-xxx) Ben advises Eugene to pursue education and success, revealing his own correspondence course in advertising and his hopes for Eugene. ### [XXXI](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-iii-xxxi) Goes to Baltimore with Helen and Gant; reacts with scowling disgust to Gant's behavior. ### [XXXII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-iii-xxxii) Goads Eugene into a fight, revealing his own frustration and bitterness; is physically subdued by Eugene. ### [XXXIII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-iii-xxxiii) Stationed in a tobacco town, warns Eugene to escape their family, appears as a ghostly figure prowling the streets. ### [Chapter XXXIV](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-iii-xxxiv) Home after being rejected by the army, bitter and angry, talks with Eugene about family and futility. ### [Chapter XXXV](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-iii-xxxv) Lies dying in the upstairs room, gasping for breath, his fierce gray lonely beauty evident even in his final moments. ### [Chapter XXXVII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-iii-xxxvii) Recently deceased; his absence dominates the chapter, and Eugene imagines his return in nature. ### [XXXVIII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-iii-xxxviii) Eugene thinks of the flowers above Ben's grave and feels grief sinking to a forgotten depth, but spring's victory over death brings ecstasy. ### [Chapter XL](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/chapters/part-iii-xl) Ben appears on the porch of Gant's shop, smoking, and engages in a cryptic conversation with Eugene. ## Links - HTML: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/characters/ben_gant - Book: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se - All characters: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/look_homeward_angel_se/characters