Character guide

Mr. Boffin

major

Also known as Boffin, Mrs. Boffin, Noddy Boffin, Nicodemus Boffin

Mr. Boffin inherits the Harmon fortune and installs himself as benefactor to Bella Wilfer and employer to John Rokesmith, transforming from humble scavenger into a man of property and opinion. His blustering confrontation with Rokesmith over Bella reveals a coarsening instinct to police stations and barter affections, even as his wife's gentler judgment pulls the other way. His shifting conduct toward those in his power becomes the moral laboratory of the novel's middle stretch.

Mortimer Lightwood

major

Also known as Lightwood, Mortimer Lightwood Esquire, Lawyer Lightwood

Lightwood moves between the Veneerings' glittering dinners and the grim business of the Harmon estate, a professional insider who knows too much and feels too little. His easy, ironic detachment, modeled on Eugene's, masks a life lived at second hand, never quite committing to love, ambition, or moral seriousness. As the legal thread that binds the dead man's fortune to the living, he keeps the plot's central question in play while quietly exposing the emptiness of fashionable London.

Eugene Wrayburn

major

Also known as Mr. Eugene Wrayburn, Mr. Wrayburn, Eugene, Sir Eugene

Eugene belongs to the idle gentry, clever enough for any career and indifferent to all of them, until his pursuit of Lizzie Hexam draws him into a world of riverside labor and dangerous rivalry. His confession to her is honest about his own weakness—he admits his cursed carelessness will not help him here—yet he still cannot bring himself to sacrifice comfort for her sake. His slow, unwilling transformation from spectator to participant is the novel's most intimate study of whether a man can be redeemed by love he did not earn.

Bella Wilfer

major

Also known as Miss Bella, Miss Wilfer, Bella Wilfer, little Bella

Bella Wilfer enters the story as a young woman whose father's disappointments have taught her to prize wealth and to distrust her own heart. Installed at the Boffins' as a favored dependent, she finds herself caught between the Secretary's quiet regard and Mr. Boffin's increasingly mercenary view of her as goods awaiting a bid. Her shame at being so appraised, and her growing tenderness toward the child and toward Rokesmith, set her on the novel's central path from calculation to genuine feeling.

Silas Wegg

major

Also known as Wegg, Mr. Wegg, Silas, the wooden Wegg

Wegg first meets Boffin as a street singer and is later installed in the Bower as a reader, a position he treats as a foothold for something larger. His cautious, self-serving manner—always weighing what a man might wish to do some day—conceals a scheme to profit from a hidden document connected to the Harmon estate. As Boffin's household grows grander, Wegg's petty treachery becomes the novel's sharpest satire on the greed that wealth attracts.

Bradley Headstone

major

Also known as Mr. Headstone, Mr. Bradley Headstone, Bradley

Headstone has climbed from poverty to a respectable teaching post, and he approaches Lizzie through her brother Charley, who is his pupil and eager ally. Awkward, intense, and painfully aware that he shows worst when he most wants to show best, he proposes in a churchyard while Charley walks away to leave them alone. His thwarted passion and his rivalry with Eugene Wrayburn turn the novel's quietest figure into its most dangerous, exposing the violence beneath respectable self-control.

Lizzie Hexam

major

Also known as Liz, Lizzie Hexam, Hexam, the real Lizzie Hexam

Lizzie belongs to the river's rough economy through her father Gaffer, yet her brother Charley is climbing out of it and resents her for not following his lead. Educated, watchful, and loyal past the point of safety, she becomes the fixed point around which the schoolmaster Bradley Headstone and the gentleman Eugene Wrayburn circle with very different hungers. Her choices in the early and middle chapters set the whole plot's machinery of pursuit, class, and sacrifice in motion.

John Rokesmith

major

Also known as Mr. Rokesmith, Rokesmith, John Rokesmith, John

Rokesmith arrives at the Bower as a nameless, capable young man hired to manage the Golden Dustman's affairs, and he is treated by turns as a servant and a nuisance. He carries a secret identity, a stubborn patience, and a love for Bella that he can neither declare nor abandon as Boffin's character begins to curdle under wealth. His presence turns the Harmon inheritance from a legal puzzle into a moral test of who deserves fortune and who merely wants it.

Alfred Lammle

supporting

Also known as Mr. Lammle, Alfred Lammle, the captivating Alfred

Alfred Lammle moves through fashionable London as the captivating young gentleman, cultivated by the Veneerings and tolerated by Twemlow, always angling for the next advantageous connection. When he discovers that his marriage to Sophronia brought no money, the pair convert their disappointment into a cold partnership of predation, targeting richer and more naive marks. His schemes give the novel its sharpest picture of how polite society manufactures its own swindlers.

Sophronia Lammle

supporting

Also known as Sophronia Akershem, Sophronia, Mrs. Lammle

Sophronia enters the Veneering set as a bride with no family to give her away and no money to bring, only her beauty and her husband's schemes. She plays the charming confidante to Georgiana Podsnap even as Alfred grooms the girl for Fledgeby, and the hypocrisy of that friendship begins to work on her conscience. Her flickers of decency make her the one Lammle who might still choose a different ending.

Mr. Venus

supporting

Also known as Venus, Cock Robin, the unfortunate Mr. Venus

Venus reconstructs skeletons for a living and keeps a shop full of oddities, including a preserved human hand and a young alligator, and he speaks of his trade with a mournful precision. When Wegg brings him a discovered will and a scheme to squeeze the Golden Dustman, Venus becomes a reluctant accomplice whose conscience keeps snagging on the enterprise. His refusal to burn the document, and his uneasy loyalty, make him a hinge on which the Boffin plot turns.

Roger Riderhood

supporting

Also known as Riderhood, Mr. Riderhood, Rogue Riderhood, the Rogue

Riderhood haunts the riverside pubs and lock-houses where watermen drink, cadging pints and picking up the scraps of gossip that he can sell or use. He is the kind of man who accuses others of crimes he has committed himself, and his feud with Gaffer Hexam and later with Bradley Headstone gives the novel its most poisonous strand of blackmail. His menace is small-scale and relentless, the human face of the river's criminal underside.

Twemlow

supporting

Also known as Mr. Twemlow, Poor Twemlow, the estimable Twemlow

Twemlow drifts through the Veneering set as its most earnest and least consequential ornament, securing a window at the club and gravely working the Pocket-Breaches cause because someone asked him to. His defining tension is that he mistakes being used for being needed, and his small dignities—the restive hair, the borrowed importance—make him both comic and quietly pitiable. He matters because his loyalty to Veneering exposes how the new moneyed world absorbs and exhausts the old gentility.

Fledgeby

supporting

Also known as Mr. Fledgeby, Fascination Fledgeby, young Fledgeby

Fledgeby operates Pubsey and Co. through the dignified front of old Riah, keeping his own hands conspicuously clean while squeezing debtors and baiting Lammle in private. His cowardice and cunning form a single vice: he wants the profits of cruelty without ever being seen to inflict it. He matters because his sham respectability is the novel's sharpest early study in how finance disguises predation as gentility.

Jenny Wren

supporting

Also known as Miss Jenny Wren, Jenny, Miss Wren, the dolls' dressmaker

Jenny stitches dresses for dolls in a fog-bound London room, calling Riah her godmother and turning her deformity into a running joke she controls before anyone else can. Her tension is between the tenderness she hides—she kisses the maimed hand—and the acid she deploys against self-important men like Headstone and Charley. She matters because her clear-eyed judgments and her friendship with Lizzie make her the moral tuning fork of the early and middle chapters.

Charley Hexam

supporting

Also known as Charley, young Charley Hexam, Charley Hexam, Charles Hexam

Charley is the waterman's son who has been lifted into respectability by education and now wants to keep climbing, even at the cost of the family he came from. His flaw is a self-serving shame that Jenny Wren names outright—selfish, thinks only of himself—and it sets him against Lizzie's loyalty and Headstone's increasingly dangerous fixation. He matters because his upward striving pulls the plot's respectable and criminal worlds into the same room.

Gaffer Hexam

supporting

Also known as Gaffer Hexam, Gaffer, Jesse Hexam

Gaffer works the river's dark economy, hauling bodies from the tide and treating the dead as a trade rather than a horror, which places him at the edge of the law and outside ordinary society. His fierce, possessive bond with Lizzie and his contempt for Charley's respectable ambitions create the family fracture that drives the opening of the book. He matters because the mystery of the river and the Hexams' fate begins in his boat.

Mrs. Wilfer

supporting

Also known as Wilfer, the worthy Mrs. Wilfer, the discreet Mrs. Wilfer

Mrs. Wilfer presides over the crowded, threadbare Wilfer household with folded gloves and a monotone of wounded propriety, forever correcting her husband and extolling her own family's trials. Her specialty is gratifying her spleen by praising her children's sufferings, especially Bella's, as if grief were a title she alone could confer. She matters because her theatrical self-pity shapes Bella's hunger for a life beyond the family's pinched gentility.

Lavinia Wilfer

supporting

Also known as Miss Lavinia, Lavinia, Lavvy, the sharp Lavinia

Lavinia is the bold, sardonic daughter who lays the tablecloth as if raising the wind and punctures her mother's martyred airs with a single retort. Her affections have shifted to George Sampson, but she punishes him for having overlooked her first, holding him in a course of stinging discipline. Her irreverent eye exposes the family's genteel poverty from the inside, making the Wilfer household comic and painfully real.

Reginald Wilfer

supporting

Also known as R. Wilfer, Wilfer, Rumty, Pa

R. Wilfer, called Rumty and Pa, is a mild clerk who seems to count his many children anew each time one appears and who argues from a fellow-creature point of view. He yields to his wife's severe monotony with a stipulation and a compliment, never quite winning. His loving, defeated decency gives the Wilfer poverty its pathos and makes Bella's ambitions and resentments legible.

Mr. Podsnap

supporting

Also known as Podsnap, dear Mr. Podsnap

Mr. Podsnap is a self-satisfied businessman whose opinions are confined within close bounds, like his head within his shirt-collar, and enunciated with a pomp that creaks like his boots. He has a daughter, Georgiana, whom he has trained as an institution called the young person, shielded from anything that might bring a blush. His complacent respectability is the novel's target, and his household is the gilded cage into which the Lammles insinuate themselves.

Georgiana Podsnap

supporting

Also known as Georgiana, little Georgiana, Georgiana Podsnap

Georgiana is an undersized, dejected damsel whose early views of life came from her father's boots and the dim drawing-rooms, and who seems to take frosty peeps out of childhood into womanhood before shrinking back. She is delighted and bewildered by the Lammles' flattery and by the prospect of being admired by young Fledgeby. Her innocence is the raw material of a social scheme, and her loneliness makes her both pitiable and vulnerable.

Riah

supporting

Also known as Mr. Riah, the Jew, Riah the Jew

Riah is the gentle old man who keeps Fledgeby's counting-house and is dismissed with a scrawled note calling him an unthankful dog of a Jew. He accepts the blow with dignity, takes his few goods and his staff, and is taken in by Jenny Wren, his goddaughter in spirit. His kindness and his homelessness expose the cruelty of the respectable world that uses him as a screen, and his friendship with Jenny and Lizzie gives the novel its moral center.

Pleasant Riderhood

supporting

Also known as Miss Pleasant Riderhood, Pleasant, poor Pleasant

Pleasant is the daughter of the river-thief Roger Riderhood, a young woman of the waterside whose tavern and whose father's reputation both weigh on her. She has a romantic interest in Mr. Venus, the articulator of bones, and her cautious hope for a better life is shadowed by her father's trade. Her position between respectability and the river's criminal world makes her a quiet measure of how the novel's characters are shaped by their origins.

Sloppy

supporting

Also known as Mister Sloppy, Mr. Sloppy, the sympathetic Sloppy

Raised among the poor and passed along by charity, Sloppy clings to Betty Higden with a loyalty that makes him refuse any better place that would separate them. Gentle, literal, and easily unmanned by others' sorrow, he becomes the awkward messenger who carries news of little Johnny's illness to the Boffins and, with unconscious shrewdness, explains Betty's dread of being a burden. His devotion sets the moral key for the novel's poorer households.

Betty Higden

supporting

Also known as Mrs. Betty Higden, Mrs. Higden, Betty, old Betty

Betty scrapes a living by folding and stitching, keeping Sloppy and little Johnny as her household, and she speaks of the Union with a horror that is both terror and principle. When Johnny dies and Sloppy will not leave her to better himself, she resolves to run away from the boy she loves rather than stand in his light. Her fierce, self-punishing independence makes her the novel's sharpest rebuke to official charity.

Miss Abbey Potterson

supporting

Also known as Miss Potterson, Abbey, Miss Abbey, the stately Abbey

Miss Abbey rules her waterside house of call with a severity that is also a kind of justice, softening only for those she judges genuinely wronged. She receives Riah and Jenny Wren on Lizzie Hexam's behalf, and when Riderhood is carried in half-drowned she takes command of the room, fetching doctor and daughter and pitching Captain Joey out for his butcher's-shop remedies. Her tavern is the novel's crossroads where river folk, police, and secrets meet.

Mr. Inspector

supporting

He belongs to the official machinery that must make sense of a body pulled from the Thames and of the many stories the river keeps. Where amateurs like Mortimer Lightwood and Eugene Wrayburn treat the case as romance or amusement, the Inspector works it as a matter of fact and procedure. His presence keeps the mystery tethered to law and consequence, even as the plot's deeper currents run beneath his reach.

George Sampson

minor

Also known as George, George Sampson, Mr. George Sampson, Mr. Sampson

Awkward young man who courts Lavinia Wilfer and later marries her.

Mrs. Veneering

minor

Also known as Veneering, Anastatia Veneering, Anastatia

Social-climbing wife of Mr. Veneering, obsessed with fashionable dinner parties.

Mr. Veneering

minor

Also known as Veneering, Hamilton Veneering

Newly rich politician and host, whose dinners are a social barometer.

Lady Tippins

minor

Also known as old Lady Tippins, the Lady Tippins, Tippins

Widowed society gossip who frequents Veneering parties and matchmakes.

Miss Peecher

minor

Also known as Little Miss Peecher, little Miss Peecher, good Miss Peecher

Schoolmistress who secretly loves Bradley Headstone.

Mrs. Milvey

minor

Also known as little Mrs. Milvey, brisk Mrs. Milvey

Brisk and kind wife of Reverend Milvey, helps with charitable work.

Reverend Frank Milvey

minor

Also known as the Reverend Frank Milvey, Frank, Mr. Milvey

Poor but good-hearted clergyman who performs marriages and assists the poor.

Mrs. Podsnap

minor

Also known as the majestic Mrs. Podsnap, the conquering Podsnap

Podsnap's wife, a majestic and silent presence in his household.

Bob Gliddery

minor

Also known as Bob, Bob Gliddery

Barman at the Six Jolly Fellowship Porters, serves Miss Abbey.

Young Blight

minor

Also known as Blight, young Blight

Clerk to Mortimer Lightwood, eager and somewhat comical.

Mrs. Boffin

supporting

Also known as the cheerful Mrs. Boffin, the openhearted Mrs. Boffin

Raised from nothing to sudden wealth, Mrs. Boffin keeps her warm, unpretending kindness intact, weeping over little Johnny Higden and pressing to know how she can help. She takes Bella under her wing and treats Sloppy with a courtesy that costs her nothing and means everything to him. Her generous, unguarded heart becomes the moral counterweight to the novel's calculations of money and marriage.

Mary Anne

minor

Young pupil of Miss Peecher, often questioned about Headstone.

Dolls

minor

Also known as Mr. Dolls

Jenny Wren's drunken and abusive father, who eventually dies.

Tom Tootle

minor

Also known as Tom, Tootle, the blushing Tootle

A young man who blushes easily, a guest at Veneering's.

Gruff and Glum

minor

Also known as Gruff, Glum, victorious Gruff and Glum

Two comic servants of the Boffins, known for their taciturnity.

John Harmon

minor

Also known as a Mr. Harmon, Mr. John Harmon, the deceased Mr. John Harmon, old Mr. Harmon

Deceased miser whose will sets the plot in motion; his son is presumed dead.

Julius Handford

minor

Also known as Mr. Julius Handford, Mr. Handford, Handford

Mysterious alias used by John Rokesmith when first appearing in London.

George Radfoot

minor

Also known as Mr. Radfoot, Radfoot

Sailor who conspired with and was murdered in place of John Harmon.

Job Potterson

minor

Also known as Mr. Job Potterson, Potterson

Brother of Miss Abbey, a ship's steward who returns home.

Mrs. Sprodgkin

minor

Annoying parishioner who pesters Reverend Milvey with trivial complaints.

Lord Snigsworth

minor

Also known as the awful Snigsworth, the sublime Snigsworth, Snigsworth

Twemlow's noble relative, often mentioned but rarely seen.

Analytical Chemist

minor

Also known as The Analytical, the Analytical, The Analytical Chemist

Veneering's haughty butler, known for his disdainful silence.

Mrs. Tapkins

minor

Also known as Mrs. Henry George Alfred Swoshle née Tapkins

Social climber who writes to Mr. Boffin seeking patronage.

Brewer

minor

Also known as Mr. Brewer

One of the Veneerings' dinner guests, a man of business.

Boots

minor

Also known as Mr. Boots

Another of the Veneerings' dinner guests, often paired with Brewer.

Buffer

minor

Also known as Same Buffer

Frequent guest at Veneering dinners, known for his bland conversation.

Mr. Jacob Kibble

minor

Also known as Mr. Kibble

A friend of the Boffins who gives advice about the dust mounds.

Captain Joey

minor

A river man, possibly a friend of Riderhood.

Uncle Parker

minor

Relative of the Wilfers, mentioned in family discussions.

John Elwes

minor

Also known as John Elwes, Elwes

Historical miser mentioned as a comparison to old Mr. Harmon.

Daniel Dancer

minor

Also known as Daniel Dancer, Dancer, Mr. Dancer

Historical miser referenced in the novel for his extreme thrift.

Miss Dancer

minor

Sister of Daniel Dancer, also a miser, mentioned in passing.

Vulture Hopkins

minor

Also known as Hopkins

Historical miser mentioned as a comparison to old Harmon.

Mrs. Jack Styles

minor

Also known as Johnny

Woman who adopts an orphaned child, mentioned by Betty Higden.

Edward

minor

A minor character, possibly a servant or clerk.

Clifford

minor

A guest at Veneering's, possibly a military man.

Margaretta

minor

A servant in the Wilfer household.

Cecilia

minor

A minor female character, possibly a friend of the Wilfers.

Bob Glamour

minor

Also known as Bob

A minor character, possibly a river worker.

Jack Mullins

minor

Also known as Mr. Jack Mullins, Mullins, the blushing Mullins, Johnny

A young man who courts and marries a minor character.

William Williams

minor

Also known as Williams

A minor character, possibly a clerk or tradesman.

Robert Baldwin

minor

A minor character mentioned in the narrative.

General John Reid

minor

Also known as General sensation

Historical figure mentioned in a social context.

Aaron

minor

Also known as Mr. Aaron

A Jewish associate of Riah, possibly a moneylender.

Judah

minor

A Jewish associate of Riah, mentioned briefly.

Little Eyes

minor

A child or small person mentioned in the narrative.

Stobbles, Chicksey, Veneering

minor

Also known as Chicksey, Stobbles

Firm name of Veneering's former business partnership.

Pubsey and Co.

minor

Also known as Pubsey

Firm name under which Fledgeby operates his moneylending business.

Lady Belinda Whitrose

minor

Also known as Lady Belinda, Bella

A society lady, possibly a friend of the Veneerings.

Mrs. Eugene Wrayburn

minor

Also known as Mrs. Eugene

Eugene's mother, mentioned but not appearing in the story.