# The Blacker the Berry — Character guide

> Key figures in The Blacker the Berry by Wallace Thurman.

- [Emma Lou Morgan](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/emma_lou_morgan.md): Emma Lou graduates as the only Negro pupil in her high school, dressed in white and placed conspicuously on stage, already certain her complexion is a liability rather than a fact of life. Her fair-skinned family has spe
- [Alva Junior](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/alva_junior.md): Alva moves through Harlem with the casual authority of a man whose color opens doors Emma Lou keeps finding shut, and he knows it. He offers her the warmth and desirability she has craved her whole life, but his eye wand
- [Braxton](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/braxton.md): Braxton is the kind of young man who seems promising on paper, attentive enough to make Emma Lou hope, and embedded in the same color-conscious circles that quietly rank her last. His interest flickers and retreats, teac
- [Geraldine](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/geraldine.md): Geraldine moves easily through the social world Emma Lou longs to enter, and her fairness is the passport she never has to think about. She is not a villain so much as a mirror of the community's quiet arithmetic, treati
- [Hazel Mason](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/hazel_mason.md): Hazel Mason is everything Emma Lou fears being read as: dark, unpolished, and unbothered by the standards that have governed Emma Lou's whole life. Emma Lou recoils from her as "vulgar," but the disgust is tangled with r
- [Arline Strange](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/arline_strange.md): Arline Strange glides through Harlem's lighter-skinned circles with the confidence of someone who has never had to argue for her place, and her name alone signals the world Emma Lou is barred from. She is a rival for Alv
- [Weldon Taylor](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/weldon_taylor.md): Weldon Taylor moves through campus life with the ease of someone who has never had to apologize for his complexion, and his notice of Emma Lou feels like sunlight after years of shade. For a young woman taught to read he
- [Gwendolyn Johnson](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/gwendolyn_johnson.md): Gwendolyn Johnson belongs to the Harlem that Emma Lou has only imagined, a place where color lines shift block by block and charm can be a kind of currency. Her friendship gives Emma Lou both companionship and a measurin
- [John](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/john.md): A suitor Emma Lou rejects for being too dark.
- [Benson Brown](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/benson_brown.md): A college friend of Emma Lou's brother.
- [Anise Hamilton](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/anise_hamilton.md): A friend of Emma Lou's from college.
- [Truman Walter](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/truman_walter.md): A light-skinned man who flirts with Emma Lou.
- [Uncle Joe](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/uncle_joe.md): Emma Lou's uncle in Boise.
- [Verne Davis](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/verne_davis.md): A college acquaintance of Emma Lou.
- [Grace Giles](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/grace_giles.md): A friend of Emma Lou's in Harlem.
- [Jane Morgan](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/jane_morgan.md): Emma Lou's mother.
- [Bob Armstrong](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/bob_armstrong.md): A young man who dances with Emma Lou at a party.
- [Miss Morgan](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/miss_morgan.md): Emma Lou's aunt.
- [Aloysius McNamara](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/aloysius_mcnamara.md): A college student who corresponds with Emma Lou.
- [Jasper Crane](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_blacker_the_berry_se/characters/jasper_crane.md): A man who attends a party with Emma Lou.

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