Character guide

Germany

major

Also known as herself, its

Germany enters the book already prostrate — its people accused of overturning the foundations on which everyone lived, yet also bound to France, Italy, and Austria by what Keynes calls hidden psychic and economic bonds. The treaty's terms threaten to complete a ruin Germany began, and Keynes insists the victors cannot destroy their victim without inviting their own. Everything in the early chapters converges on whether this nation will be allowed to work and feed itself again.

Unknown

major

Also known as mine, myself

He moves between London's oblivious prosperity and continental Europe's rumblings, insisting England stands outside Europe while Europe is solid with herself. He admits the liberties of a historian, touching questions of motive where spectators err, because the world needs light even if partial and uncertain. His presence turns dry treaty analysis into testimony, and his unease about the settlement drives the book's gathering argument.

Clemenceau

major

Also known as M. Clemenceau, the Carthaginian Peace of M. Clemenceau

Clemenceau leads the treaty's harshest provisions, opening from extreme positions on the prudent assumption that compromise will follow. He earns a reputation for moderation by theatrically discarding his own ministers' proposals, while Allied critics, ignorant of the true point at issue, let provisions pass. His double-game — extreme demands, impartial air — matters because it shapes the terms Keynes will spend the book dismantling.

The Allies

supporting

Also known as themselves, their

Bound by prudence and magnanimity to reestablish life and heal wounds, the Allies instead let France take the lead in framing extreme proposals. British and American critics grow slack wherever their own interests are untouched, and the eleventh-hour refusal to allow discussion with the Germans seals provisions even the French took lightly. Their collective failure of attention is what Keynes means to expose.

Europe

supporting

Also known as itself, herself, its

Europe is personified as one body: France, Germany, Italy, Austria, Holland, Russia, Romania, and Poland flourishing together, rocking together in war, and liable to fall together. Its population exceeds what can be fed, its transport is ruptured, its food supplies impaired, and its civilization convulses. The Peace of Paris becomes destructive precisely because it ignores this interdependence — the book's central claim.

The Germans

supporting

Also known as Germans, the retreating Germans, some Germans, The Germans

Keynes grants them the initiating guilt — moved by insane delusion and reckless self-regard, they overturned the foundations on which all lived. Yet he refuses to let that guilt justify a peace that would impair the delicate organization through which European peoples must employ themselves and live. Their fate becomes the test case for whether victors can distinguish justice from vengeance.

Mr. Lloyd George

major

Also known as a Lloyd George, Mr. George, Lloyd George, George

Lloyd George sits among the four men Keynes calls the microcosm of mankind, representing a Britain that still stands outside Europe and cannot feel its tremors. His position is torn between an electorate hungry for German payment and the economic reality that ruin in Germany means ruin for Britain's trade and employment. In Keynes's account, his tactical flexibility matters because the Treaty's severity depended on whether British criticism stayed alert or, as too often happened, grew slack where British interests were not directly engaged.

Wilson

major

Also known as President Wilson, President

Wilson stands as one of the four figures in whom the world's hopes and purposes concentrated during the first months of 1919. His task was not only to honor engagements and satisfy justice but to reestablish life and heal wounds across a continent sick and dying. The tension Keynes exposes is between Wilson's principled vision and the practical bargaining of the Conference, where American ignorance of European detail and reluctance to seem the enemy's advocate let harsh provisions pass unchallenged.

M. Klotz

supporting

Also known as poor M. Klotz, M. Klotz

Klotz belongs to the French ministerial cohort whose extreme initial proposals Clemenceau could later discard with an air of impartial moderation. His fixation on what Germany could be made to pay embodies the French tactic of opening from an extreme position, expecting double compromise with allies and then with the Germans. Keynes's pity for him is telling: the finance minister's figures were taken seriously enough to shape the Treaty, yet not seriously enough by the French themselves, and the eleventh-hour refusal to discuss terms with the Germans sealed their effect.

The French

supporting

Also known as their

In Keynes's telling, the French took the lead in the provisions he examines, making the most definite and extreme proposals first as a matter of tactics. Clemenceau gained a reputation for moderation by throwing over his ministers' excesses, while British and American critics, ignorant of the true point or unwilling to appear the enemy's advocate, let much pass. The French thus embody the destructive significance of the Peace: abusing momentary victorious power to destroy a Germany with which France is inextricably intertwined by hidden psychic and economic bonds.

Mr. Hoover

supporting

Also known as Mr. Hoover

Hoover stands for the practical, unglamorous work of keeping Europe fed while the Conference pursued its political aims. Keynes frames the stakes starkly: a continent sick and dying, its population in excess of any available livelihood, its transport ruptured and food supplies terribly impaired. Against that background, Hoover's relief effort represents the prudence and magnanimity that the Peace Conference was supposed to honor alongside justice, and his presence quietly indicts the settlement's failure to reestablish life and heal wounds.

Sir Eric Geddes

minor

British politician and transport expert at the peace conference.

America

supporting

Also known as herself

America appears in Keynes's argument as both Europe's lifeline and its blind spot, the source of food on which a shattered continent depends and a nation that, like England, could remain unconscious of the rumblings abroad. Her representatives at Paris were naturally a little ignorant of the true point at issue, and where American interests were not seriously involved their criticism grew slack. That combination of indispensable resources and imperfect understanding makes America central to why the Peace's economic provisions went through as they did.

Lenin

minor

Russian revolutionary leader mentioned as a historical figure.

Dr. Stamp

minor

British economist involved in reparation calculations.

M. Loucheur

minor

Also known as And M. Loucheur

French minister of industrial reconstruction.

Great Britain

minor

Also known as herself

United Kingdom personified as a national entity.

M. René Pupin

minor

Also known as M. Pupin

French economist and statistician cited in the text.

M. Dubois

minor

French delegate on the Reparation Commission.

The Reparation Commission

supporting

Also known as the Commission

Summoned into being by the Treaty to fix what Germany owes, the Commission inherits a continent that is sick and dying, its transport ruptured and its population too large for the livelihood left to it. Its task is to honor engagements and satisfy justice, yet every figure it sets must be weighed against the fragile, artificial organization on which ordinary life still depends. Keynes watches how the Commission's demands, shaped by French tactics and Allied fatigue, become the hinge on which the whole peace settlement swings.

M. Bilinski

minor

Austro-Hungarian finance minister mentioned in context.

England

minor

Also known as herself

England personified as a national entity.

Mr. Hughes

minor

Australian prime minister at the peace conference.

Dr. Diouritch

minor

Expert on Balkan economics cited in the text.

Lord Northcliffe

minor

British newspaper proprietor and wartime propagandist.

Mr. Barnes

minor

British Labour Party representative at the peace conference.

Signor Orlando

minor

Also known as Orlando

Italian prime minister at the peace conference.

Mr. Bonar Law

minor

British Conservative politician and later prime minister.

Sartorius von Waltershausen

minor

Also known as Sartorius v. Waltershausen

German economist cited on pre-war economic conditions.

Sir Sidney Low

minor

British journalist and historian mentioned in the text.