The Grand Babylon Hotel · Characters
Character guide
Key figures in The Grand Babylon Hotel by Arnold Bennett.
Skim names here — open a free preview to see character cards and Character Web beside the page as you read.
Theodore Racksole
major
Also known as Mr. Theodore Racksole, Mr. Racksole, Racksole
Racksole is a self-made American who has never been beaten and takes the credit even when luck hands him an opening. Buying the hotel began as a whim over a badly cooked steak, but the presence of the princes of Posen rouses his fighting instincts and an abstract love of justice he won't name. His instinct to conceal what he learns from the police puts him at odds with the law even as he pursues the criminals.
Nella Racksole
major
Also known as Miss Racksole, Nella
Nella moves through the Grand Babylon with the assurance of someone who always gets what she wants and insists it has nothing to do with her father's dollars. She and Prince Aribert share a charged history from a rainy afternoon in Paris that neither will fully explain. Her sharp instincts and her terse note to her father — keep an eye on Rocco — quietly steer the investigation from the domestic side.
Prince Aribert
major
Also known as Prince, Aribert, the Prince
Aribert is a young man of sane, healthy instincts who can think of nothing but Nella's loveliness even when he means to discuss affairs of State. He insists no one at the hotel know he was in Paris last spring, and he broods when Nella hints at how she uncovered his identity. His connection to the missing Prince Eugen makes him both a guest and a puzzle the Racksoles cannot leave alone.
Prince Eugen
major
Also known as Prince Eugen of Posen, Eugen, little Eugen
Eugen arrives at the hotel already entangled in something dangerous, and his rescue from Jules, Rocco, and Miss Spencer only deepens the mystery rather than closing it. Racksole, having taken up arms on the princes' side, refuses to let the matter rest even after the immediate danger passes. The young prince's fate becomes the measure by which Racksole judges whether justice has actually been done.
Jules
supporting
Also known as Mr. Jules, the great Jules
Jules is the dark and tempestuous career at the center of the hotel's criminal machinery, a man whose cleverness and ingenuity seem almost admirable until they aren't. He flees across the roof by main strength and a fire-escape ladder, only to be undone by a single rung rusted through from bad paint. His death forces Racksole to answer to the police for everything he has concealed.
Félix Babylon
supporting
Also known as Mr. Félix Babylon, Mr. Babylon, Babylon, little Félix
Babylon built the hotel's kitchens into a wonder of Europe and keeps himself as carefully curated as his Louis XV room. He refuses to be party to a middleman's secret profit, and he agrees to sell to Racksole only on the condition that the property not be transferred to a limited company. His wary, watchful ownership sets the terms on which the whole mystery unfolds.
Sampson Levi
supporting
Also known as Mr. Sampson Levi, Mr. Levi, Levi
Levi is a Stock Exchange speculator rich enough to hire out the Grand Babylon's Gold Room for a thousand guests, yet obscure enough that no one can tell Racksole who he really is. His opulent hospitality and his wife's diamonds mark him as exactly the sort of plutocrat Racksole itches to humble. That the ball proceeds at all — and that a hidden window overlooks it — quietly plants Levi in the novel's web of watchfulness and suspicion.
Miss Spencer
supporting
Also known as Spencer
Miss Spencer presides over the hotel's official lair, dispensing Bradshaw knowledge and telephone calls while never travelling or going to a music-hall herself. She shares Jules's contempt for Theodore Racksole's 'Angel Kiss' and ranges herself instantly on the waiter's side, hinting at alliances deeper than her post suggests. One of the hotel's three gods, she is the still, watchful centre from which much of the early intrigue radiates.
Rocco
supporting
Also known as Mr. Rocco, M. Rocco, the great Rocco
Rocco is the hotel's supreme artist of gastronomy, a lean, graceful celebrity whom rival hotels have failed to poach and who never deigns to appear in his own kitchens. Yet Racksole, hidden behind woodwork, watches him photograph a corpse by aluminium flash-light — the body of Reginald Dimmock — in a suite reserved for Royalty. His fame and his secrecy pull in opposite directions, making him the novel's most unsettling early mystery.
Reginald Dimmock
supporting
Also known as Mr. Dimmock, Dimmock, young Dimmock
Dimmock is dead before he is properly introduced, his body laid out on the table of a suite meant only for Royal blood while Rocco works over it with sinister calm. The flashlight that exposes his features to Racksole's eyes also exposes him to the camera, tying his death to whatever scheme Jules and Rocco are running. His identity as a hotel employee makes his murder a scandal the Grand Babylon cannot afford to ignore.
George Hazell
supporting
Also known as Mr. Hazell, Hazell
Hazell belongs to the loose network of watchers and agents circling the hotel's mysteries, present in the Royal apartments where so much of the novel's ceremonial and clandestine action unfolds. His role is bound up with the investigation that Racksole and Nella find themselves conducting almost against their will. He matters because the plot's early-middle arc depends on information passing between people who may or may not be trustworthy.
Tom Jackson
supporting
Also known as Mr. Tom Jackson, Thomas Jackson, Jackson
Tom Jackson — otherwise Jules, erstwhile head waiter — has the bearing of a gentleman and the methods of a conspirator, holding Nella captive aboard a yacht with a discreet crew and no Miss Spencer in sight. He parries her threats with imperturbable courtesy, even as he hints she may never return, and confesses a connoisseur's appreciation of her beauty and defiance. His double identity makes him the human face of the conspiracy Nella is determined to unravel.
Hans
minor
Also known as old Hans, Old Hans
An old servant or employee at the hotel.
Baroness Zerlinski
minor
Also known as the Baroness Zerlinski, Zerlinski, the Baroness
A mysterious baroness who visits the hotel briefly.
Mr. Hubbard
minor
Also known as Hubbard, this Mr. Hubbard
A singular and mysterious man who appears at the hotel.
Princess Anna
minor
Also known as Princess Anna of Eckstein-Schwartzburg, Anna
A princess connected to the royal intrigue.
Elihu P. Rucker
minor
Also known as Mr. Elihu P. Rucker, Mr. Rucker
An American associate of Theodore Racksole.
Count Steenbock
minor
Also known as the Count Steenbock, Count
A count involved in the royal affairs.
Jack Everett
minor
Also known as Everett, old Everett
An old acquaintance or associate of the Racksoles.
