# The Plastic Age — Character guide

> Key figures in The Plastic Age by Percy Marks.

- [Hugh Carver](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/hugh_carver.md): Hugh arrives at college clean, boyishly frank, and easily swept up by the campus's social currents — poker, bootleg gin, and the pull of new friends. His instinct to comfort the weeping Morse reveals the warmth that defi
- [Cynthia Day](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/cynthia_day.md): Cynthia moves through the summer-society world of Norry's New York circle with frankness and physical grace, drawing Hugh in before he has any language for what he feels. She refuses to flatter him — insisting his feelin
- [Carl Peters](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/carl_peters.md): Carl writes nightly to his mother and can read Morse's homesickness with unnerving accuracy, insisting the redheaded boy is sick, not merely lonely. When he drops his slangy armor to tell Hugh something of himself, he be
- [Norry Parker](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/norry_parker.md): Norry is the gateway: his family's cottage on the Sound, his introductions to boarding-school girls who smoke and pet and drink, his father's quiet gratitude for Hugh's friendship. He is treated by the girls as a nice sm
- [Jimmie Henley](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/jimmie_henley.md): Henley is that rare professor who teaches rather than professes, reading Hugh's first drafts and naming them for what they are without cruelty or flattery. His warning — that natural gift without effort earns only a C — 
- [George Winsor](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/george_winsor.md): Winsor embodies the campus's cheerful self-indulgence: a hundred berries to the good, a quiz in eccy the next morning, and still unable to resist a two-bit-limit game that will soon go sky-high. He is bound for medical s
- [Harry Slade](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/harry_slade.md): The name the boys shout at the screen during silent-film melodramas, Harry Slade is the running joke of a movie night crowd that heckles love scenes with expert timing.
- [Pudge Jamieson](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/pudge_jamieson.md): A plump, horn-rimmed prodigy who rates an A without trying, Pudge Jamieson runs the dorm seminar like a one-man faculty and hoards the college's most notorious library of erotica.
- [Ted Allen](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/ted_allen.md): A student who participates in campus activities.
- [Bob Tucker](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/bob_tucker.md): A student and acquaintance of Hugh.
- [Helen Simpson](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/helen_simpson.md): A young woman who interacts with Hugh and his friends.
- [Janet Harton](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/janet_harton.md): A female student with a presence in the social dynamics.
- [Malcolm Graham](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/malcolm_graham.md): A student and friend of Hugh's circle.
- [Professor Kane](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/professor_kane.md): A faculty member at Sanford College.
- [Leonard Gates](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/leonard_gates.md): A student who appears in campus life.
- [Hezekiah Sanford](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/hezekiah_sanford.md): Founder of Sanford College, referenced historically.
- [Calvert of Raleigh](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/calvert_of_raleigh.md): A historical figure mentioned in passing.
- [Mr. Carver](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/mr_carver.md): Hugh's father, mentioned in correspondence.
- [Merton Billings](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/merton_billings.md): A student with limited narrative presence.
- [Larry Stillwell](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/larry_stillwell.md): A student mentioned in the college context.
- [Gordon Ross](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/gordon_ross.md): A student with a small role.
- [Paul Vinton](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/paul_vinton.md): A student who appears in a scene.
- [Melville Burbank](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/melville_burbank.md): A minor character mentioned.
- [Dodge](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/dodge.md): A minor character in the narrative.
- [Plautus](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/plautus.md): A classical reference or minor figure.
- [Professor Henley](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_plastic_age_se/characters/professor_henley.md): A faculty member, possibly Jimmie's relative.

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