The Red and the Black

Characters

Character Map

Who is who, and who belongs to whom. Click a name to open the character page.

Julien Sorel Carpenter's son from Verrières, prodigious memory, a Latinist by heart and a secret reader of Napoleon. He is the protagonist, and the novel exists to follow his calculation from within, without absolving or condemning him. Madame de Rênal The mayor's wife in Verrières, mother of three, devout and with no training in society. She receives Julien at home, whom her husband hires as the children's tutor, and she is his first love, the truer of the two, and the one who decides the ending of the... Mathilde de La Mole The daughter of the Marquis de La Mole, young, extremely wealthy, bored and a reader. She is Julien's second love, and the exact opposite of the first: where Madame de Rênal loves without knowing it, she decides to love. Monsieur de Rênal Mayor of Verrières, owner of the nail factory, who made his fortune in the iron trade, and husband of Madame de Rênal. In Chapter 2 of Book I, his greatness is measured in walls built and plane trees pruned twice a year, by the yardstick the narrator writes... Marquis de La Mole Parisian nobleman, father of Mathilde de La Mole and Norbert, in whose mansion Julien Sorel lives in Book II as a secretary. The ancestor who gives the family its name is Boniface de La Mole, beheaded in 1574 (see the severed head). Abbé Chélan Curé of Verrières, eighty years old at the start of the book, threatened with dismissal for having received a liberal inspector in prison. In Chapter 3 of Book I he appears as the only figure in town who does not measure things in money, and it is there that... Abbé Pirard Abbé of the seminary at Besançon (see the seminary at Besançon) who receives, examines and protects Julien Sorel, and who later goes to Paris in the service of the Marquis de La Mole. In Chapter 29 of Book I he is described as someone who treats Julien... Abbé de Frilair Vicar general of Besançon, a man of the congregation, who dreams of the bishopric. In Chapter 5 of Book I, the Ultraroyalist clerical network named in passing in Verrières will take full bodily form in him. Valenod Director of the poorhouse of Verrières and rival of Monsieur de Rênal in the town's status symbols. At the end of the book he is a baron, named governor, and presides over the reading of the verdict that condemns Julien Sorel. Father Sorel Father of Julien Sorel, a peasant at the sawmill where the son first appears, whom Chapter 4 of Book I describes as rude and calculating. Julien is always the carpenter's son.

Other characters

Fouqué: A young timber merchant who lives on the great mountain above Verrières and is Julien's friend: he keeps Julien's books, offers him a partnership in the business, which Julien refuses (ch. 12 of Book I), and visits him in prison, where he wants to sell all his property to bribe the jailer (ch. 37 of Book II).
Rênal's children: The three boys whom Julien teaches in the mayor's house: Adolphe is the eldest, and Stanislas-Xavier, the youngest, falls ill (ch. 19 of Book I) and later wants to sell the silver cutlery to pay Julien what he is worth (ch. 22 of Book I).
Maugiron: Subgovernor of Bray; he sees Julien recite the Bible in Latin (ch. 6 of Book I), helps name him an honor guard (ch. 18 of Book I), and later offers him, on behalf of an official he does not name, eight hundred francs a year, paid quarterly and in advance (ch. 22 of Book I).
Élisa: Madame de Rênal's lady's maid, who inherits some money and wants to marry Julien; when refused, she tells Valenod and the two curés about his affair with her mistress (ch. 19 of Book I, ch. 23 of Book I), and later is sent to bribe his jailer (ch. 36 of Book II).
Madame Derville: Cousin and school friend of Madame de Rênal, who arrives at Vergy and laughs at her wild ideas (ch. 8 of Book I); she suspects the affair with Julien, dismisses him harshly in Besançon (ch. 28 of Book I) and faints at the trial (ch. 41 of Book II).
Maslon: A priest sent from Besançon to keep watch over the curés of the region; he takes the place of the curé Chélan when he is removed (ch. 14 of Book I) and tries to bar him from the king's procession for being a Jansenist (ch. 18 of Book I).
Moirod: A timid devout man of Verrières, owner of houses that would have to be set back when the street is widened; he is a candidate for deputy mayor (ch. 17 of Book I), commands the king's honor guard and falls off his horse into a mudhole (ch. 18 of Book I).
The bishop of Agde: A young bishop, nephew of the Marquis de La Mole, who shows the relic of Saint Clement to the king; Julien catches him rehearsing blessings before a mirror (ch. 18 of Book I), and later he proposes, at the secret meeting, to sacrifice Paris (ch. 23 of Book II).
Cholin: An old man of Verrières whose servile petition to the marquis asks for the lottery agency (ch. 19 of Book I); Julien gives him the post for amusement (ch. 7 of Book II), and he later appears among Julien's jurors, alongside Valenod and Moirod (ch. 40 of Book II).
Falcoz: An old childhood friend of Rênal, a paper merchant who founds a liberal newspaper and is ruined by the Congregation (ch. 21 of Book I); Julien meets him on the Paris mail coach, where he speaks as a Bonapartist (ch. 1 of Book II).
Geronimo: A Neapolitan singer who turns the gloomy house in Verrières into a party (ch. 23 of Book I) and whom Julien meets again at an inn near Metz, where he warns him that there are horses hidden and ends up drugged with laudanum (ch. 23 of Book II).
Amanda Binet: A young woman at the counter of the great café in Besançon, who takes Julien in and teaches him to call himself a cousin of her mother; one of her lovers almost drives him to a duel (ch. 24 of Book I), and her address found in his luggage exposes him before Pirard (ch. 26 of Book I).
Castanède: Vice-director of the seminary at Besançon and enemy of Pirard; his men search Julien's luggage (ch. 26 of Book I), and later he searches Julien's room at an inn, as head of the congregation's police at the border (ch. 23 of Book II).
Chas-Bernard: A fat priest with a frank face, director of ceremonies at the Besançon cathedral, whom Julien helps decorate for the procession (ch. 28 of Book I); his letter in Julien's favor leads Pirard to appoint him tutor (ch. 29 of Book I).
Saint-Giraud: A former printer and philosopher who sells the Monfleury castle and flees the province, pursued by the vicar for refusing donations and by the liberals for refusing to vote; he blames Bonaparte for having called the priests back (ch. 1 of Book II).
Norbert: Count Norbert de La Mole, the marquis's son: a young man who is elegant, extravagant and brave, squadron leader of the hussars, whom Pirard predicts will despise Julien as a petty bourgeois (ch. 1 of Book II) and who later takes him riding (ch. 3 of Book II).
Tanbeau: A young man of letters, nephew of the academician who is the marquise's friend, who tries to divide the marquis's library with Julien and is rebuked (ch. 3 of Book II); later he spreads slander against him and spies on him in the salon (ch. 27 of Book II).
Croisenois: Marquis de Croisenois, a gentle young man of perfect manners, who frequents Mathilde's circle (ch. 4 of Book II) and intends to marry her; Julien wins her love over him (ch. 13 of Book II), and he dies in a duel before the end of the book (ch. 45 of Book II).
Caylus and Luz: Two young noblemen of Mathilde's circle who, with Croisenois and Norbert, mock anyone who arrives at the salon (ch. 4 of Book II); she confides to Julien that she had felt enthusiasm for them (ch. 18 of Book II).
Altamira: A Neapolitan count, a liberal sentenced to death in his own country and at the same time devout, whom Julien meets in the Jansenist societies to which Pirard takes him (ch. 5 of Book II); at the ball, his condemnation inspires Mathilde's maxim that only the death penalty honors a man (ch. 8 of Book II).
Korasoff: A Russian prince whom Julien meets in London and who initiates him into dandyism (ch. 7 of Book II); met again in Strasbourg, he gives him the plan to win back Mathilde and fifty-three ready-made love letters (ch. 24 of Book II).
Nerval: Prime minister present at the secret meeting, whom the cardinal wants out of government; he declares that he has a mission from heaven, studies Julien's face in a mirror and leaves before the night is over (ch. 23 of Book II).
The Marechale de Fervaques: A devout widow of rare beauty and phlegmatic temperament, who frequents the La Mole house; Julien courts her as a false target to provoke Mathilde's jealousy (ch. 24 of Book II), and she becomes involved out of boredom with the copied letters (ch. 29 of Book II).
Bustos: Don Diego Bustos, a liberal Spaniard and Carbonaro, with the gravity of a monk, who courted the Marechale de Fervaques; he poses the riddle on which Julien's future depends and lends him four of her letters (ch. 25 of Book II).
Félix Vaneau: The lawyer summoned by Mathilde, a former captain of the Army of Italy, who argues out of formality against Julien's refusal to appeal and reminds him that there are still two days to do so (ch. 42 of Book II).