Dec 23, 2009

Blackberry Winter | Characters

Dellie
Dellie is the wife of the sharecropper Old Jebb and mother of Seth’s sometime playmate Jebb. She works as a cook for Seth’s family. They are an African-American family who live in a cabin on the narrator’s family’s farm. On the day the story takes place, Dellie is sick in bed with an unspecified ‘‘female’’ illness. Young Seth is shocked by her ravaged appearance and stunned when she lashes out and slaps her son so hard that he cries.

Father
The father’s first or last name never appears in the story, but he plays a prominent role...