Aug 30, 2008

The Robber Bridegroom | Characters

Working as she does with the fairy tale mode, Welty deliberately creates stereotypical figures, most of whom are one-dimensional and static. As Welty points out in a talk she delivered on The Robber Bridegroom before the Mississippi Historical Society, she uses only one word to describe her planter, Clement Musgrove, the word "innocent." That word, she says, "shines like a cautionary blinker to what lies on the road ahead." Clement's wife, the evil Salome, is also one-dimensional as are the clownish Goat, the braggart Mike Fink, and the bloodthirsty Little Harp. Rosamond, Clement's...