Bluebeard

Refer to Marquis

Bride

Refer to Narrator

Heroine

Refer to Narrator

Jean-Yves

Jean-Yves, a blind piano tuner, becomes friends with the narrator when she marries the Marquis. He learns about the grim fates of the Marquis's former wives. Through Jean-Yves, readers gain insight into the Marquis's family's violent history in the region. After the narrator's mother kills the Marquis, she starts a music school and is "busily engaged in setting up house" with Jean-Yves. He loves her for her true self and cannot see the mark of shame on her forehead. His role as her happily-ever-after partner subverts the typical fairy-tale ending, where the woman usually falls for a handsome prince or dashing hero.

Marquis

Inspired by the legendary figure Bluebeard, the notorious wife-murderer, much about the Marquis remains shrouded in mystery. He is "much older" than his seventeen-year-old bride, though his precise age is unspecified. He is as "rich as Croesus," the ancient Lydian king, and resides in a menacing castle surrounded by a moat. As a Marquis, he hails from a long lineage of French aristocrats but appears to have no living family. This large, lion-like man has had three wives, all of whom died under mysterious circumstances, yet he shows no signs of mourning. The Marquis's enigmatic nature overwhelms his new bride with curiosity, prompting her to search through his personal items while he mysteriously vanishes on business during their honeymoon. She uncovers several clues about his character: evidence of his "connoisseurship" of pornography and involvement in an opium-dealing ring in Laos. These discoveries, along with a cryptic love note from his third wife, the countess, lead her to defy his strict order not to enter the locked room in the west wing. There, she uncovers his true identity as a murderer. Her broken promise gives him the pretext he needs to justify killing her, proving that his love for violence and his demand for absolute obedience and submission from women are his top priorities.

Mother

The mother, who rescues her daughter at the story's conclusion, has a background filled with adventure and sacrifice. As the daughter of a wealthy tea planter, she spent her childhood in Indo-China. She later married a soldier of humble means, and after his death, she was left destitute. She sold all her jewelry, "even her wedding ring," to ensure her daughter could attend a music conservatory. The deep bond she shares with her daughter allows her to sense that something is amiss when her daughter calls from the castle during her honeymoon, even though the daughter herself cannot articulate the problem. It is the warrior within her—the part that once fought tigers and pirates—that ultimately slays the Marquis as he is about to kill her daughter. This makes the mother the hero of the story, diverging from the original Bluebeard tale where the girl's brothers are the rescuers. This twist gives Carter's retelling a feminist perspective.

Narrator

The narrator of "The Bloody Chamber" is a young pianist who was raised in Paris with her mother and nanny. Her father died in battle when she was a child, but her most cherished memory of him is attending the opera Tristan and Isolde , which ignited her passion for music. She relies on this love of music when she is isolated in the Marquis's castle. At seventeen, she meets the Marquis, still slender, delicate, and sexually inexperienced. She is a naive girl who cannot truthfully answer her mother when asked if she loves the Marquis and who orders avocado, shrimp, and ice cream for dinner. She only knows that the Marquis evokes...