Dodong is the main protagonist of “Footnote to Youth.” He lives in an unspecified rural area in the Philippines with his mother and father. An able-bodied and hardworking teenager, he spends his days plowing the fields with a carabao. Dodong does not resent the hard work of cultivating the land and even finds it invigorating. Another one of his virtues is his thoughtfulness, as shown when he refrains from eating any more of the caked sugar on his family’s table in order to leave some for his parents. He also expresses pity for both his father, who is pained by a diseased tooth, and his mother, who is burdened with the brunt of the housework. However, these virtues are overshadowed by his apparent immaturity and stubbornness.

Although he is only seventeen years old, Dodong wishes to marry Teang as soon as possible. He is infatuated with her and mistakes this infatuation for a path he must pursue in order to become a man. Because Dodong feels that he is no longer a child, he wishes to be inducted into the world of adulthood in a tangible way. While his feelings for Teang are sincere, they are also entwined with Dodong’s urgent desire to fulfill his personal fantasies of masculine strength and autonomy.

When Dodong is met with disapproving silence after he tells his father that he is marrying Teang, he becomes cross and impatient. Stubborn and single-minded, he interprets his father’s attempts to reason with him as an affront to his masculinity and budding independence. It is not until after the birth of his first child that he comes to understand the grave consequences of his decision to marry young. After realizing that he is thoroughly unprepared for the responsibilities of raising a family, he finds himself burdened with feelings of deep embarrassment and guilt.

In the final part of the story, Dodong is a grown man who has had many children with his wife. When his eighteen-year-old son, Blas, comes to him with the news that he wants to marry his sweetheart, Dodong feels pained at the thought of the difficult life that awaits his son. He tries in vain to reason with Blas but knows that his son’s youthful stubbornness will triumph. As the story concludes, Dodong comes to the realization that the young are doomed to repeat the mistakes of the old.

Teang is the girl whom Dodong eventually marries. Around the same age as Dodong, she is described as having “a small brown face and small black eyes and straight glossy hair.” She bears Dodong many children through the years, which takes a toll on both her health and appearance. Overworked with cooking, cleaning, and other household chores, she becomes thin and emaciated. Despite her love for Dodong, Teang grows to regret marrying at such a young age. However, she keeps this information from him for fear of upsetting their marriage.

In the very first paragraph of “Footnote to Youth,” Dodong describes his father as a silent and hardworking farmer. Dodong’s father, who remains unnamed in the story, also has a habit of chewing areca nut—a seed of the areca palm which acts as a mild stimulant when chewed. This may be the reason behind his diseased tooth. However, fear and superstition keep him from visiting the town dentist to have it pulled out.

Although he is the patriarch of the family, Dodong’s father is neither strict nor imposing, as he lets Dodong marry Teang for fear of upsetting his son. In fact, he remains kind and supportive when Dodong becomes a...

Like Dodong’s father, Dodong’s mother remains unnamed throughout the story. Since Dodong is their only child, she does all the housework alone. In most rural areas in the Philippines in the early 1900s, housework was traditionally relegated to the women of the family, while the men worked the fields.

Dodong’s mother does not appear much in the story. She does, however, help Teang deliver her and Dodong’s first child. She also provides Dodong with much-needed emotional support, as Dodong feels terrified and overwhelmed by the sight of childbirth.

Lucio is a character who appears only in Teang’s recollections of her youth. He is a former suitor of hers who is older than Dodong by nine years. Although Lucio had married another girl after Teang’s rejection, he remains childless through the years—which is why Teang eventually wonders if he would have made a better husband than Dodong.

Blas is Dodong and Teang’s firstborn son. At the age of eighteen, he comes home one night, excited to report to his father that he will be marrying Tona. When Dodong attempts to protest Blas’s decision, Blas immediately meets his father with resentment. Ultimately, Blas mirrors how Dodong once behaved at his age, as he stubbornly insists on getting his way.

Tona is Blas’s sweetheart and future wife. Although she never appears in “Footnote to Youth,” Blas’s mention of her marks the story’s conclusion. Tona represents a future in which Blas lets “Youth and Love” triumph and makes the same mistakes his father did.