The old man is the story's central character and its central mystery. He is given no name but is precisely described in the title, which includes everything that can be said about him with any assurance: he is an extremely old man, in failing health, with all the frailties and limitations of human old age, and he has a huge pair of bird's wings growing from his back. We follow the other characters in their comic efforts to explain him, to assign some ''meaning'' to his sudden appearance, and finally to just put up with his annoying presence, but when he flies away at the story's end, the mystery remains.

The very idea of a ''winged humanoid'' evokes the image of angels, and most of the "wise" villagers quickly assume that he is an angel. But everything about him seems to contradict traditional stereotypes of heavenly power and immortal perfection. When Pelayo first finds him in the courtyard, apparently blown out of the sky by a strong rainstorm, his condition is pathetic: he lies ''face down in the mud," "dressed like a ragpicker,’’ and tangled in his half-plucked, bug-infested wings. The narrator tells us directly that this ''pitiful condition of a drenched great-grandfather had taken away any sense of grandeur he might have had,’’ and Father Gonzaga underscores the point later, when he observes that ''nothing about him measured up to the proud dignity of angels.'' Nor do the villagers allow him any dignity or respect; throughout the story, they treat him ‘‘without the slightest reverence.’’ He is displayed like a circus animal or sideshow freak; poked, plucked, and prodded; branded with a hot iron; pelted with stones and garbage; and held prisoner for years in a filthy, battered chicken coop, exposed to the elements. Though he is the source of the family's great fortune, Elisenda comes to find him an intolerable annoyance, becoming ''exasperated and unhinged'' by his presence. He is understandably "stand-offish" toward people, tolerating only the company of the couple's young child, and the villagers come to think of him as ''a haughty angel who scarcely deigned to look at mortals.’’ Given his cruel captivity, the reader can only agree when the narrator observes that his ‘‘only supernatural virtue seemed to be patience.’’ Even this virtue is later deprived of any otherworldly greatness; it becomes merely ''the patience of a dog who had no illusions.’’

The old man is described in imagery of earthly poverty and human weakness, contradicting traditional heavenly stereotypes. Even the birds with which he is compared to are ignoble ones (‘‘buzzard wings," "a huge decrepit hen," "a senile vulture’’). Yet there is clearly something of the magical about him beyond his unexplained wings and mysterious origin. He does, after all, perform miracles—but they, too, fail to satisfy expectations. The blind man's sight isn't restored, but he suddenly grows three new teeth; the leper's sores aren't cured, but sunflowers begin growing from them. These are ‘‘consolation miracles,’’ which show ''a certain mental disorder,'' as if senility had caused his magic powers to misfire. Alternately, they could be practical jokes, a form of ‘‘mocking fun'' to avenge his abuse by the crowd. Their sick child recovers when Pelayo and Elisenda take in the old man, but this could be coincidence, or perhaps another case of failed magic (if, as the neighbor woman believes, he is an angel of death sent to take the baby). And, despite his obvious infirmities, he is possessed of a surprising inner strength. His health seems to be in irreversible decline throughout; a doctor's examination finds it ‘‘impossible for him to be alive,’’ and very late in the story his death appears imminent. Yet with the coming of spring, after years of uselessness, his wings grow new feathers and regain their strength, allowing him to escape the village forever.

Although his wings make him a creature of the sky and he is clearly not at home on land, the old man also has some association with the sea. He comes from the sea (or at least from over it), washed up with a tide of crabs by a three-day storm; his first attempts to fly away are accompanied by ''a wind that seemed to come from the high seas.’’ Pelayo and Elisenda first take him for a foreign sailor (perhaps because they detect ‘‘a strong sailor's voice’’ in his incomprehensible speech), and an early plan called for him to be set out to sea on a raft with provisions. As his wings begin to regenerate, he sings ‘‘sea chanteys’’ under the stars. Critics disagree in their interpretations of this connection and in their judgments on its significance. But in García Márquez's other works, they often find the sea to be an important theme or symbol, both as a natural force of great power (equally capable of bringing rich gifts or terrible destruction), and as a force associated with the supernatural. Several of his stories include episodes where unusual strangers from the ‘‘outside world’’ appear in a small town and have a strong effect on its people. Very often, these remarkable visitors arrive by sea.

The old man is also connected in some way with Pelayo and Elisenda's child. The newborn is ill when he first appears, but quickly recovers when the ''angel'' takes up residence. The ''wise neighbor woman'' believes that he was sent to takes the child's life. Both the child and the old man come down with chicken pox at the same time, and the old man uncharacteristically allows the child to play with and around him, tolerating ‘‘ingenious infamies'' with patience. But beyond these details, the connection or bond between the two is not developed.

Because the old man is a misunderstood outsider subjected to cruel mistreatment, he becomes primarily a figure of pity—a strange emotion for an "angel" to inspire. He has enough magical qualities to let the reader see him, at least potentially, as a figure of wonder, but his very human vulnerability keeps this from being much more than a suggestion. Finally, there is at least an equal suggestion of a potential ‘‘dark side.’’ Pelayo's first impression is that of having seen a ''nightmare,'' and the ''mental disorder’’ of the old man's miracles suggests that his ‘‘magic powers’’ are uncontrollable, making him dangerous. When burned with a branding iron, his startled wing-flapping creates ‘‘a whirlwind of chicken dung and lunar dust,'' ''a gale of panic that did not seem to be of this world.’’ It is almost a moment of terror; when he calms down, the villagers regard him with renewed caution and fear: ''his passivity was not that of a hero taking his ease, but that of a cataclysm in repose.'' And though his visit brings truly miraculous results for Pelayo and Elisenda by making them fabulously wealthy, it also seems to be a frightful and unnerving experience for them. Elisenda comes to feel that she lives in ‘‘a hell full of angels,’’ and when they design their dream home, the couple make sure to ''angel-proof" it with iron bars.

A former woodcutter, Father Gonzaga is the village priest whose religious training and standing in the community make him a moral and intellectual authority. Of all the characters, he seems uniquely qualified to pass judgment on the strange visitor and to determine whether he is really one of God's angels or ‘‘just a Norwegian with wings.’’ However, his understanding of church doctrine leads him to no solid conclusions. He counsels the villagers to withhold their own judgment until he can receive a definitive answer from scholars in the Vatican. Father Gonzaga is never able to provide an explanation, and he loses sleep over the mystery until his parishioners eventually lose interest in the old man entirely.

Examining the angel-like creature, Father Gonzaga immediately suspects that he is ''an impostor.’’ The old man's unbearable odor, his derelict condition, and his undignified appearance all make him seem ''much too human'' to accept as a perfect immortal or member of a divine race. But rather than make a judgment from the evidence of his senses (and knowing that the devil likes to trick people with appearances), he applies a series of tests to the old man, presumably based on church teachings about the nature of angels. First, he greets the old man in Latin; the lack of a response is yet another suspicious sign, for it shows that the ''angel’’ doesn't ‘‘understand the language of God or know how to greet His ministers.’’ A series of letters from higher church authorities results in further ''tests’’ of divinity (Does the old man have a bellybutton? Does his language seem related to the biblical dialect of Aramaic?) but fail to lead him to any final judgment. Unable to provide the answer that they seek from him, the Father can only warn his flock not to jump to any conclusions—a warning which they ignore with enthusiasm.

As a comic authority figure Father Gonzaga is open to a variety of interpretations. He is clearly ineffective in his role as a spiritual authority and as a source of wisdom and enlightenment. His superiors in the church hierarchy prove no more helpful and seem to be obsessed with obscure theological abstractions, such as how many angels can fit on the head of a pin. Such factors suggest at least a mildly satirical view of the Catholic Church and perhaps of organized religion in general. To some critics, Father Gonzaga's means of inquiry are also a parody of the scientific method, while his fruitless correspondence with church scholars reflects the uselessness of bureaucracies everywhere. And other critics even see a reflection of themselves—the figure of the cultural authority, whose profession makes him unwilling to admit the obvious limits of his understanding.

Elisenda is married to Pelayo and is a new mother at the beginning of the tale. She is similar to her husband in her desires and temperament but is depicted even more uncharitably than he is. While Pelayo’s cruelty to the old man can be passive, Elisenda at times appears openly hostile toward him. Like Pelayo, Elisenda, too, disregards the miracle of the winged old man, concluding that he must be a shipwrecked sailor. When people begin visiting the old man, believing he is an angel, it is Elisenda who decides to take advantage of the situation and charge visitors an admission fee. This shows that Elisenda is practical and shrewd. After she and Pelayo become rich, she buys herself fine silks and shoes, which indicate her materialism and love for appearances. Despite making money through the old man, Elisenda never thanks him or treats him fairly. She regards him as an encumbrance and is relieved when he finally flies away. Strikingly, it is Elisenda who watches the old man take flight, a truly wondrous occurrence. But the sight does not move her, which shows she is too apathetic and mired in the mundane to note the real miracles happening around her. Her one redeeming feature is that she does breathe a sigh of relief for herself “and him” when the old man manages to gain altitude. This indicates that she is glad he is safe. However, she is too caught up in her everyday life to allow herself to grow into this sense of empathy. Overall, Elisenda is a static character who does not change over the course of the narrative, despite her change in fortune.

Pelayo is an important character in the narrative, the husband of Elisenda and a new father at the start of the tale. Pelayo lives in a small house by the shore in his seaside town. It is obliquely suggested that he may be a minor court official, since he possesses a “bailiff’s club.” It is Pelayo who finds the winged old man in his courtyard and locks him in the chicken coop. Pelayo treats the old man with neglect, if not cruelty, failing to realize the enormousness of his discovery of the extraordinary being. Even after the old man causes a change in Pelayo’s fortune through the viewing fees he brings in, Pelayo continues to treat him no better than an animal. As the tale ends, Pelayo ends up rich, quits his job as a bailiff, and sets up a rabbit farm. He and Elisenda convert their rundown house into a mansion. Yet, the irony is that though Pelayo’s external circumstances change, he undergoes no internal change. He remains a static character.

Symbolically, Pelayo represents the person who has witnessed true grace or inspiration—in the form of the old man—and chooses to squander it with apathy. Though Pelayo is a devoted father and husband, he is too small-minded to extend his care to those different from him, such as the old man. He does provide for the old man indirectly, but his care carries little meaning, as it is not very thoughtful.

The centerpiece of a traveling carnival, the ''woman who had been changed into a spider for disobeying her parents’’ proves to be a more popular attraction than the old man, causing the villagers to lose interest in him and putting an end to Pelayo and Elisenda's profitable courtyard business. As a young girl, she had once gone dancing all night against her parents' wishes; later, while walking home, she was allegedly struck by lightning and transformed into ''a frightful tarantula the size of a ram ... with the head of a sad maiden.'' Compared to the baffling old man, the spiderwoman provides a far more satisfying spectacle. While she is at least as grotesque and fantastic as the "bird-man," she charges a lower admission price; more importantly, she is willing to communicate freely with her visitors, recounting her sad experience and inspiring sympathy for her fate. The ''meaning'' of her story is easy to grasp and teaches a clear moral lesson—one that confirms the villagers' conventional beliefs. In contrast, the old man makes no attempt to explain himself and seems to contradict all religious and folk beliefs about the nature of angels. His very existence raises disturbing questions, but he offers no reassuring answers.