Cathedral characters

First appears in chapter 2

An alcoholic trying to rebuild a life with his estranged wife in a furnished house rented from a man called Chef. The borrowed seaside home gives him a temporary structure in which sobriety and marriage both seem possible.

First appears in chapter 2

Wes's estranged wife and the narrator of their attempted reconciliation. She joins him at Chef's rented house and values the calm they find there, while remaining alert to the difference between real recovery and a hopeful interval.

First appears in chapter 2

Wes's friend and the owner of a furnished house near the ocean. He rents the place to Wes cheaply and takes satisfaction in the couple's renewed stability, though his own family needs eventually limit what he can offer them.

First appears in chapter 4

A divorced father traveling by train across Europe to meet the son he has not seen for years. Suspicious and emotionally defensive, he carries a wristwatch as a gift but is uncertain whether the planned reunion can repair their distance.

First appears in chapter 5

Scotty's mother, preparing for her son's eighth birthday when an ordinary errand is interrupted by catastrophe. She begins the story focused on a specially ordered cake and is soon forced into the bewildering routines of a hospital vigil.

First appears in chapter 5

Ann's husband and Scotty's father. He joins Ann at the hospital after their son is struck by a car, sharing her fear while trying to obtain clear answers from medical staff.

First appears in chapter 5

The baker from whom Ann orders Scotty's birthday cake. At first he is a remote, impatient tradesman who knows only that an expensive order has not been collected, and his unexplained telephone calls add to the parents' distress.

First appears in chapter 6

A traveling vitamin salesperson trying to keep a struggling group of employees productive. Her work has filled her home and marriage with the pressure of quotas, unsold stock, and the needs of coworkers whose prospects are as uncertain as her own.

First appears in chapter 8

An alcoholic who has returned to a residential drying-out facility after another collapse. Separated from the women closest to him and uncertain what comes next, he listens to another resident's story while testing whether he can imagine recovery as more than a temporary pause.

First appears in chapter 8

A fellow resident at the drying-out facility whose face shows the damage of his recent drinking. He tells the narrator about becoming a chimney sweep, falling in love with Roxy, and watching alcohol turn a hopeful domestic life into violence and separation.

First appears in chapter 10

A father left to care for two young children after his wife goes away with another man. He tries to preserve work and household routines while a succession of caregivers exposes how little control he has over the family's altered life.

First appears in chapter 11

A hairdresser who manages a residential complex with her husband and narrates the arrival of the Holits family. She observes their financial decline and family strain while hoping the new tenants will bring steadiness to a place marked by transience.

First appears in chapter 12

A guarded man whose wife has invited her old friend Robert to stay overnight. He has never met a blind person, feels displaced by the intimacy between his wife and her visitor, and retreats into sarcasm and television rather than acknowledge his jealousy.

First appears in chapter 12

The narrator's wife, who formed a lasting friendship with Robert years earlier when she worked for him as a reader. Their recorded conversations have carried the relationship across marriages, separation, and bereavement, and she is eager to welcome him into her home.

First appears in chapter 12

A blind widower and longtime friend of the narrator's wife. Sociable, self-possessed, and willing to meet his suspicious host without defensiveness, he arrives for an overnight visit after the death of his wife Beulah.