Maskerade characters

Also known as Esme Weatherwax, Esmerelda Weatherwax

Appears from the start

The senior witch of Lancre, restless and out of sorts now that the coven has shrunk to two. Convinced that a proper coven needs three, and worried what she might become with too little to occupy her, she fixes on a promising young woman who has left the mountains for the city, and finds a reason to follow her there.

Also known as Gytha Ogg

Appears from the start

The cheerful, worldly Lancre witch, who has written a scandalously bawdy cookery book and wants the money owed to her by its Ankh-Morpork publisher. That errand gives her and Granny a convenient excuse to travel to the city, where they can also look in on the young woman they hope to draw back to witchcraft.

Also known as Perdita, Perdita X

Appears from the start

A large, sensible, good-natured young woman from Lancre with an extraordinary singing voice and uncanny control over it. Tired of being the reliable, likeable girl everyone takes for granted, she has left home for Ankh-Morpork and joined the Opera House, calling herself by the more dramatic name Perdita in the hope of becoming someone new.

Appears from the start

A pretty, fashionable, and thoroughly self-absorbed young soprano at the Opera House. Confident and much admired for her looks, she is given leading roles despite a singing talent that falls far short of her ambitions.

Appears from the start

An awkward, shabby young odd-job man who does the menial work around the Opera House and is treated as simple by most of the staff. Devoted to his mother and to the building itself, he shuffles about half-noticed in the wings.

Appears from the start

The Opera House's sharp-tongued director of music, a practical and cynical man with open contempt for the superstition, melodrama, and general hysteria of theatre folk. He prides himself on being the one sensible person in a building full of nonsense.

Appears from the start

A blunt, money-minded Ankh-Morpork cheese merchant who has bought the Opera House as an investment, with little idea of the peculiar traditions, temperamental performers, and lurking dangers that come with it.