The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter characters

Appears from the start

A deaf man who communicates chiefly through sign language, writing, and attentive expression. After his closest companion is institutionalized, Singer rents a room with the Kelly family and becomes the quiet confidant onto whom several lonely townspeople project their hopes and convictions.

Appears from the start

Singer's longtime deaf companion, with whom he has shared a home for years. Antonapoulos is childlike, self-absorbed, and increasingly difficult to care for, yet Singer remains profoundly devoted to him.

First appears in chapter 2

The observant proprietor of the New York Cafe, open through the night. He watches his customers closely and is especially interested in people who seem isolated or unusual, while remaining guarded about his own desires and dissatisfaction.

First appears in chapter 2

An itinerant laborer and impassioned political radical who arrives in town drinking heavily and searching for people who understand his anger about exploitation. Once sober, he is articulate and intense, but his need to convert others often deepens his isolation.

Also known as Mick

First appears in chapter 3

A restless adolescent in the crowded Kelly household. Mick invents games, dreams of composing music, and longs for private space in which to develop an inner life larger than her family's poverty allows.

First appears in chapter 4

A Black physician whose life's work is improving the health, education, and political awareness of his community in the segregated South. His stern ideals have estranged him from much of his family, including his daughter Portia.

First appears in chapter 3

Dr. Copeland's practical, warmhearted daughter, who works as a domestic employee for the Kelly family. She remains concerned for her father despite their conflicts and forms an important link between the Copeland and Kelly households.

First appears in chapter 4

Portia's husband, who works at a mill and shares a home with her and her brother Willie. Sociable and comparatively easygoing, he tries to keep peace within a family shaped by Dr. Copeland's uncompromising expectations.

First appears in chapter 4

Dr. Copeland's son and Portia's brother, a young Black man whose life is constrained by poverty and racist violence. He works away from home and remains part of the family circle that Copeland hopes to guide.

First appears in chapter 7

Mick's Jewish neighbor and friend, thoughtful and politically alert. Their conversations about fascism and injustice give Mick a peer with whom she can consider the larger world beyond her home and school.

First appears in chapter 2

Biff's wife and partner in running the cafe. More direct and less fascinated by the cafe's troubled patrons than her husband, she challenges his habit of extending help and credit to people such as Jake Blount.

First appears in chapter 3

Mick's younger brother, whom she often includes in her elaborate neighborhood games. A dangerous accident during one of the children's outings brings the pressures on the Kelly family into sharper focus.