The Martian Chronicles characters

Also known as Mrs. K

First appears in chapter 2

A Martian woman living beside an ancient sea with her husband, Yll. Dissatisfied with the narrow routine of her marriage, she begins having vivid dreams of a tall, unfamiliar man arriving from a distant world in a silver craft.

Also known as Mr. K

First appears in chapter 2

Ylla's husband, possessive and suspicious when her dreams describe an Earthman and the place where his ship will land. He dismisses her visions in conversation while quietly acting on the information they contain.

First appears in chapter 6

The captain of Earth's third expedition to Mars. He is confronted by an apparently ordinary American town populated by people his crew believed dead. Though uneasy about the impossible welcome, he is also vulnerable to the home and family it seems to restore.

First appears in chapter 7

Commander of the fourth expedition, which reaches a Mars emptied by an epidemic brought by earlier Earth crews. He tries to maintain order among men exhilarated by survival and is more receptive than most of them to the moral weight of the ruined civilization around them.

First appears in chapter 7

A crewman on the fourth expedition who responds to the dead Martian cities with reverence and growing anger. He sees beauty and wisdom in the civilization Earth has accidentally destroyed and is appalled when his companions treat its remains as scenery for celebration.

First appears in chapter 9

An early settler who realizes that Mars's thin air will defeat many newcomers unless the landscape changes. Remembering the trees that made breathing easier on Earth, he begins planting seeds across the open ground with patient urgency.

First appears in chapter 11

A young Earth settler driving alone across Mars at night who encounters a Martian traveler on the same road. Friendly and open-minded, he tries to understand how each can see a different civilization occupying the identical landscape.

First appears in chapter 11

A Martian traveling to a festival in a thriving city that Tomas Gomez can see only as ruins. He and Tomas cannot touch one another, yet their courteous conversation lets both consider that separate moments in Martian history may briefly share one road.

First appears in chapter 17

A wealthy admirer of forbidden fantastic literature who builds an elaborate House of Usher on Mars. Bitter that government censors destroyed books and suppressed imagination on Earth, he prepares the house as both a work of art and a trap for the officials who come to inspect it.

First appears in chapter 19

An elderly settler living on Mars with his wife, Anna. Both still grieve for their dead son Tom, so LaFarge is deeply shaken when a being with Tom's face appears near their home and seems to know their private memories.

First appears in chapter 21

A former member of Wilder's expedition who opens a hot-dog stand with his wife beside an empty Martian highway. Expecting a flood of customers from Earth, he treats the planet primarily as a commercial opportunity even as disturbing news begins arriving from home.

First appears in chapter 23

A quiet miner who misses the mass return to Earth and gradually realizes he may be the last man left on Mars. He enjoys abandoned towns and unlimited supplies, but the absence of another person soon drives him to search the planet by radio.

First appears in chapter 23

A young woman who answers Walter Gripp's broadcasts after the evacuation, apparently making her the last woman on Mars. Her voice represents companionship to him before they meet, though each has imagined a very different life with the planet's only other resident.

First appears in chapter 24

A former member of the fourth expedition who remains on Mars for decades with his wife and children. When Captain Wilder returns, Hathaway welcomes him at a remote home whose apparently unchanged family raises questions about how he endured the long isolation.

Also known as Dad

First appears in chapter 26

A father who takes his wife and sons to Mars on what he presents as a family trip. He has prepared the journey secretly and intends it as a permanent escape from a devastated Earth and the institutions that helped destroy it.