Suggestions

Use up and down arrows to review and enter to select.
  • Shakespeare dark gray
    • No Fear Shakespeare Translations
    • Shakespeare Study Guides
    • Shakespeare Life & Times
    • Glossary of Shakespeare Terms
  • Literature dark gray
    • No Fear Literature Translations
    • Literature Study Guides
    • Glossary of Literary Terms
    • How to Write Literary Analysis
  • Other Subjects dark gray
    • Biography
    • Biology
    • Chemistry
    • Computer Science
    • Drama
    • Economics
    • Film
    • Health
    • History
    • Math
    • Philosophy
    • Physics
    • Poetry
    • Psychology
    • Short Stories
    • Sociology
    • US Government and Politics
  • Test Prep PLUS dark gray
    • Test Prep Lessons
    • AP® English Literature
    • AP® English Language
  • Teacher dark gray
    • SparkTeach
    • Teacher's Handbook
  • Blog
My PLUS Dashboard
  • My PLUS Activity dark gray
    • Notes
    • Bookmarks
    • Test Prep PLUS
    • No Fear Translations & Audio
    • Mastery Quizzes
    • Flashcards
    • Infographics
    • No Fear Graphic Novels
  • Account Details
  • Subscription & Billing

Please wait while we process your payment

Reset Password

  • Please wait while we process your payment

    Log in Sign up

    Sparknotes

  • By signing up you agree to our terms and privacy policy.

    Don’t have an account? Subscribe now

    Create Your Account

    Sign up for your FREE 7-day trial

    • Ad-free experience
    • Study notes
    • Flashcards
      & Quizzes
    • AP® English Test Prep
    • Plus much more

  • Already have an account? Log in

    Your Email

    Choose Your Plan

    BEST VALUE

    Save over 50% with a SparkNotes PLUS Annual Plan!

    Purchasing SparkNotes PLUS for a group?

    Get Annual Plans at a discount when you buy 2 or more!

  • Price

    $24.99 $18.74 /subscription + tax

    Subtotal $37.48 + tax

    Save 25% on 2-49 accounts

    Save 30% on 50-99 accounts

    Want 100 or more? Contact us for a customized plan.

    Your Plan

    Payment Details

  • We're sorry, SparkNotes Plus isn't available in your country.

  • Payment Details

    Payment Summary

    SparkNotes Plus

    You'll be billed after your free trial ends.

    7-Day Free Trial

    Not Applicable

    Renews February 7, 2023 January 31, 2023

    Discounts (applied to next billing)

    DUE NOW

    US $0.00

    SNPLUSROCKS20  |  20% Discount

    This is not a valid promo code.

    Discount Code (one code per order)

    SparkNotes Plus subscription is $4.99/month or $24.99/year as selected above. The free trial period is the first 7 days of your subscription. TO CANCEL YOUR SUBSCRIPTION AND AVOID BEING CHARGED, YOU MUST CANCEL BEFORE THE END OF THE FREE TRIAL PERIOD. You may cancel your subscription on your Subscription and Billing page or contact Customer Support at custserv@bn.com. Your subscription will continue automatically once the free trial period is over. Free trial is available to new customers only.

    Choose Your Plan

    Payment Details

    Payment Summary

    Suggestions

    Use up and down arrows to review and enter to select.
    • My Account Icon My Account white
      • My PLUS Activity
        • Notes
        • Bookmarks
        • Test Prep PLUS
        • No Fear Translations
        • Mastery Quizzes
        • Flashcards
        • Infographics
        • No Fear Graphic Novels
      • Account Details
      • Subscription & Billing
      My PLUS Dashboard
    • Shakespeare white
      • No Fear Shakespeare Translations
      • Shakespeare Study Guides
      • Shakespeare Life & Times
      • Glossary of Shakespeare Terms
    • Literature white
      • No Fear Literature Translations
      • Literature Study Guides
      • Glossary of Literary Terms
      • How to Write Literary Analysis
    • Other Subjects white
      • Biography
      • Biology
      • Chemistry
      • Computer Science
      • Drama
      • Economics
      • Film
      • Health
      • History
      • Math
      • Philosophy
      • Physics
      • Poetry
      • Psychology
      • Short Stories
      • Sociology
      • US Government and Politics
    • Test Prep PLUS white
      • Test Prep Lessons
      • AP® English Literature
      • AP® English Language
    • Teacher white
      • SparkTeach
      • Teacher's Handbook
    • Blog
    • Help

    Please wait while we process your payment

    expired-logo

    Your PLUS subscription has expired

    • We’d love to have you back! Renew your subscription to regain access to all of our exclusive, ad-free study tools.
    Renew your subscription

    Please wait while we process your payment

    expired-logo

    snpromo-logo
    • Get 20% off of AD-FREE study tools!
      Use Code: SparkPLUS20

    The American

    Henry James

    Study Guide
    • Study Guide
    • Summary
      • Summary & Analysis
      • Chapters 1–2
      • Chapter 3
      • Chapters 4–5
      • Chapters 6–7
      • Chapters 8–9
      • Chapters 10–11
      • Chapter 12
      • Chapters 13–14
      • Chapters 15–16
      • Chapters 17–18
      • Chapters 19–20
      • Chapters 21–22
      • Chapters 23–24
      • Chapters 25–26
      • Full Book
      • Full Book Summary
      • Key Facts
    • Characters
      • Character List
      • Christopher Newman
      • Valentin de Bellegarde
      • Noémie Nioche
    • Literary Devices
      • Themes
      • Motifs
      • Symbols
    • Quotes
      • Important Quotes Explained
    • Quick Quizzes
      • Book
      • Full Book Quiz
      • Essays
        • Mini Essays
        • Suggested Essay Topics
      • Further Study
        • Suggestions for Further Reading
        • Henry James and The American Background

      Please wait while we process your payment

      snplus-logo

      Unlock your FREE SparkNotes PLUS trial!

      Unlock your FREE Trial!

      Sign up and get instant access to bookmarks.
      • Ad-Free experience
      • Easy-to-access study notes
      • Flashcards & Quizzes
      • AP® English test prep
      • Plus much more
      Already have an account? Log in
      Characters

      Character List

      Characters Character List
      • Christopher Newman

        The novel's hero and protagonist. Newman is a "superlative American": tall, pleasant, temperate, liberal, athletic, independent, and direct—a self- made success full of the "easy magnificence of his manhood." Forced to earn a living at a young age, Newman has accumulated a substantial fortune through a combination of diligence and luck. Now forty-two, he travels to Paris to enjoy the fruits of his labors and to find a wife to complete his fortune. He is simple in some respects, inquisitive but interested only in "the best" of any genre—as evidenced by his opening marathon tour of the Louvre—not out of elitism, but rather a genuine curiosity to see what others consider superlative. Newman is curious at, but unimpressed with, the intricate Parisian social system—an attitude that causes him trouble. Yet, though often unaware of what he has provoked, Newman is far from a simplistic hero. His moral reasoning, honest love, and unfailing allegiance mark him as mature, consistent and self-aware, even out of his element.

        Read an in-depth analysis of Christopher Newman .

      • Tom Tristram

        An old acquaintance of Newman's who briefly served with him in the Civil War before moving to Paris six years before the novel begins. Tristram lives on the Avenue d'Iéna, the wealthy American district, with his wife Lizzie and their several children. He is dull, unaware and unappreciative of artistic or personal genius, preferring to spend his time in the Occidental Club smoking and thinking about clothes, style, cigars and card games with other Americans. Yet he is no patriot, and rails against the United States so often that Newman, a reluctant patriot, is forced to come to the country's defense. In his least sympathetic moments, Tom is openly dismissive and disdainful of his intelligent wife's opinions, recommendations, witticisms and sensibilities, much to Newman's dismay.

      • Lizzie Tristram

        Tom Tristram's wife and Newman's first friend and advocate in Paris. Mrs. Tristram is intelligent, well-spoken, graceful, and compassionate, but her marriage to the boorish Tom has left her somewhat incomplete. She is neither beautiful nor truly brave, lacking the brazen courage to acquire the renown, reputation and admiration that real beauty would easily give. Nonetheless, she is a deeply sympathetic character and one of the novel's most human women: morally honest, loving, disappointed, romantic, full of unspent wit and dreams. Newman instantly likes her, and she is immediately taken by him. It is Mrs. Tristram who first discerns Newman's wish to marry, and suggests her childhood friend, Claire de Cintré.

      • Noémie Nioche

        A charming, fearless, free-spirited, and ruthless Parisian copyist whose painting Newman agrees to buy. Noémie is acutely aware of her many charms and can use them tirelessly to her advantage, able to play a part at a moment's notice or coax more from the men in her life than they might have meant to give. Valentin declares her "capable of seeing a man strangled without changing colour." Noémie habitually humiliates her father, M. Nioche, sending him on menial errands, berating his mistakes, and giving him an occasional stipend gleaned from her rich admirers. When Valentin and Kapp agree to duel over her, she is thrilled, caring little for the loss of life. Yet Noémie's implicit cruelty stems less from sadism than ambition, her willingness to sacrifice anything or anyone for the sacred end of marrying well.

        Read an in-depth analysis of Noémie Nioche .

      • Claire de Bellegarde (the Comtesse de Cintré)

        The daughter of the Marquis and Marquise and the sister of Valentin and Urbain, also the childhood friend of Mrs. Tristram and the beloved of Newman. Claire is described as an exquisite and perfect woman: cultured, aristocratic, beautiful, and kind. At twenty-eight, she is a widow, her mother having married her off at eighteen to the rich but unsavory Comte de Cintré, primarily out of an eagerness to refill the dwindling family coffers. Though Claire is strong and willing to stand against her family on moral principles, she cannot ultimately fight for her own happiness. Newman's courtship gives her a brief glimpse of the joy others experience, but by novel's end she comes to feel that personal satisfaction and pleasure are hopelessly vain in a world where others suffer. Claire's decision to enter the Carmelite order is not simply an act of desperation, but a sign that she has dedicated her life to God to redeem the family.

      • Urbain de Bellegarde (the young Marquis de Bellegarde)

        The older son of the Marquis and Marquise, middle-aged and much older than Claire and Valentin. Urbain is infinitely epicurean and accomplished, cultivating the best manners in France. He takes after his mother the Marquise in looks, ambition, values, and temperament. However, though Urbain fancies himself the male head of the household, he is little more than his mother's lackey. His role in the household, as in the murder, is that of accomplice, posturer and guard. Though he has inherited the Marquise's ethics and intense haughtiness, he does not quite have her talent for the stinging comeback or the mortal blow.

      • Valentin de Bellegarde (the young Comte de Bellegarde)

        The younger son of the Marquis and Marquise, brother of Claire and Urbain. The charismatic and entertaining Valentin is a great friend to Newman, who sees him as the "typical, ideal Frenchman" Valentine is very close to Claire and loves and admires her tremendously, while resenting their mother and Urbain for forcing Claire into a horrific marriage against her will. Valentin also suspects that his mother and Urbain were involved in his father the Marquis' death, but he does not know how. Valentin plays the go-between between Claire and Newman, singing Newman's praises to his hesitant sister and acting as Newman's advocate towards the Marquise and Urbain. His motives are not entirely selfless, however, as he sees Newman as a means to take revenge against his mother and brother's reign of terror.

      • The Marquise de Bellegarde

        The mother of Urbain, Valentin, and Claire, born Lady Emmeline Atheling, the daughter of an English earl. The Marquise, Newman's nemesis, is completely at home in her meticulously arranged world of pedigrees and lost fortunes, a ruthless matriarch and a formidable adversary. Together, she and Urbain run the Bellegarde household with an iron fist, first secretly killing her husband the Marquis for attempting to prevent Claire's first marriage and now scheming to manipulate Claire and Valentin for the glory of the family name. The Marquise, unmoved by her daughter's naïve wish for peace and happiness, resembles the lovely Claire "as an insect might resemble a flower." Yet even the Marquise's most appalling actions stem from a deep sense of entitlement and of duty to the aristocratic traditions she has been given to uphold. Though Newman ultimately finds the Marquise and Urbain "sick as a pair of poisoned cats," he cannot help but admire her brazen assurance and the heroically impenetrable manner in which she receives his damning news of the Marquis' surviving letter.

      • The young Marquise de Bellegarde

        Urbain's wife, a flighty, fashionable woman who, bored with pedigrees and damp chateaux, is looking for some excitement. The young Marquise adores music, dancing, and fashion. She flirts, pouts, and fears her husband even though she finds him dull. She attempts to establish an alliance with Newman—another outsider to the family—but her idea of a joint venture is a secret trip to the rowdy students' ball in the Latin Quarter. Though the young Marquise cultivates an exquisite boredom, it is difficult to imagine what would really make her satisfied or happy.

      • The Comte de Cintré

        The rich, despicable old man whom Claire was forced to marry at eighteen. The Claire's mother the Marquise chose the Count because of his fortune, pedigree, and willingness to accept a small dowry. Claire was overwhelmed with disgust when she first met the Count, but by then the wedding arrangements had already been made. When the Count died several years later and an inquiry was made into his money, his business practices so horrified Claire that she renounced all her claims to his money.

      • The Marquis de Bellegarde

        The late father of Claire, Valentin, and Urbain, and late husband of the Marquise. The handsome, eloquent, and sympathetic Marquis is reflected in Valentin and Claire just as the ruthless Marquise is reflected in Urbain. When the Marquis refused to allow Claire to marry to the wealthy but unsavory Comte de Cintré, his wife and eldest son murdered him at the family estate at Fleurières.

      • Mrs. Catherine Bread

        An old British nurse, formerly the maid the Marquise when she was still living in England as the Lady Atheling. Mrs. Bread is thin, pale, and thoroughly English, standing straight and perpetually dressed in black. She helped to raise Valentin and Claire, loves them fiercely, and embraces Newman as someone who can give her beloved charges a chance at happiness. Mrs. Bread is honest, decent, observant, discreet, and completely trustworthy, and is also the only non- complicit witness to the Marquis' murder.

      • Monsieur Nioche

        Noémie's father, an old, minor aristocrat who has fallen on bad times. M. Nioche has the manners but not the means of the higher classes, feeling miserable and ruined after having lost his small fortune. Noémie continually harangues him after years of having been cuckolded by his wife. Nioche's decent forlornness appeals to Newman's democratic instincts, and indeed all the help Newman gives Noémie is meant not for her directly but to assuage her father's fears. Newman's attempts ultimately prove futile, however, as Nioche becomes progressively more bitter and resentful of his petty, prodigious and increasingly popular daughter.

      • The Duchess (Madame d'Outreville)

        A very fat heiress whom Urbain introduces to Newman as the greatest lady in France. The Duchess is opulent and good-spirited, a master of the conversational arts. When Newman decides to spill the Bellegardes' secret, he goes first to the Duchess, but is so turned off by her impenetrable wall of saccharine bon mots that he leaves abruptly without disclosing his reason for coming.

      • Lord Deepmere

        Valentin, Claire, and Urbain's seventh cousin, an extremely rich heir to sizable estates in England and Ireland. At thirty-three, Deepmere is young, artless, and fairly simple. Though he enjoys Paris and London, he is a self-avowed Irishman lacking the subtlety, ruthless ambition, or real social sophistication of his relatives the Bellegardes. The elder Bellegardes are thrilled with Deepmere, hoping that he will marry Claire and allow them access to his non-commercial fortunes. His lack of sophistication borders on naïve honesty, as when Madame de Bellegarde tries to persuade him to steal Claire from Newman and he immediately tells Claire everything. Deepmere's attitude it also implies childish pleasure and convenient forgetfulness, as when he consorts unashamedly with Noémie several months after she causes the death of his cousin Valentin.

      • Stanislas Kapp

        A large, ruddy brewer's son from Strasbourg who insults Valentin's honor by stealing his place in Noémie's opera box at a performance of Don Giovanni. The men trade insults and eventually agree to a duel. Though Kapp is not a good shot, he manages to mortally wound Valentin below the heart on the second firing.

      • Benjamin Babcock

        A Unitarian minister from Massachusetts with whom Newman falls into a tacit traveler's partnership during his tour of Europe in the summer of 1868. Babcock is nervous, pious, and overly concerned with the gravity of life and art, living mainly on Graham bread and hominy. He is acutely worried by Europe, hating its oddities, impurities, and impieties but somehow feeling that it is more deeply and richly beautiful than his own feral homeland. Babcock's ambiguity is reflected in his relationship with Newman, whom he admires as one of nature's supermen even as he rejects Newman's enjoyment of simple and sensual pleasures.

      • Madame Dandelard

        A pretty, childlike Italian woman who has obtained a divorce from her abusive husband and fled to Paris. Mme. Dandelard now lives hand-to-mouth in the city, perpetually looking for an apartment and relying on the kindness of others. Valentin is sure that her story will end badly, as divorced, pretty, penniless women in nineteenth-century Paris have little choice other than prostitution. Though Valentin neither helps nor hurts Mme. Dandelard, he keeps in touch with her to satisfy his morbid curiosity about just how long her descent will take.

      • Monsieur Ledoux

        One of two friends of Valentin's who act for him in the duel against Stanislas Kapp. Ledoux, the nephew of a distinguished Ultramontane bishop, met Valentin when they fought together in the Pontifical Zouaves. He meets Newman at the Geneva train station to take him to Valentin's deathbed, and irritates Newman with his premature eulogies the following morning.

      • Monsieur de Grosjoyaux

        The second of two friends acting for Valentin in the duel against Kapp. Grosjoyaux is a stout, fair man, with whom Newman occasionally sees Valentin in Paris.

      Next section Christopher Newman
      Did you know you can highlight text to take a note? x

      Please wait while we process your payment

      snplus-logo

      Unlock your FREE SparkNotes PLUS trial!

      Unlock your FREE Trial!

      Sign up and get instant access to creating and saving your own notes as you read.
      • Ad-Free experience
      • Easy-to-access study notes
      • Flashcards & Quizzes
      • AP® English test prep
      • Plus much more
      Already have an account? Log in

      Popular pages: The American

      • Christopher Newman: Character Analysis CHARACTERS

      • Important Quotations Explained QUOTES

      • Themes LITERARY DEVICES

      • Review Quiz FURTHER STUDY

      Take a Study Break

      • QUIZ: Is This a Taylor Swift Lyric or a Quote by Edgar Allan Poe?

      • The 7 Most Embarrassing Proposals in Literature

      • The 6 Best and Worst TV Show Adaptations of Books

      • QUIZ: Which Greek God Are You?

      Sign up for our latest news and updates!
      By entering your email address you agree to receive emails from SparkNotes and verify that you are over the age of 13. You can view our Privacy Policy here. Unsubscribe from our emails at any time.

      SparkNotes—the stress-free way to a better GPA

      • Quick Links
      • No Fear Shakespeare
      • Literature Guides
      • Other Subjects
      • Blog
      • Teacher’s Handbook
      • Premium Study Tools
      • SparkNotes PLUS
      • Sign Up
      • Log In
      • PLUS Help
      • More
      • Help
      • How to Cite SparkNotes
      • How to Write Literary Analysis
      • About
      • Contact Us
      • Advertise

      Copyright © SparkNotes LLC

      • Terms of Use
      • |
      • Privacy
      • |
      • Cookie Policy
      • |
      • Do Not Sell My Personal Information