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Aibileen Clark

One of the novel’s three narrators and protagonists. Aibileen is a Black woman who has been working as a maid since leaving the seventh grade and has taken care of seventeen white children. Before working for the Leefolts, Aibileen’s twenty-four-year-old son, Treelore, died in an accident at the mill where he worked. Though Aibileen remained hardworking and soft-spoken after grieving for Treelore, she felt a bitterness grow inside her that she had never experienced before.

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Minny Jackson

One of the novel’s three narrators and protagonists. Minny is Aibileen’s best friend, a mother of five, and has also worked as a maid since the age of fourteen. Minny is known for both her cooking and her tendency to talk back to her white employers, which often gets her into trouble. Although Minny has no problem being outspoken with most people, she cannot bring herself to stand up to her husband, Leroy, who beats her.

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Eugenia “Skeeter” Phelan

One of the novel’s three narrators and protagonists. At the beginning of the novel, Skeeter has recently graduated from the University of Mississippi. Unlike her friends, who have gotten married and had children, Skeeter longs to move out on her own and find a job as a writer. Skeeter is far more open-minded and tolerant than the other white women of Jackson, though quickly finds she is very naive about the harsh realities of the world.

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Hilly Holbrook

A childhood friend of Skeeter’s and the novel’s chief antagonist. Although Hilly presents herself as the model housewife and mother, she is the most openly unkind and racist character, her chief goal being to create separate bathrooms for maids in people’s homes as she spreads lies that Black people carry diseases. Hilly is extremely hypocritical and conniving.

Celia Foote

The woman Minny begins working for after Hilly fires her from working for her mother. Celia is from a rural area deep in the country, though she desperately tries to fit in with Hilly and the other women of Jackson’s high society. Celia is deeply insecure about the fact that she has had several miscarriages and may not be able to give her husband a child.

Elaine Stein

A senior editor at Harper & Row with whom Skeeter corresponds via the mail and telephone. Elaine sympathizes with Skeeter, as she too once desired to enter the working world without any relevant experience. Elaine is helpful to Skeeter, though she does not hesitate to criticize Skeeter’s half-baked ideas.

Elizabeth Leefolt

Aibileen’s employer and Skeeter’s childhood friend. Elizabeth is insecure about her family’s economic status, and she is hyper-focused on making sure her home looks presentable and her clothes look store-bought instead of handmade. Elizabeth, having been raised by a cruel mother, vacillates between being cruel and neglectful toward her daughter, Mae Mobley.

Charlotte Phelan

Skeeter’s mother. As an old-fashioned Jackson woman, Charlotte is distressed that Skeeter does not conform to gender norms and encourages her to work on her appearance and meet a husband. Charlotte proves herself to be very much the product of prejudiced Jackson society in her firing of Constantine. Still, Charlotte loves and wants the best for Skeeter, especially as Charlotte begins dying of cancer.

Constantine Bates

The Phelan family’s maid throughout Skeeter’s childhood. Constantine treated Skeeter with love and kindness as a child. When the novel begins, Constantine has left Jackson for Chicago without telling Skeeter or even saying goodbye.

Lulabelle Bates

Constantine’s daughter. Constantine gave Lulabelle up for adoption shortly after she was born, as Lulabelle had light skin, and she knew sending Lulabelle away was the only way to keep her safe. While Skeeter is away at college, Constantine reunites with Lulabelle, who is now a strong-minded young woman.

Mae Mobley Leefolt

Elizabeth Leefolt’s daughter and the young girl Aibileen spends most of the novel caring for. Mae Mobley longs for her mother’s attention, though she is often not able to get it and so sees Aibileen as more of a mother figure than Elizabeth.

Stuart Whitworth, Jr.

The son of a state senator whom Skeeter dates on and off throughout the novel. Stuart is initially hung up on his broken engagement, which he ended due to his fiancée having an affair with a civil rights activist. Still, Stuart is interested in Skeeter and encourages her writing, though in the end cannot condone her criticism of the Jim Crow South. 

Yule May Crookle

Aibileen’s and Minny’s friend and Hilly’s maid. Short seventy-five dollars on the tuition for her twin college-bound sons, Yule May resorts to stealing an unused ring after being denied a loan from Hilly. Yule May is sentenced to four years in jail, and her experience incites the other maids to participate in Skeeter’s book.

Lou Anne Templeton

An acquaintance of Skeeter’s and a member of the Junior League. Though Skeeter initially sees Lou Anne as another one of Hilly’s followers, she discovers the immense kindness with which Lou Anne treats her maid, Louvenia, and the depth of Lou Anne’s depression.

Louvenia

The maid of Lou Anne and grandmother of Robert Brown, who is beaten and blinded after accidentally using a bathroom for white people.

Miss Walters

Minny’s former employer and Hilly’s mother. Miss Walters is amused by the pie Minny gives Hilly, showing she does not approve of her daughter’s actions or beliefs.

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