The Kitchen House

Belle is one of the main characters of the novel, and half of the chapters are from her perspective. She’s the daughter of James, the plantation owner, and her mother was a slave who died shortly after she was born. When Belle was a little girl, she grew up in the big house with her white grandmother. However, when James marries, Belle must live in the kitchen house because James doesn’t want his wife to know about her. In the big house, Belle learned to read and write, unlike the other slaves.

Belle’s character is like Lavinia’s, in that she is a woman stuck between opposing worlds, having lived both in the big house as James’s daughter and in the kitchen house as a slave. Her father demonstrates his love for her in secret, but he never reveals their relationship in public. Belle considers the plantation her home, but her father wants her to leave as a free woman so that she can pursue a better life. However, unlike Lavinia, Belle stands up for what she wants despite opposition from others.

All Belle wants is acceptance from her father and to call the plantation her home. This is complicated by her father, who keeps her a secret for the sake of his reputation, and later by Marshall, who complicates her life by raping and impregnating her. As a result, Belle is a character who can only react to the actions and desires of those around her. Rather than being able to make her own way in life, she must always navigate the circumstances that others have forced on her. Only at the end of the novel, when Lavinia inherits the plantation, does Belle finally get what she’s always desired—a place on the plantation that is her own.

Mama Mae is a staple character who remains consistent throughout the novel. She is the loving, wise, and maternal woman whom everyone in the slave housing turns to for comfort and guidance. She is Beattie, Fanny, Dory, and Ben’s mama, but Belle and Lavinia think of her as their mama as well. Mama Mae is the only one who can initially comfort Lavinia when she first arrives at the plantation, and she’s also the one who is most maternal to Marshall when his father is gone, and his mother is bedridden from laudanum use.

Mama Mae is hard working and loyal. After spending her first years at the plantation in the fields, she first began to work in the big house after James asked her to breastfeed Belle. Ever since, she has taken her role in the big house seriously because she knows that it’s far better than the physically demanding work in the fields. Although she is a slave, she seems to genuinely care for James and his family. While her own family recognizes her incalculable worth, Martha and Marshall continually look down on Mama and the other slaves, despite their diligence and loyalty. 

Marshall is one of the most complex characters in the novel. He is the only surviving son of James and Martha, and he spends all his youth on the grounds of the plantation. When he first appears in the novel, he is a fun-loving child who enjoys playing with his sister, Sally. However, once his tutor, Mr. Waters, enters the picture, Marshall becomes angry, violent, and withdrawn. This is because Mr. Waters sexually and violently abuses Marshall, but it’s also because his own mother and father don’t do anything about it—his father is gone all the time and doesn’t listen to Marshall’s pleas to fire Mr. Waters, and Martha is too drugged on laudanum to understand reality. In this way, Marshall must deal with Mr. Waters on his own.

While Marshall’s parents don’t help him, the slaves do. They recognize that Mr. Waters is a bad man, and when Lavinia finds Marshall incapacitated in the outhouse after Mr. Waters abuses him, Mama cares for him while Ben and Papa guard the door from the tutor. It’s also the slaves who finally get rid of Mr. Waters after he tries to molest Dory. These efforts could have made Marshall compassionate toward the slaves, but that doesn’t happen. As Marshall grows older, he becomes aggressive and violent with the slaves, following in the footsteps of his mentor, the cruel field master, Rankin. Once Marshall rapes Belle, it’s clear that his past experiences have forever marred his once sweet character.

Although the reader knows about Marshall’s secret, evil deeds, Lavinia doesn’t. For a brief time, Marshall presents himself as a gentleman to her; he even rescues her from nearly getting raped. The two seem to have a special bond, and it almost seems as if Marshall is a redeemable character. However, once Marshall and Lavinia marry and move back to the plantation, Marshall’s anger, violence, and hatred resurface. This demonstrates Marshall’s inability to change and his perpetuation of the cycle of violence. 

Ben is the son of Mama Mae and Papa George, and he is a loyal and just character. He stands up for what he believes is right despite the potential consequences. He takes Lavinia under his wing and treats her like his own sister, and even after he’s brutally attacked by Rankin and his men, he goes back to his work without retaliating. He is a natural protector who looks after those in need. He displays these traits best when he protects Marshall and Dory from Mr. Waters, and when he feels ashamed at his inability to protect Belle from Rankin and Marshall.

One of Ben’s main roles in the novel is that he is Belle’s love interest. He and Belle have a continual attraction to each other, but James has forbidden Belle to have a romantic relationship with anyone on the plantation. However, once Ben marries Lucy, a woman from the quarters, Belle and Ben begin an affair.

Ben’s affair is an example of his alternative morality. He tries to make the situation right by remaining faithful to both women and by refusing to leave his wife. Ben also murders Mr. Waters. While both the affair and the murder would be wrong in most circumstances, Ben manages to create his own moral code that allows for such behaviors, and the novel paints him in a positive light. 

Martha is a character defined by loss. After losing three infants and a child, she is unable to face that reality. As a result, she becomes addicted to laudanum and begins a strange relationship with Lavinia, whom she calls “Isabelle,” after her deceased younger sister. In her heavy laudanum use, she becomes bedridden, spending her days sleeping or in a waking dream. While she has one living child, Marshall, she distances herself from him, blaming him for Sally’s death on the swing.

Martha also feels isolated. While still a teenager, she moved away from her family to marry James and live on his plantation. In her mind, she thought it would be a romantic affair, but he left her alone for long stretches of time to do business on his ship. All alone, without family or friends, she began to feel isolated. This feeling of isolation is compounded by the loss of her children, and toward the end of the novel, when she enters the insane asylum, she’s again isolated in a jail-like cell.

Throughout Martha’s isolation and grief, Lavinia remains by her side. Lavinia embraces her role as Isabelle; when she is a little girl, this means that she lets Martha play with her hair and read to her, and when she’s older, Lavinia becomes Martha’s caretaker. Both characters fulfill a need for each other: Martha becomes like Lavinia’s mother, and Lavinia becomes like her daughter.

Jamie is the product of Marshall raping Belle, but Belle loves Jamie more than anyone else. As a young child, he follows Belle everywhere, clinging to her side as she works. When Belle moves to Will’s plantation and Marshall takes Jamie, Jamie clings to Martha’s side, looking to her as a replacement mother. The older he gets, the more he looks exactly like his father, Marshall.

Like his mother, Jamie grows up trapped between two opposing worlds. Martha raises him in the big house as her son, but once he’s older, his own father tries to sell him as a slave. Jamie is an example of how history repeats itself on the plantation. Although Belle’s father loved her, he was still too ashamed of having slept with a slave to tell anyone about her. Belle’s and Jamie’s childhoods were similar—both are estranged from their fathers and treated as inferior because of their skin color.