Briony Tallis

• Protagonist

• Precocious girl with a gift for writing which leads to a necessity to control everything around her

  • Much older siblings and absent parents, so used to having control over her own insulated life

  • Writing fulfils this need, as she can create entire worlds that she controls

  • Sees herself as much smarter than everyone around her

• Her childishness is emphasised by how little she questions her own assumptions and views about the world

• Misinterprets the fountain scene, which leads her to wrongly accuse Robbie

  • Driven by her love of storytelling, illusion that she is already grown up and preconception that she understands things that she really does not

• Later becomes a nurse and works to make up for what she did to Robbie

• Revealed at the end that she has written the novel in an attempt to atone

  • Understands that she can never be forgiven

• Narrates the conclusion as an elderly woman who has been diagnosed with terminal dementia

Cecilia Tallis

• Briony’s sister

• Realises early in the story that she is in love with Robbie

• When Briony accuses Robbie, Cecilia cuts off her ties with her family and promises to wait for Robbie

• She becomes a nurse

• Briony and Cecilia reconnect slightly during the war as Briony tries to take back her false testimony

• At the end, Briony says that Cecilia died in a bombing soon after Robbie died

Robbie Turner

• Son of Grace and Ernest Turner

• Studied at Cambridge and plans to become a doctor

• Education is funded by the Tallises, who treat him like a son

• Realises he is in love with Cecilia

• Wrongly imprisoned for Lola’s rape

• After three years in prison, enlists in the army in exchange for a reduced sentence

• In Part Three, he is at Cecilia’s apartment and is still furious with Briony

  • Revealed at the end that Briony made this bit up to give him a life with Cecilia

• Actually died the night before the Dunkirk evacuation

Lola Quincey

• Briony’s older cousin

• Acts mature but is only 15

• Raped by Paul Marshall and is so traumatised that she accepts Briony’s testimony

  • Seems likely that she knows Paul was her rapist

• Later marries Paul, implied to be an agreement to both hide their complicity in Robbie’s imprisonment and because she will become wealthy

• Becomes a well-known London socialite

Paul Marshall

• Leon’s dull friend who is making a fortune in chocolate

  • His company manufactures Amo bars

• When he visits the Tallis family, they think he may be a good match for Cecilia, but he is uninterested in her

• He rapes Lola but lets Robbie take the blame

• Later marries Lola

• Becomes a philanthropist

Emily Tallis

• Briony, Cecilia and Leon’s mother, Jack’s wife

• Relatively absent parent, partially due to her debilitating migraines

• Snob, condescending towards Robbie, dislikes Jack funding his education

• Hates her sister Hermione, sees her as always stealing attention

  • Thinks Lola is exactly the same

Jack Tallis

• Briony, Cecilia and Leon’s father, Emily’s husband

• Absent parent because he works as a high-ranking bureaucrat in London

  • During tensions leading up to WW2

• Seems to be a kind man- funds Robbie’s education and supports Grace

  • Aid abruptly stops when Robbie is blamed for Lola’s rape

Pierrot and Jackson Quincey

• Lola’s little brothers

• At the beginning, they are rowdy young boys, and the events of Part One pass over their heads

• Pierrot appears at the end, when he leads his grandchildren in a performance of The Trials of Arabella

Nettle and Mace

• Robbie’s comrades during the war

• Briony communicates with Nettle to write Robbie’s portion of the story

Fiona

• Briony’s friend from nursing

• From a rich London family

Leon Tallis

• Oldest Tallis child

• Brings Paul Marshall to the house

• Old man at the family reunion at the end

Nurse Drummond

• Briony’s strict supervisor at the hospital

Danny Hardman

• Servant of the Tallis family

• Cecilia and Robbie wrongly suspect him of being Lola’s rapist

Old Hardman

• Danny Hardman’s father

• Servant of the Tallis family

Betty

• Servant of the Tallis family

• Works in the kitchen

Hermione and Cecil Quincey

• Lola, Pierrot and Jackson’s parents

• In the middle of an unpleasant, public divorce, so they send the children to stay with the Tallises

Grace Turner

• Robbie’s mother

• Charlady of the Tallis family

Ernest Turner

• Robbie’s father, Grace’s husband

• Quit his job as the gardener and abandoned his family when Robbie was young