Characters / Babel, or the Necessity of Violence

The cohort

Robin Swift

Robin Swift

A Chinese orphan raised in England after the death of his family who struggles between the desire to help his motherland and live a comfortable life as a Babel Scholar.

• Abusive Parents: When a young Robin forgets to attend one of his classes, Professor Lovell violently beats him with a fire poker. Throughout the book, Robin notes that his guardian rarely showed him any affection. It all boils over in Book II, when Robin realizes he was nothing but an asset, resulting in him killing Lovell in a fit of rage.
  • What’s more, Griffin notes that Lovell was even harsher to him than he was to Robin.
• Affectionate Nickname: After knowing him for no more than a day, Ramy begins calling Robin “birdie”. Letty later does this when trying to manipulate him, and Victoire uses it when comforting him.
• Ambiguously Bi: There is no explicit romance between the main characters, but Robin’s narration implies attraction to both Ramy and Victoire.

Robin had the absurd impulse to place his hand against Ramy’s cheek; indeed, he’d half lifted up his arm before his mind caught up with his body./ She had, Robin noticed, enormous and very pretty doe-like eyes. He liked listening to her speak; every sentence felt like she was pulling laughter out from inside him.

• Asian and Nerdy: Hails from Canton, and has a talent and passion for languages.
• Blinded by Rage: Two times, one after an argument with Lovell, and the next after Letty murders Ramy in cold blood.
• But Not Too Foreign: Robin was born in China and lived there until he was 10, but can pass as white under certain lighting, doesn’t use his original name, and only speaks Chinese in an academic context or when activating a silver bar.
• Broken Pedestal: During his first few days at Oxford, Robin is enamored by the life of a Babbler, the idea of becoming a translator and being accepted as an English citizen, but after talking to Griffin, he learns how fundamentally flawed the British empire is.
• Calling the Old Man Out: Two notable times.
  • Once during his first dinner with Lovell after enrolling at Oxford. He repeats Griffin’s points about how unjust the silver-trade system is, only to be shut down.
    • Than after the disastrous Canton trip, Lovell confronts him about his discussion with Commissioner Lin. Robin retorts and points out how he and the British are ruining a country full of innocent people, and breaches the subject of his mother and the abuse Lovell put him through.
• Despair Event Horizon: After all the trauma he endures, Robin finally crosses it after Ramy’s death.
• Heroic Bastard: Professor Lovell was his father.
• He Who Fights Monsters: Robin firmly enters this territory once the tower is seized. Traumatized, grieving, and suicidal, he's more far willing to escalate, which alarms and concerns many of the other scholars (Victoire especially).
• Meaningful Rename: Downplayed, changes his name to “Robin Swift” to better fit into British society when Professor Lovell tells him he has to pick an English name, and we never do find out his original, Chinese name.
• Missing Mom: Robin’s mother died from cholera when he was 10.
• My God, What Have I Done?: Consumed by rage after a heated argument and his realization that he was nothing but an asset, Robin uses a silver bar designed to blow a hole in the chest of its victim on his father. He immediately regrets it and begs him to wake up.
• Strong Family Resemblance: Robin is a spitting image of his father.
• Took a Level in Cynic: When Robin and his group return to Britain after murdering Professor Lovell, Robin accepts that violence is a necessary part of revolution.
• Tragic Bromance: Ramy, his first real friend dies just before they were able to take control of the tower.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: His argument with Lovell at the end of Book III.

Ramiz “Ramy” Rafi Mirza

Ramy Mirza

Robin’s first and closest friend, who bears a strong sense of wit and studies Urdu, Arabic, and Persian.

• The Ace: Sir Horace Wilson noticed Ramy’s strength when it came to learning and absorbing languages early on, and was the one who proposed sending him to England.
• Affectionate Nickname: Is the one who nicknames Robin “Birdie”, after knowing him for less than a day.
• Alliterative Name: Ramiz Rafi Mirza.
• Attack on the Heart: This is how he goes out.
• Deadpan Snarker: Especially towards Letty.

'My father was stationed in Calcutta,’ she said. ‘Three years, from 1825 to 1828. Could be you saw him around.

‘Lovely,’ said Ramy as he slathered jam over his scone.

‘Could be he pointed a gun at my sisters once.'

• Et Tu, Brute?: Letty was the one to kill him.
• Large Ham: Downplayed. He’s described as being a passionate speaker, often gesticulating wildly to get his point across.
• Motive Rant: While confronting Robin about keeping Hermes a secret for three years, he vents that he hated England and the fact that he was betraying his home country by working for Babel. This was why he joined Hermes.

‘’Everything I’ve worked for is this!’ Ramy exclaimed. ‘What, you think I came to Babel because I want to be a translator for the Queen? Birdie, I hate it in this country. I hate the way they look at me, I hate being passed around at their wine parties like an animal on display. I hate knowing that my very presence at Oxford is a betrayal of my race and religion, because I’m becoming just that class of person Macaulay hoped to create. I’ve been waiting for an opportunity like Hermes since I got here—‘’

• Playing Up the Stereotype: Ramy changes his behavior, accent, and mannerisms depending on the person’s perception of him.
• What the Hell, Hero?: To Robin regarding him not telling him and Victoire about Hermes.

Victoire Desgraves

Victoire Desgraves

A Haitian student who was raised in France, and one of the only women at Babel.

• Beware the Nice Ones: Despite playing the role of The Heart, Victoire is more than willing to resort to violent revolution.
• Broken Bird: Victoire was raised in an abusive white household where she was forbidden from speaking Haitian Creole and treated as an exotic pet by her guardian’s daughters. She faced racism and misogyny at Babel, and partook in a violent revolution which involved covering up a murder. Finally, two out of three of her friends died, and the other is now a mortal enemy.
• Don't Create a Martyr: Towards herself. She acknowledges that her death might get white Britons to care about what the empire is doing to her motherland, but makes the decision to continue living.

We have to die to get their pity,’ said Victoire. ‘We have to die for them to find us noble. Our deaths are thus great acts of rebellion, a wretched lament that highlights their inhumanity. Our deaths become their battle cry. But I don’t want to die, Robin.’ Her throat hitched. ‘I don’t want to die. I don’t want to be their Imoinda, their Oroonoko. I don’t want to be their tragic, lovely lacquer figure. I want to live.

• French Cuisine Is Haughty: The narration notes that after spending he summer in France, she “returned with insufferable opinions about food and fine dining.”
• The Heart: Victoire is arguably the most rational out of the group, and acts as Robin’s rock during the occupation of the tower.
• Hiding Behind The Language Barrier}}: When Robin and Ramy make bad first impressions due to their comments about them being women, Victoire and Letty insult them in French.
• Lady of War: Victoire is noted to be an excellent fencer along with Letty, and she is the one who shoots Professor Playfair during the occupation of the tower.
• Missing Mom: Shortly after arriving in France, Victoire’s mother (and most of the household) succumbed to disease.
• Nice Girl: While she does have her limits, Victoire is generally sweet and non-confrontational.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The patient, level-headed Blue oni to Letty’s fiery, argumentative, Red oni, although she can be an equally passionate debater.
• Silk Hiding Steel: She’s gentle, composed, and level headed, but she is not afraid of rebellion.
• Sole Survivor: Downplayed. With Robin and Ramy dead and Letty turning against them, Victoire is the only cohort member who stays till the very end.
• What Beautiful Eyes!: Robin describes her as having “enormous, and very pretty doe-like eyes.”

Letitia “Letty” Price

Letty Price

The only white member of the cohort, and one of the few women at Babel.

• Attention Whore: Lampshaded by Ramy and eventually Robin.

‘She’s just being Letty,’ said Ramy when pressed about it. ‘She wants attention, and she thinks throwing a tantrum is the way to get it.’

Letty was the kind of girl who was used to, and had come to always expect, special attention.

• Belligerent Sexual Tension: Averted, she thinks she has this with Ramy because of how often they bicker. But it turns out that she mistook their constant arguments for special attention, which devastates her.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Letty claims to love her friends, but is willing to ignore and eventually betray them when their truths don’t line up with her worldview.
• Can't Take Criticism: Refuses to listen when her implicit racism is called out.

There was no debating with Letty when she was in these moods – it was obvious she only wanted an audience to vent to…

• Clingy Jealous Girl: She’s pissed with Ramy after he declines her invitation to dance, and spends most of the night weeping into Robin’s shoulder. Later on, when she takes his life, Robin theorizes that it was because he rejected her and she couldn’t bear the humiliation.
• English Rose: Subverted; she isn’t gentle or mild-mannered as you’d expect an English rose to be, and she certainly isn’t a hero. However, she’s referred to as such by the narration.
• Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon
• Fair-Weather Friend: Letty is extremely close with the rest of her cohort, especially Victoire, but is dismissive when they tell her about their experiences with racism.
• Hypocrite: Letty (rightfully) complains about how Oxford treats women, but practically refuses to acknowledge how Robin and Ramy still suffer under white supremacy, and that Victoire is worse off as both a woman and a person of color.
• Innocently Insensitive: Subverted. At first, she seems like a well-meaning ally who happens to make ignorant comments, but as the novel goes on, it becomes clear that she doesn’t want to change her worldview or actually try and empathize with her friends.
• It's All About Me: Letty has a tendency to pivot the attention towards herself when her friends talk about their experiences with racism.
  It took him a moment to realize what it was that grated on him, and when he did, it would bother him constantly, now and thereafter; it would seem a great paradox, the fact that after everything they had told Letty, all the pain they had shared, she was the one who needed comfort.
• Lady of War: The daughter of an admiral, Letty is (unfortunately for Ramy) an excellent shot.
• Never My Fault: When her relationship with Victoire is fractured due to her racist comments about Vodou, Letty claims Victoire brought it on herself. She also has the same attitude when their night at the ball ends terribly after she’d guilt-tripped everyone into going by mentioning her dead brother.
• Playing the Victim Card: What Letty starts doing after her arguments were Ramy in Chapter 11.

But now Letty’s rejoinders had acquired an oddly victimized tone. She snapped at the smallest, often intangible slights.

• Quit Your Whining: It’s implied that she constantly brings up the topic of Anthony disappearing on an expedition to get a reaction from Victoire. She ends up on the receiving end of this when Victoire just brushes her off.

Unlike Victoire, she was determined to raise the issue at every opportunity; indeed, she was obsessed with Anthony’s death in a way that felt uncomfortably, performatively righteous.

The Hermes Society

Griffin Lovell

Griffin Lovell

Robin’s older half-brother and a former Babel scholar who introduces Robin to the Hermes Society.

• Abusive Parents: Griffin came to England before Robin and also lived under Lovell’s roof. He also notes that Lovell “softened a bit” with Robin, implying that he was even harsher.
• Broken Bird: A male version. Years of abuse by Lovell and being discarded by the Institute for his lack of fluency in Chinese, not to mention the exploitation of his homeland by Britain, turned Griffin snarky and bitter, and understandably so.
• Deadpan Snarker: Enough to give Ramy a run for his money.
  ’So when did he bring you over?’
  ‘To London?’
  ‘No, you dolt, to Manila. Yes, London.’
  
• Don't You Dare Pity Me!: When Robin tries to offer Griffin money to buy a thicker coat during winter, he refuses. Robin notes that he’s too proud to accept help.
• Et Tu, Brute?: Gets this after seemingly having recruited classmate and friend Eveline Brooke, only for her to have been plotting to catch him during a theft. He ends up blowing a hole in her chest out of fear.
• Foil: To Robin. While his half-brother is naive and still enamored with Oxford, Griffin has seen Babel for what it is. And according to Lovell, Robin is everything Griffin isn’t-humble, bright, and hardworking.
• Good Is Not Nice
  • ''Nice comes from the Latin word for stupid,’* said Griffin. ‘We do not want to be nice.’'
• Hates Their Parent: Griffin despises Lovell, and it’s not hard to see why.
  Our father,’ Griffin said loudly, ‘was a cruel, selfish man who thought anyone who wasn’t white and English was less than human. Our father destroyed my mother’s life, and let yours perish. Our father is one of the principal engineers of a war on our motherland. If he’d come back from Canton alive, Parliament wouldn’t be debating right now. They’d have voted already. You’ve bought us days, perhaps weeks. So what if you’re a killer, brother? The world’s better off without the professor in it. Stop shrivelling under the weight of your conscience and take the damned credit.’
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: He’s brash, condescending, and snarky, but he damn if he won’t give risk his life for Hermes.
• Pet the Dog: Typically closed off to Robin but gifts him Oliver Twist since he likes Dickens.
• The Unfavorite: When it turns out that Griffin didn’t remember enough Chinese to be useful to the empire, Lovell (who held the opinion that silver-working was the only course at Babel that mattered) tossed him aside. Lovell explicitly tells Robin that he’s “everything Griffin isn’t.

Oxford

Richard Lovell

Richard Lovell

An Oxford professor who takes in Robin after his family dies of cholera.

• Abusive Parents: Lovell has four known children: while it's unclear how's he like with his "legitimate" children, Griffin and Robin were never treated like sons.
• Actually Pretty Funny: the only moment of genuone human warmth we ever see from him is sharing a laugj with Robin the over dramatic mannerisms of Dr. Playfair.
• Asshole Victim: He and Robin get into a fight after the Canton trip ends in disaster. After dismissing Robin's justified protests as a sign of his "inferior heritage", and refuses to even acknowledge the boy's mother, his son snaps and blows open his chest. He had it coming.
• Burial at Sea: After Robin kills him, his body is thrown overboard to cover up his death.
• Children as Pawns: Both Griffin and Robin were bastards he sired for the purpose of creating students bilingual in Chinese. Griffin failed to meet his expectations because he was removed from China too early, and it's all but stated that Robin is his second attempt. The realization that Lovell never saw him as a son is one of the factors that leads to Robin killing him in a fit of rage.
• Everyone Can See It: The fact that he's Robin's father is an open secret.
• Failure-to-Save Murder: Lovell waited under after Robin's mother succumbed to cholera to save the boy from the brink of death, and it's made clear that he was in Canton well before her death.
• Lack of Empathy: From the way he acts, it's as if he doesn't know the word in any language.
• Nothing Is the Same Anymore: Lovell's death serves as the turning point for the entire story.

Other

Mrs. Piper

Mrs. Piper

Professor Lovell's kindly Scottish housekeeper.

• Actually Pretty Funny: Mrs. Piper is not above having a laugh at Mr. Lovell's expense.
• Serious Business: they are not 'scones', they are 'Bannock', thank you very much.
• Supreme Chef: Her pastries are legendary. Robin uses this as an excuse to leave Oxford at one point and Remy, whose had said pastries, accepts the line of reasoning instantly.