Antagonist

Character Role Analysis

Vergil Gunch/The Good Ol' Boys

At the beginning of the novel, there's no one Babbitt dislikes more than the left-wing "radical" Seneca Doane. But as the novel unfolds, Babbitt actually comes to feel sympathy for Doane and starts rebelling against his conservative friends. Most of these good ol' boys don't take Babbitt's rebellion all that seriously, but one man named Vergil Gunch is very serious about snuffing out any liberal beliefs when he hears them.

He even downright threatens Babbitt in order to get him to fall back in line. But Babbitt refuses to be bullied by the world around him. It's not until his wife Myra gets sick that he caves into peer pressure and reconnects with these antagonists. Still though, the reunion is a bittersweet one, since it has cost Babbitt his freedom.