Hyperion Characters

In-Consul-AbleThe Hegemony Consul is the first character we meet, in the Prologue of the story, and the third-person narrator often follows his P.O.V. during the portions of the story between the p...

Beauty and Brawn(e)Brawne Lamia is the sole female pilgrim on the voyage to Hyperion. It's a little hard to picture her. She's from Lusus, a world that has gravity 1.3 times stronger than that of E...

This is the Sound... of SilenusClose your eyes and think of poetry. What do you see and hear? Are you walking through woods on a snowy evening? Visiting a stately pleasure dome in Xanadu? You're pr...

The Wandering JewNo, Sol Weintraub isn't a houseplant. Houseplants don't have "sad, luminous eyes" (1.28), which the Consul notes Sol has. He's Jewish (but not exceptionally religious) and he's wan...

Modern Warfare: Simulated CombatThe word soldier conjures up images of violence and honor. Where Kassad is concerned, he definitely has the violence part down—but we might have to search a bit to...

Oh, God! You Devil!The fact that Father Hoyt is the first pilgrim to tell us his story tells us that Hyperion is probably going to have a lot to do with religion. And the fact that Father Hoyt is a...

Templar? We Hardly Know 'Er!Het Masteen doesn't have a tale. For all we know he might have a tail (he never takes off that robe), but we doubt it. The Consul does let us know that Masteen is the ca...

Gladstone? More Like Badstone!Meina Gladstone is the Hegemony CEO. That's kind of like the president, except of the whole honking universe. People of the future seem to treat government like a busi...

A Thing of Beauty Brawne Lamia's Detective's Tale begins like any good detective story: a dark and stormy night. Well, it might be day, but it is dark and drizzly. Anyway, in this story, the detect...

The Priest's Tale is more about Father Paul Duré than it is about its teller, Father Lenar Hoyt. The story covers Duré's ill-fated trip to Hyperion—but he was losing conviction in his faith eve...

One Score, Two Score, Three Score Little Creepy ThingsFather Paul Duré heads deep into the jungles of Hyperion to study the Bikura. He probably wishes he hadn't. The last person to study then wrot...

Building a MysteryMoneta is "the most beautiful woman [Kassad] had ever seen" (2.221). Well, he must like them strong and silent: she's in her late twenties, hardly ever speaks, and might not even...

The Curious Case of Rachel Sarah WeintraubWhen she's seven years old, Rachel Sarah Weintraub will be dubbed by the media the "Virgin Victim of the Time Tombs' Curse" (4.505). But that's only after...

If Robots Ran for PresidentThe TechnoCore is hard to define, especially since no one is really sure what it is. It's not as ridiculous as your toaster taking over the world, but it's close. It seem...

Aspic and Spanning the UniverseMerin Aspic is the Consul's grandfather, and the Consul's tale is more about him than about the Consul. When the tale beings, Merin is mad about something: "The day i...

All You Have to Do Is Ask"I will remember Siri" (6.150), Merin Aspic says after standing in line for 72 hours to get a new iPhone4S. Okay, so that's not true. Siri's a woman from the planet Maui-Co...

Oust, Damn Spot!The Ousters are always in the background, and they have been for long before the book began: "The Ousters had been the single external threat to the Hegemony for [...] four centurie...

So It GoesNew arrivals to Hyperion are greeted with a statue of Sad King Billy. It's nothing exciting. In his journal, Father Duré writes that it "was oddly disappointing" (1.184), and the same mi...

Deconstructive Criticism Tyrena Wingreen-Feif is Martin Silenus's editor at Transline publishing. After she's sent Silenus's manuscript, she makes a few small changes. Just little ones.Like changin...

Dreamers Often LiePoor Mike Osho, doomed to play Mercutio (the name Mike Osho even sounds a lot like Mercutio) to Merin Aspic's Romeo. Aspic's best bud is fun-loving and fancy free, checking out ba...

Theo Lane : Hyperion :: Captain Edward Smith : Titanic Theo Lane was the Consul's aide when he was Consul of Hyperion. Through Theo, we learn a bit about the Consul's life on the troubled planet. H...

Android DoesA. Bettik is the android who guides the pilgrims from the inn on Keats to the barge Benares. He doesn't serve much of a purpose in this book other than to say, Hey! We've got androids h...