The Secret Garden Characters

Mary Lennox is a Grade-A, no-holds-barred brat. And the thing about this analysis of Mary's character is that it doesn't take a lot of reading between the lines. We're not throwing out some wild th...

Colin Craven—Archibald Craven's son and Mary's cousin—is your standard jerk who hurts other people because he is hurting so badly himself. He's got a lot of reasons to feel bad about himself, t...

Archibald Craven is the master of Misselthwaite Manor and Mary's guardian when her parents die, since he is Mary's uncle. Archibald is also the father of our other main character, Colin Craven. And...

Lilias Craven is Archibald's wife and Colin's mother. She first appears in the story when Mrs. Medlock describes her to Mary as, "a sweet, pretty thing and [Archibald'd] have walked the world over...

What a Nice Young Man Dickon Sowerby, Martha's twelve-year-old brother, is basically a mensch. There's really no other word for him: He's a stand-up guy who rescues orphaned foxes and crows from dr...

Martha Sowerby is our introduction to The Secret Garden's super-positive portrayal of the poor rural residents of England: She is rosy-cheeked, hard-working, no-nonsense, family-oriented, and gener...

Ben Weatherstaff is a Yorkshire man and a crusty old gardener on the grounds of Misselthwaite Manor. When he first meets Mary, he tells her, "We're neither of us good lookin' an' we're both of us a...

Mrs. Susan Sowerby is basically the 1911 Muggle version of Mrs. Weasley: She is a mother to a big family, and she takes to her role as mother with a lot of heart, enthusiasm, and hard work. In fact...

Susan Ann SowerbyWe never see Susan Ann Sowerby directly, but she comes up in conversation every once in a while. She's the youngest Sowerby girl, at four years old. When Martha first meets Mary, s...