Martine and Philippa
The two sisters Martine and Philippa are the titular characters of the first part of Babette’s Feast, which is entitled “Two Ladies of Berlevaag”. These two elderly ladies inhabit one of the yellow houses in a small Norwegian town called Berlevaag, tucked away in a fjord between two mountains. They were tall and willowy, and as we come to know from the story, were extremely beautiful and attractive during their youthful days. Nevertheless, they had never owned anything fashionable, and had always dressed demurely in grey or black all their lives. They inherited this ascetic bent of mind from their father, the Dean, whose religiousness was in fact evident from the naming of his two daughters: Martine and Philippa were named after Martin Luther and his friend Philip Melanchton respectively.
Dean
The father of Martine and Philippa, this person has always been referred to by the author as the Dean, and his real name is never revealed to us (may be his actual name was Dean, too, which coincided with his profession – but we never know!). An old inhabitant of the small town of Berlevaag, the Dean was a prophet as well as the founder of a pious ecclesiastic party or sect, which was known in all of Norway. The members of this particular religious sect, led by the Dean, renounced all worldly pleasures, as they believed that the earth including all earthly things is illusionary in nature, and the ultimate truth is the New Jerusalem toward which they were longing. The Dean had a late marriage. The account of the Dean is retrospectively discussed in the story, as he has been long dead during the time of the narration of the story.
Lorens Loewenhielm
Lorens Loewenhielm is retrospectively introduced in the story as the lover of Martine when she was eighteen, in the year 1854. He was young office who would happily spend his days in his garrison town, and thus ran into debt. So, Loewenhielm’s angry father sent him on a month’s visit to his aunt in her old country house of Fossum near Berlevaag, so that he could have time enough to meditate and to better his ways of life. It was during this time when Loewenhielm rode into the town and met Martine in the marketplace. It was love in first sight for Lorens as he looked down at the pretty damsel, and she looked up to the fine horseman.
Bewildered by the beauty of Martine despite being demurely dressed, Lorens Löewenhielm, a young lieutenant, would often visit the Dean just to find an excuse to catch a glimpse of her. However, Lorens could never be articulate about his feelings towards his ladylove, and would suffer from an inferiority complex and a loss of self-confidence whenever he was with Martine. On his last visit, he boldly kissed her goodbye, vowing never to return, looking forward to be a military leader to overcome his lack of self-esteem. We will see him later again during the feast arranged by Babette as a noted general and man of manners, who would highly praise the culinary art of the French maid.
Achille Papin
Achille Papin was a renowned French opera singer, who visited the fjord town of Berlevaag when Philippa was eighteen years old. He was appointed by the Dean to give musical lessons to Philippa. He was excited about his pupil’s ability to sing in high scales, and wanted to take her to Paris, believing that she would make an excellent soprano singer. However, one day during the musical lessons, Papin kissed Philippa, which enraged her. She did not want to make any more contact with Papin, and he had to go back to Paris. Several years later, the two sisters receive a letter from Papin, in which he recommended the culinary skills of Babette Hersant and requested the sisters to keep Babette as a maid.
Babette Hersant
The protagonist of the story, Babette Hersant is first introduced to the reader as the maid-of-all-work as the two sisters Martine and Philippa. As it is a little awkward for two puritanical sisters to employ a maid, the narrator attempts to give an explanation by recounting how Babette had arrived and why was she appointed in the concerned household. Later we come to know that Babette has fled Paris which was at that time raged with civil wars, and the Communards were being killed indiscriminately. In fact, Babette’s husband and son were killed in the uprising.
Babette is a fine Parisian chef, although that is not revealed to Martine and Philippa until the climax of the story, and they initially keep expressing their doubts about their maid’s culinary skills. She is in fact an artist, who must seek fulfillment in her life by expressing her art. The opportunity arrives twelve years later, when the two sisters decided to celebrate the centenary anniversary of their demised father, the Dean. As she prepares a full-course French dinner for the two sisters and their guests, her identity is finally revealed as a former chef of the famous Café Anglais in Paris. Martine and Philippa assume that having won ten thousand francs from the lottery, Babette would now go back to Paris. However, she replies that she has spent all her money for the dinner, albeit the much awaited expression of her art, and she would not go anywhere. She believes that an artist is never poor, because the true wealth is not material. Martine blesses her saying that she would be a great artist in the paradise and would keep enchanting the angels.
