Julian Lethbury

Relations to other characters:

- Adoptive father of Jane

Julian Lethbury is a main character of the short story “The Mission of Jane”. His appearance is unknown owing to the fact that the story is told from his perspective. Mr. Lethbury is a clever and well-educated man who does´t tolerate stupid people. Married to Alice Lethbury but sees his marriage as a mistake, however, he still recognizes her needs and emotional states. Thinks of his wife as a stupid, limited and inflexible woman and never has a serious conversation with her at the beginning of the story but still finds entertainment in making fun of her in a kindly way. Not interested in his wife, therefore doesn´t think about having children with her but stays faithful and fulfills her wish of adopting a baby. In many situations stays an external observer and doesn´t get emotionally involved. In the pace of the story observes his wife and the changes she is going through due to the adoption of Jane. He is not glad to be an adoptive father, but at the same, he is sure he can only be happy when his wife is happy. He develops no significant feelings towards his adopted daughter but finds her presence in the house pleasant and reviving. He is responsible for Jane´s education and was at first impressed by her intellectual abilities, however, later he described Jane´s mind as a cold storage of information only used to impress or mock people or revolutionize the household in Lethbury´s house. When Jane grows up, he tries to protect his wife from Jane`s character and is glad to marry Jane off his hands. Like many of Wharton´s male characters, Mr. Lethbury is passive and possesses reactive type of character: he takes things as they come and adjust himself to changing environment; therefore, he doesn´t have any significant impact on the story, excluding the permission to adopt the child. Everything he does seems to be against his will: his unhappy marriage with Mrs. Lethbury, the adoption, the behavior of Jane. His passiveness lies mostly in the efforts to make his wife happy, thus he is sometimes paralyzed by her pleas to let Jane do what she wants. He doesn´t change anything he doesn´t like, he only philosophically observes everything what happens in his family, and when he is ready to take an action to change something, the problems are solved in a natural way or by other characters.