Shakespearean Characters - J

J

• Jachimo is a villain in Cymbeline. He persuades Posthumus, wrongly, that he has slept with Posthumus' wife, Imogen.
• Jack:
  • Jack Cade (hist) leads a proletarian rebellion in Henry VI, Part 2.
  • See also John: especially Sir John Falstaff, who is often addressed as Jack.
• Jacquenetta is described as a light wench, and is the love interest of many comic characters in Love's Labour's Lost.
• Jailer:
  • Two Jailers guard the imprisoned Posthumus in Cymbeline.
  • A Jailer keeps Palamon and Arcite in custody in The Two Noble Kinsmen.
  • The Jailer's Brother accompanies his niece in her madness, in The Two Noble Kinsmen.
  • The Jailer's Daughter develops an obsessive love for Palamon, and releases him from prison, in The Two Noble Kinsmen. She descends into madness.
  • A sympathetic Jailer guards and commiserates with Antonio in The Merchant of Venice.
  • See also Gaoler.
• Jaques (pronounced "jake-wheeze"):
  • Jaques is a melancholy lord in As You Like It.
  • Jaques DeBoys is a brother to Oliver and Orlando in As You Like It.
• James:
  • James Gurney (fict) is a servant of Lady Faulconbridge, in King John.
  • James Soundpost, Simon Catling and Hugh Rebeck are minor characters, musicians, in Romeo and Juliet.
  • Sir James Blunt is a supporter of Richmond in Richard III.
  • Sir James Tyrrell (hist) is employed to murder the princes in the tower in Richard III.
• Jamy (fict) is a Scottish captain in Henry V.
• Jessica is Shylock's daughter in The Merchant of Venice. She elopes with Lorenzo and converts to Christianity.
• A Jeweller sells a jewel to Timon in Timon of Athens.
• Joan la Pucelle (hist), better known to history as Joan of Arc, leads the Dauphin's forces against Talbot and the English in Henry VI, Part 1. Shakespeare presents her as an adulterer who fakes pregnancy in order to avoid being burnt at the stake.
• John:
  • Don John is the bastard brother of Don Pedro, and is the chief villain in Much Ado About Nothing.
  • Friar John is a minor character, who is unable to deliver a crucial letter from Friar Laurence to Romeo, in Romeo and Juliet.
  • John is a servingman of Mistress Ford: he carries Falstaff to Datchet Mead in a buck-basket, in The Merry Wives of Windsor.
  • John Bates (fict) is a soldier the English army in Henry V.
  • John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster (hist)is uncle to King Richard and father to Bolingbroke in Richard II.
  • John Gower (hist) is the "Presenter", or narrator, of Pericles, Prince of Tyre.
  • John Rugby is a servant to Caius in The Merry Wives of Windsor.
  • John Talbot is the son of Sir John Talbot. They die together bravely in battle in Henry VI, Part 1.
  • King John (hist) is the title character of King John: a king whose throne is under threat from the claim of his young nephew, Arthur.
  • Prince John of Lancaster (hist) is the younger brother of Prince Hal in Henry IV, Part 1, Henry IV, Part 2, and Henry V. He is also the Duke of Bedford who is Regent of France in Henry VI, Part 1.
  • Sir John Blunt is a supporter of the king in Henry IV, Part 2.
  • Sir John Coleville is a rebel captured by Falstaff in Henry IV, Part 2.
  • Sir John Falstaff (fict, but see Sir John Oldcastle and Sir John Fastolfe) is a central character of Henry IV, Part 1, Henry IV, Part 2, and The Merry Wives of Windsor. In the Henry plays, he is "bad angel" to prince Hal, and is eventually rejected by him. He is the lecherous gull of the title characters in Merry Wives. His death is reported in Henry V, although he is not a character in that play. He is (with Hamlet) one of the two most significant roles in Shakespeare.
  • Sir John Fastolfe (hist) is a coward, stripped of his garter in Henry VI, Part 1.
  • Sir John Montgomery (historically Thomas Montgomery) is a minor Yorkist character in Henry VI, Part 3.
  • Sir John Mortimer (hist) is an uncle of Richard Duke of York (1) in Henry VI, Part 3.
  • Sir John Stanley supervises Eleanor's penance in Henry VI, Part 2.
  • Sir John Talbot (hist) is the leader of the English forces in France, and therefore the chief enemy of Joan, in Henry VI, Part 1.
• Joseph is a servant of Petruchio in The Taming of the Shrew.
• Jourdain, with Southwell, Hume and Bolingbroke, are the supernatural conspirators with Eleanor Duchess of Gloucester in Henry VI, Part 2.
• Julia is the faithful lover of Proteus, who follows him disguised as a young man and is dismayed to discover his infatuation with Silvia, in The Two Gentlemen of Verona.
• Juliet:
  • Juliet is a title character in Romeo and Juliet. The daughter of Capulet, she falls in love with Romeo, the son of her father's enemy Montague, with tragic results.
  • Juliet, lover of Claudio, becomes pregnant by him, leading to his death sentence, which begins the action of Measure for Measure.
• Julius Caesar (hist) is the title character of Julius Caesar, an Emperor of Rome who is stabbed in the Capitol, on the Ides of March.
• Junius Brutus and Sicinius Velutus, two of the tribunes of the people, are the hero's chief political enemies in Coriolanus, and prove more effective than his military foes.
• Juno (myth) is presented by a masquer in The Tempest.
• Jupiter (myth) hears the pleas of the ghosts of Posthumus' family, in Cymbeline.
• Justice (title):
  • A Justice is a minor role in the trial of Froth and Pompey, in Measure for Measure.
  • The Lord Chief Justice (hist) is a dramatic foil to Falstaff in Henry IV, Part 2.
  • Justice Shallow (fict) is an elderly landowner in Henry IV, Part 2 and The Merry Wives of Windsor.
  • Justice Silence (fict) is an elderly friend of Justice Shallow in Henry IV, Part 2.