46 pages • 1 hour read
W.W. JacobsThe Monkey's Paw
Fiction | Short Story | Adult | Published in 1902A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Character Analysis
Mr. White
Mr. White is the main protagonist in the story. He has been married to Mrs. White for nearly 40 years and is father to Herbert White. He shows a caring and deep relationship with both characters. He is also hospitable and kind, as is obvious in his interactions with Sergeant-Major Morris. Mr. White is an older man and has a “thin grey beard” (8). He is also a risk taker, established immediately in the story by how he plays chess. The narrator says he has “ideas about the game involving radical changes” (1). This risk-taking disposition gathers strength in the story with his insistence to see the monkey paw and willingness to retrieve it from the fire and use it to make a wish. He is not a man of great wealth, and he complains about his home’s terrible condition and location. He is curious about the world, evident in his responses when Morris describes his travels and the monkey’s paw.
Mr. White simultaneously shows a deep understanding of what is of value. He struggles to think of a wish and says he already has all he wants in life. He only makes a wish after his son suggests 200 pounds. After making the first wish, Mr. White quickly becomes the most cautious character about the monkey’s paw and its effects. He reacts to the curl of the monkey’s paw with a shiver and imagines seeing a monkey’s face in the fire before going to bed. Mr. White’s caution deepens into an understanding of the monkey paw’s powers. His reactions to the events in the story grow in fear and timidity.
Mr. White does not say much when the visitor arrives from Maw and Meggins, but he confides to the man that Herbert was the last one of his family. After Herbert’s death, Mr. White is resigned in his grief—showing more acceptance of its reality than Mrs. White—and he tries to resist his wife’s urge to make a wish for Herbert’s return to life. Mr. White now shows a grasp of risk and consequences. He responds to her with rationality and reasoning, trying to convince her that wishing their son back will not bring what they want. Yet, as with the first wish, he seems unable to go against the desires of his family members. He reacts to the knocks following the wish with fear and horror, and being a person of action, finds the paw and makes the final wish for Herbert to disappear before Mrs. White can greet him at the front door. He is now a man unwilling to see what a second and third wish would have in store for him and his wife.
Mrs. White
Mrs. White is an older woman with white hair. She is a kind and loving mother and wife, described as trying to calm Mr. White when he complains about the house or losing the chess game. She takes care of the home and its residents well. Like Mr. White and Herbert, she shows interest in the story of the monkey’s paw but is more dismissive of its magical qualities, suggesting as she sets out supper to “wish for four pairs of hands for me” (45). Her flippant attitude toward the monkey’s paw continues into the next morning when nothing happened following the wish. She admonishes herself and the men for “listening to such nonsense” (68).
Unlike Mr. White, Mrs. White asks the visitor questions about her son and falls quickly into well-warranted anxiety. Once she realizes Herbert is dead, she falls silent until she cries out at the sum being exactly 200 pounds. Part 3 shows a woman far different than the one at the beginning of the story. Like her husband, she is profoundly grieved by the loss of her son. She sobs thinking of his demise. She then becomes excited once she remembers they could use the monkey’s paw to wish Herbert back to life, and she appears unwilling to listen to any reasoning about why it is not a good idea. Her wish is rooted in a mother’s love for her son and that she would be willing to accept any version of her son she could have again. Her final emotion at seeing no one at the front door is complete despair.
Herbert White
Herbert White is the son of Mr. and Mrs. White. He is a happy young man who playfully puts his father in checkmate as the story begins. His relationship with his parents is strong and caring, and he shows awareness of both of their dispositions. He laughs off the monkey’s paw, questioning whether Morris used it himself. After Morris’s exit, Herbert continues with this lighthearted approach to the paw, telling his father, “Why, we’re going to be rich, and famous and happy. Wish to be an emperor, father, to begin with; then you can’t be henpecked” (52). Herbert knows his father wants to be settled with the house and that 200 pounds would do it. When Mr. White reacts to the curl of the monkey’s paw after the wish is made, Herbert runs to calm his father.
Herbert continues to act frivolously the next day, kidding his dad that the money would drop from the sky and teasingly warning his parents to not spend the money before he returns. Herbert dies at his workplace—Maw and Meggins—after getting caught in the machinery in an accident that renders him unrecognizable apart from his clothing. Herbert’s fate is sad and ironic because he is friendly, kind, funny, and warm, and yet he transforms into a monster in death.
Herbert pushed for the wish of 200 pounds, and his death brings that exact sum for his parents. His death provokes questions about its connection to the wish. Herbert dismissed the power of the monkey’s paw and ultimately never knew that its magic was something his parents could no longer deny. Herbert likely died believing the monkey’s paw was nothing more but a silly talisman.
Sergeant-Major Morris
Sergeant-Major Morris is a secondary character who only briefly appears in Part 1. Welcomed by Mr. White, Morris is described as a “tall, burly man, beady of eye and rubicund of visage” (10). Morris has many stories to tell about his travels to distant parts of the world, and he does not spare the family details about the world’s ills. He appears weary from his travels and experiences, drinking whiskey and telling Mr. White to enjoy his home. When asked about the monkey’s paw, Morris tries to dissuade the family from taking interest in its powers, stating, “I warn you of the consequences” (44). When asked if he would use the paw again, he says, “I don’t know” (38). Morris’s face grows white when discussing the paw, and his “tones were so grave that hush fell upon the group” (34). He does his best to prevent others from experiencing the paw’s ills by throwing it in the fire. Unfortunately, he is unsuccessful.
