Sal Paradise
narrator and one of the main characters of the novel; lives originally with his aunt in New York; leaves on four different trips across the country with Dean Moriarty; the fictional alter ego of Jack Kerouac.
Dean Moriarty
main character; lives in San Francisco, but travels constantly back and forth to New York; a wild, mad character whose energy and craziness affect others, especially Sal; with Sal, drinks large amounts of alcohol, does a lot of drugs, and sleeps with a lot of different women, fathering four children by two different women; the fictional alter ego of Kerouac's friend Neil Cassady.
Carlo Marx
eccentric poet in New York; becomes best friends with Dean and Sal; the fictional alter ego of the poet Allen Ginsburg.
Old Bull Lee
writer and drug addict in New Orleans; has traveled the world; mentor to Dean and Sal; the fictional alter ego of William Burroughs.
Marylou
Dean's first wife and brief love interest of Sal.
Ed Dunkel
close friend of Sal and Dean; lives mostly in Denver and San Francisco; marries Galatea so that she will pay for his cross-country trip with Dean, then leaves her in a Denver motel.
Galatea Dunkel
wife of Ed; often left by him in difficult situations, but stays with him through the novel; the only woman not afraid of Dean--she gives him a piece of her mind.
Remi Boncoeur
friend of Sal's from prep school; Frenchman who lives in a shack in San Francisco; helps Sal get a job as a security guard; gambler and thief, but also often kind-hearted and settled in his life.
Lee Ann
Remi Bondoeur's girlfriend in San Francisco.
Sal's aunt
maternal figure throughout the novel; always willing to give Sal and Dean shelter and food at the end of their journeys; protects them in one scene by paying for a traffic ticket and keeping them out of jail.
Chad Gray
Sal's friend in Denver; interested in Indian culture and anthropology.
Tim Gray
Dean's and Sal's friend in Denver.
Roland Major
writer and friend of Sal's in Denver; patterns himself after Hemingway and is more acquainted with life's delicacies.
Camille
Dean's second wife; lives in San Francisco and fathers two of Dean's children; the final woman Dean goes back to at the end of the novel.
Babe and Ray Rawlins
brother and sister who live in Denver.
Elmer Hassel
Elmer never actually appears in the novel; he got lost in Times Square and was never seen again, though Dean and Sal always look for him when they are there.
Lucille
a brief love interest of Sal's; Sal believes he will marry Lucille, but he gets called to go on the road with Dean instead.
Terry
Chicano migrant worker Sal meets in California; Sal falls in love with Terry and spends several months picking cotton in the fields with Terry, her child, her family, and other migrant farm workers; Terry first symbolizes the purity Kerouac sees in marginalized cultures in America.
Slim Gaillard
jazz musician.
Inez
a woman Dean finds and lives with in New York; Dean has a child with Inez and leaves her to follow Sal to Mexico; after divorcing Camille, his second wife, Dean marries Inez only to leave her the next day to go live with Camille in San Francisco.
Stan Shephard
friend of Dean's and Sal's who accompanies them to Mexico City.
Victor
Sal's and Dean's friend and guide in Gregoria, Mexico; provides Sal and Dean with drugs and whores during their stay.
Eddie
hitchhiker Sal meets on the road; reminds Sal of his family in New York.
Rita Bettencourt
a girl to whom Dean introduces Sal.
Rollo Greb
beatnik scholar whom Sal and Dean greatly admire.
Hingham
friend of Sal's in Arizona.
