Dr. Melville

Outer characterization

Dr. Melville is one of the main characters of the short story “The Lynching of Jube Benson” by Paul Laurence Dunbar. In the time of the outer story, his hair is “freely sprinkled with gray”, which makes him look like “a man of forty–five or fifty”. His face, which is “lined and serious”, is still “youthful, the face of a man hardly past thirty”. His outer appearance suggests that, although rather young, Dr. Melville has aged prematurely because of a dramatic event which turns out to be his involvement in the lynching of a man who was his friend.

Soon after he finished college, Dr. Melville rented some rooms for his practice in the town of Bradford and fell in love with his landlord’s daughter, Annie. 

Inner characterization

Dr. Melville’s inner c...