CHARACTER ANALYSIS OF HELENA CHARLES IN OSBORNE'S LOOK BACK IN ANGER

Physical Description: Helena is of the same age as Alison, of medium height, and carefully dressed. When she is first introduced to us, she is busy with preparing tea for the inmates of the house where she is staying as a guest. She is feeling perfectly at home and is assisting Alison in household work. She has a rather judicial expression of alertness on her face, but when this expression softens, she looks very attractive. She possesses a sense of matriarchal authority and she behaves as if she were a gracious representative of some visiting monarch. Actually, she belongs to the middle class which feels perfectly secure in its basic rights. Most men would be anxious to please and to impress a woman of this kind. Even from other young women, like Alison, she receives her due respect and admiration. Jimmy is, however, absolutely impervious to both her strength and dignity.

Helena’s Prolonged Stay at the Porters’ Flat: Helena had come to stay with the Porter’s only for a week or so, but she has been staying for a much longer time, to the great irritation and annoyance of Jimmy. In fact, Jimmy bluntly asks her why she has been staying on longer than originally proposed, and her reply is that she had been asked by Alison to stay on. This reply makes us a little suspicious about her intention in staying on, especially because she is conscious of Jimmy’s hostility to her.

Her Attitude to Jimmy: just as Jimmy is openly hostile to Helena, she too makes no secret of her dislike for him. When speaking privately to Alison, she is quite blunt in her criticism of Jimmy. On hearing Jimmy playing loudly on his trumpet, Helena says to Alison that it seems that Jimmy wants to kill someone with the noise of his trumpet. This is how she expresses her feelings on this point: “It’s almost as if he wanted to kill someone with it. And me in particular. I’ve never seen such hatred in someone's eyes before. It’s slightly horrifying”. A little later in the play, she describes Jimmy to Alison as a real savage.

Helena’s Influence over Alison: Helena seems to have a great hold upon Alison. Under Helena’s influence, Alison agrees to go to church for prayers, But Helena’s influence upon Alison is much greater than her merely succeeding in taking Alison to church. After observing Jimmy’s habitual ill-treatment of Alison, Helena begins to work upon Alison’s mind and urges her to settle once for all how the relationship between her and Jimmy is to be adjusted. Helena does not mince matters when discussing the situation with Alison. She points out that, now when Alison is going to have a baby, she cannot go on living in this way any longer. “Before, it was different—. But you can’t go on living in this way any longer”, says Helena. She goes on to say that either Jimmy should learn to behave properly and look after his wife or Alison must get out of this “mad-house”, this “menagerie.” According to Helena, Jimmy does not seem to know what love or anything else means. But Helena does not stop here. She further says to Alison: “Listen to me. You’ve got to fight him. Fight, or get out. Otherwise, he will kill you”.

Helena’s Verbal Skirmish with Jimmy: At the tea-table Helena asks Jimmy why he tries hard to be unpleasant and offensive and then says that in her opinion he is a very tiresome young man. Jimmy, of course, knows how to hit back. When Jimmy denounces Alison’s mother, Helena intervenes, saying: “Oh for heaven’s sake, don’t be such a bully! You’ve no right to talk about her mother like that”! When Jimmy still does not stop, Helena says: “I feel rather sick, that’s all. Sick with contempt and loathing”. A little later, Jimmy denounces Helena herself, and this time Helena threatens to slap him, saying: “It’s a pity you’ve been so far away all this time. I’d probably have slapped your face.” When Jimmy threatens to hit her back, Helena says: “You probably would. You’re the type.” When a few moments later Jimmy goes out, Helena expresses her reaction to him in the following words addressed to Alison:” You feel all right, don’t you? What’s he been raving about now? Oh, what does it matter? He makes me want to claw his hair out by the roots. When I think of what you will be going through in a few months’ time—and all for him! She then rebukes Cliff for keeping quiet and not doing anything to curb Jimmy’s habit of speaking offensively and insultingly to everybody.

Helena’s Responsibility for  Alison’s Decision to Leave Jimmy: It is Helena who is directly responsible for Alison’s decision to leave Jimmy. She makes Alison more conscious than she was before. Then, without telling Alison, Helena sends a telegram to Alison’s father to come and take away Alison because Alison is very unhappy. She then reveals to Alison her action in having sent the telegram to Alison’s father and obtains a promise from Alison that she will leave the letter to Jimmy and go away with her father. In all this, Helena is apparently acting as Alison’s well-wisher. We have no reason at this point to suspect Helena’s intentions or motives. We ourselves realize that it is dangerous for Alison to continue to stay with Jimmy in her pregnant condition when Jimmy is all the time scolding her and trying to hurt her. (Jimmy himself at this time is unaware of the fact that Alison is pregnant).

Helena’s Slapping, and then Kissing Jimmy: When Alison is leaving the flat with her father, Helena stays back, although it was understood that she too would go with Alison. Helena explains her action in staying behind by saying that she has an appointment in Birmingham on the following day about a job and that she would be staying here for only one more night. After Alison is gone, Jimmy returns from his visit to London and, on his speaking in his usual offensive way to Helena, she slaps him; but, to our great surprise, the very next moment she kisses him passionately and then draws him down beside her. Helena’s action in thus making love to Jimmy naturally gives rise to the suspicion in our minds that she had fallen in love with Jimmy in the very beginning, and that her having urged Alison to go to her parents’ home was a part of her planning to get an opportunity to acquire Jimmy as a lover for herself. However, this is only a conjecture on our part, because the author himself does not say anything to make the position clear.

As Jimmy’s Mistress:  Helena then lives with Jimmy as his mistress for several months, and she is obviously quite happy with him as is he with her. Helena has been able to adjust herself wonderfully to Jimmy’s habitual manner of talking critically and resentfully about things. Helena has fully replaced Alison and is ironing the clothes as Alison used to do. She is even wearing a shirt of Jimmy’s when ironing the clothes, as Alison had done. However, Helena does not seem to have stopped going to church in order to please Jimmy. For instance, Jimmy refers to Helena‘s busy chatting with the priest on the previous day, and Helena admits the fact. We see her fondling his ear and neck, and when he speaks appreciatively to her, she says: “I love you………Oh, my darling………I’ve always wanted you always!”  It seems that Helena has entered into a steady relationship with Jimmy.

The Awakening of Helena’s Conscience and her Desertion of Jimmy: However, there is another big surprise waiting for us. Just when we had reached the conclusion that Helena and Jimmy had found in each other permanent life-partners (though without getting married), Alison returns unexpectedly. Alison’s return brings about an abrupt and revolutionary change in Helena‘s attitude. In spite of discontent, Helena declares that her having lived with Jimmy as his mistress was all wrong when Alison comes back in her own house. This is what she says to Alison: “Alison—I knew that it was all utterly wrong………..I believe in good and evil, and I don’t have to apologize for that.” In other words, Helena’s conscience has now awakened and she cannot continue living sinfully with Jimmy any longer. In fact, she says that throughout the period of her stay with Jimmy, she had been experiencing a sense of the wrong that she had been committing. She even believes that Alison’s miscarriage was a divine judgment on them all.

Our Final Attitude to Helena: Whatever we may think of Helena in the earlier parts of the play, at the end (in Act III, Scene II) we are filled with admiration for her because she gives evidence of a strong will-power and a strong sense of right and wrong. She voluntarily gives him up because of a compulsive urge to undo the wrong she has been doing. Her action in leaving Jimmy is a true sacrifice which we generally see only on the Indian screen.