Working as she does with the fairy tale mode, Welty deliberately creates stereotypical figures, most of whom are one-dimensional and static. As Welty points out in a talk she delivered on The Robber Bridegroom before the Mississippi Historical Society, she uses only one word to describe her planter, Clement Musgrove, the word "innocent." That word, she says, "shines like a cautionary blinker to what lies on the road ahead." Clement's wife, the evil Salome, is also one-dimensional as are the clownish Goat, the braggart Mike Fink, and the bloodthirsty Little Harp.

Rosamond, Clement's daughter, and her lover, Jamie Lockhart, however, are dual-natured. When the beautiful Rosamond opens her mouth the lies fall out "like diamonds and pearls." Furthermore, when she meets Jamie in the woods she pretends to be someone other than herself. He, too, wears two faces. In civilized company, he is Jamie Lockhart, handsome gentleman; but...