Jean-Baptiste Grenouille

The main character of the novel. Grenouille is orphaned as an infant and raised in strict conditions by a woman named Madame Gaillard, who takes in orphans. He is a small man, ugly, and with a crippled foot. He possesses a superhuman sense of smell, which he can use as other people use sight to perceive objects and other people. He does not give off any scent himself, however, which makes him nearly invisible to others. He grows up without any sense of right and wrong, it seems, and he does not hesitate to kill a young girl when it suits him in order to experience her scent. Later he will kill twenty-five other girls in the same fashion, and for much the same reason.

Grenouille is cold and ruthless in his cunning, and is able to maneuver and manipulate others into helping him, largely by letting...