Mick Kelly Character Analysis in The Heart is a Lonely Hunter

Mick Kelly is the youngest protagonist of the novel at just 13 years old. The middle child in a large family, Mick is often lonely and bored. Obsessed with music and the symphonies of Beethoven and Mozart but too poor to afford music lessons or a piano, Mick takes to wandering through the town’s richer neighborhoods at night in hopes of hearing the sounds of a symphony on someone’s radio. Mick, dreamy and idealistic, spends much of her time in an “inside room” in her mind where she composes music and imagines traveling the world as a famous conductor. When John Singer rents a room in Mick’s family’s large boarding house, Mick becomes obsessed with him—transfixed by his tranquility and validated for the first time in her life by his listening skills, Mick develops a crush on Singer that is more emotional than romantic. Mick is a feisty, contrarian tomboy, and she’s misunderstood by almost everyone she meets—but with Singer, she feels seen and understood at last. Over the course of the year in which the novel takes place, Mick grows up considerably. She goes from being a tomboy who cares nothing for clothes, boys, or social affairs to a young woman who wants to gain the admiration of her high school classmates. Amidst her struggles with her annoying, cruel siblings—and her family’s ever-increasing money troubles—Mick forms a friendship with the Jewish boy next door, Harry Minowitz, and from him learns about the evils of fascism and the necessity of political passion. Toward the end of the novel, Mick loses her virginity to Harry. Afterward, he asks for her hand in marriage, but Mick declares that she’ll never marry. Soon after her fateful afternoon with Harry, Mick is forced to make the biggest decision of her life: whether to stay in school or drop out and take a job at Woolworth’s department store in order to help her parents escape their mountain of debt. Mick chooses to do the latter, and, within just a few weeks, she finds her reckless spirit, fanciful dreams for the future, and passionate artistry trampled and stifled by the exhaustion and existential boredom of work.

Mick Kelly Quotes in The Heart is a Lonely Hunter

The The Heart is a Lonely Hunter quotes below are all either spoken by Mick Kelly or refer to Mick Kelly. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:

What would Portia say if she knew that always there had been one person after another? And every time it was like some part of her would bust in a hundred pieces. […]

Mick sat on the steps a long time. […] Her face felt like it was scattered in pieces and she could not keep it straight. The feeling was a whole lot worse than being hungry for dinner, yet it was like that. I want—I want—I want—was all that she could think about—but just what this real want was she did not know.

Related Characters: Mick Kelly, Portia

Page Number and Citation: 52

Explanation and Analysis:

[Mick] wondered what kind of music [Singer] heard in his mind that his ears couldn’t hear. Nobody knew. And what kind of things he would say if he could talk. Nobody knew that either.

Related Characters: Mick Kelly, John Singer

Related Symbols: Music

Page Number and Citation: 53

Explanation and Analysis:

Singer was always the same to everyone. He sat in a straight chair by the window with his hands stuffed tight into his pockets, and nodded or smiled to show his guests that he understood.

Related Characters: John Singer, Mick Kelly, Bartholomew “Biff” Brannon, Jake Blount, Doctor Benedict Mady Copeland

Page Number and Citation: 92

Explanation and Analysis:

The music left only this bad hurt in her, and a blankness. She could not remember any of the symphony… […] Now that it was over there was only her heart like a rabbit and this terrible hurt.

The radio and the lights in the house were turned off. [...] Suddenly Mick began hitting her thigh with her fists. […] But she could not feel this hard enough. The rocks under the bush were sharp. She grabbed a handful of them and began scraping them up and down on the same spot until her hand was bloody. Then she fell back to the ground and lay looking up at the night. With the fiery hurt in her leg she felt better. She was limp on the wet grass, and after a while her breath came slow and easy again.

Related Characters: Mick Kelly

Related Symbols: Music

Page Number and Citation: 119

Explanation and Analysis:

[Mick] went into the inside room. […] School and the family and the things that happened every day were in the outside room. Mister Singer was in both rooms. Foreign countries and plans and music were in the inside room. […] The inside room was a very private place. She could be in the middle of a house full of people and still feel like she was locked up by herself.

Related Characters: Mick Kelly, John Singer

Related Symbols: Music

Page Number and Citation: 163

Explanation and Analysis:

But now no music was in her mind. […] It was like she was shut out from the inside room. Sometimes a quick little tune would come and go—but she never went into the inside room with music like she used to do. It was like she was too tense. Or maybe because it was like the store took all her energy and time. […] When she used to come home from school she felt good and was ready to start working on the music. But now she was always tired.

Related Characters: Mick Kelly

Related Symbols: Music

Page Number and Citation: 353

Explanation and Analysis:

Mick Kelly Character Timeline in The Heart is a Lonely Hunter

The timeline below shows where the character Mick Kelly appears in The Heart is a Lonely Hunter. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.

Communication and Self-Expression Theme Icon

Biff looks up from the counter to see Mick Kelly enter the café. Biff is shocked to see her there—Mick is barely a teenager.... (full context)

...in the morning, and only four or five patrons remain. He feels guilty for selling Mick cigarettes—he has a feeling of fatherly “tenderness” toward her which nonetheless makes him feel unsettled... (full context)

Mick wakes up early, eats breakfast, and waits on the porch for John Singer to come... (full context)

Mick leads Bubber and Ralph to the construction site of their family’s new boarding house. She... (full context)

Mick tells Bubber to comfort Ralph, then goes by herself into the empty, half-finished house. Though... (full context)

Mick hears Ralph crying again. She goes outside to find him sitting in his wagon alone—Bubber... (full context)

Back at the house, Mick puts Ralph in her parents’ room and gives him a toy to play with. She... (full context)

In the gangly and awkward Bill’s room, Mick sets the hatbox down. She opens it as Bill works at his typewriter. Mick pulls... (full context)

Racism, Inequality, and Injustice Theme Icon

In the kitchen, Mick and Bubber listen as Portia, a black woman who works as a servant in the... (full context)

Portia begins talking about how her father has abandoned religion, and Mick remarks that she doesn’t believe in God “any more than [she does] Santa Claus”—she loves... (full context)

Mick sits on the stairs outside the room of one of the boarders, hoping to hear... (full context)

...sitting on the stairs if she knows where he can throw away his dirty overalls. Mick leads him to an alley at the back of the house, where two black men... (full context)

...York Café, he returns to his room, where he waits for his guests to arrive. Mick, Doctor Copeland, Biff Brannon, and Jake Blount come to his room separately to air their... (full context)

To Mick, talking to Singer is “like a game”—when Mick is with him, she feels like she’s... (full context)

Upon returning to the boarding house, Singer finds that Mick, Doctor Copeland, Jake, and Biff are full of questions about where he’s been and why.... (full context)

All summer, Mick Kelly is full of the feeling that she is on the verge of some kind... (full context)

One night in August, Mick is hurrying out of the house so that she can make it to a neighbor’s... (full context)

Several weeks later, school has started. It is a Saturday afternoon. Mick is giving a prom party at the boarding house later that evening, and she, Bubber,... (full context)

Mick is anxious about the party. She fusses with the pictures on the wall in the... (full context)

Later that night, the party is in full swing. All of Mick’s classmates are laughing and mingling—until the moment she passes out the actual prom cards and... (full context)

Amidst all the awkwardness, Mick notices Harry Minowitz, her next-door neighbor and a Jewish boy two years her senior. Harry... (full context)

...are kids as young as four and as old as thirteen playing on the lawn. Mick orders them all home, but it’s no use—the party is “all messed up.” Even though... (full context)

Mick returns home, embarrassed by her torn dress. She longs to put her shorts back on,... (full context)

Mick walks through the streets aimlessly until she comes to a more upscale neighborhood. She goes... (full context)

As the symphony ends, Mick feels a “terrible hurt” inside of her. She begins punching her legs and scraping her... (full context)

...hot chocolate machine at the New York Café—the drink is a big hit, especially with Mick Kelly, who comes in four times a week for a cup. Mick always seems sad... (full context)

...New York Café for business. His regulars are all there, including Singer, Jake Blount, and Mick. Everything at the café seems the same as it’s always been. Blount shouts drunkenly about... (full context)

Biff watches as Mick timidly joins Blount and Singer at their table. He thinks it is an odd sight—a... (full context)

...the first clear day of the month, the neighborhood kids rejoice in the nice weather—but Mick does not join them outside to play. She’s been staying after school an hour each... (full context)

After eating, Mick goes outside to join the other kids. Bubber and his friend Spareribs are playing with... (full context)

Mick soon gets annoyed with the kids’ chatter and decides to go the library. Bubber is... (full context)

The next several minutes pass by in a strange blur. Mick feels her mouth and body move in slow motion as her father comes out to... (full context)

Mick knows exactly where to find Bubber—he is in their old tree house in the yard.... (full context)

...talk with the Kellys. Mr. Kelly says he’s worried that Mrs. Wilson will sue them. Mick suddenly feels terrible for Bubber and worries that something bad actually will happen to him.... (full context)

Mick runs out to the tree house and climbs up to find Bubber—but he isn’t there.... (full context)

After they drive half a mile out of town, Mick spots Bubber on the side of the road. He has a butcher knife on him,... (full context)

As the days go by and Christmas approaches, Mick notices a change in Bubber. He insists on going by his given name, George—even as... (full context)

...been coming to his room to talk to him for more than seven months—Doctor Copeland, Mick, Jake Blount, and Biff Brannon. Of the four of them, the quiet Biff is the... (full context)

...his guests at once, but the atmosphere in the room is awkward and uncomfortable. Copeland, Mick, Blount, and Brannon are stony and silent—an oddity, considering how on their own they each... (full context)

...in the middle of the night. In his dreams, he has disturbing visions of Antonapoulos, Mick, Doctor Copeland, Blount, and Brannon naked and kneeling all around him. (full context)

...down the street, he feels a sense of shame—lately, he has been taking walks through Mick’s neighborhood, hoping to run into her. Though he knows what he’s doing is “not quite... (full context)

Biff does not run into Mick on his walk, and soon returns to the café to find it empty. As the... (full context)

...He dreams of adopting a boy and a girl—sweet, round-cheeked children who will look like Mick and Baby. Biff begins looking back on unpleasant and embarrassing moments throughout his marriage to... (full context)

...and Baby’s accident, the Kelly family—forced to repay Lucile each month—has fallen on hard times. Mick hardly ever has any pocket change anymore, and her older siblings have had to take... (full context)

Mick has been writing tunes in her notebook all winter, struggling to transcribe the music based... (full context)

The other great presence in Mick’s “inside room” is John Singer. Though Mick has allowed thoughts of other people into her... (full context)

One afternoon, Mick asks Harry Minowitz for some help with her English homework. As they study together, Harry... (full context)

Harry tells Mick he has a secret for her. He admits that when he first saw pictures in... (full context)

As Harry’s lip begins to tremble, Mick finds herself attracted to his “warm boy smell.” Just as Mick is about to give... (full context)

After dinner that night, Mick goes upstairs in hopes of visiting with Singer—but sees that his door is open, and... (full context)

...to the Kellys and the other boarders, and everyone listens in rapt, mournful silence. As Mick listens, she grows angry, and states that she’d like to round up the guards who... (full context)

A month after hearing the news about Willie, Mick still finds herself plagued by nightmares about him—she has been rattled to her core by... (full context)

When Mick wakes up next, she realizes she’s slept very late. She washes and dresses, then goes... (full context)

Summer is in the air, and Mick can’t get a new piece of music out of her head. Mick takes her hatbox... (full context)

...day, Harry brings a set of bicycles over early in the morning, and he and Mick set out for the woods. The ride is several miles long, and at a filling... (full context)

At the creek, Harry jumps right into the cool water. Mick is self-conscious in her too-tight bathing-suit, which is borrowed from Hazel, and she worries that... (full context)

After lunch, Harry tells Mick that he thinks she’s pretty. Mick, flustered, suggests they head for home, but Harry asks... (full context)

During the ride back, Harry seems sad and confused, and tells Mick that they’ve got to “understand” what they’ve done. He fumbles for words as he tries... (full context)

...he stays at home, his mother will be able to “read this in [his] eyes.” Mick asks Harry to look at her and tell her if he can see a difference... (full context)

Mick walks inside to find her family sitting all together in the kitchen and dining room... (full context)

Mick goes out to the yard to be alone. While she’s out there, her father calls... (full context)

Mick has recently found herself disconnected from her “inside room”—she feels the need to be busy... (full context)

...putting signs up around town, but the extra publicity doesn’t do a thing for business. Mick does her best to forget about Harry. When he writes her a postcard, as he... (full context)

One of the boarders moves out, and Bill takes the man’s room. Mick, who has been sleeping on the couch, moves into George’s room, but still has trouble... (full context)

...in June, Hazel announces that she’s heard about a job opportunity at Woolworth’s. Hazel asks Mick if she’s interested. Mr. Kelly answers for her, explaining that Mick is too young to... (full context)

The next day, Hazel and Etta loan Mick some nice clothes and get her all made up for the interview at Woolworth’s. They... (full context)

...him about it that he hardly understands what has transpired. He feels guilty about letting Mick down, too—she came to his room one morning full of questions, but he couldn’t understand... (full context)

Several months into her job at Woolworth’s, Mick is feeling despondent and hopeless. She fears that all the plans she dreamed and all... (full context)

Mick sits and thinks about the loss both of John Singer and of her own youth... (full context)

Brannon brings Mick her sundae and her beer, and she pretends to be absorbed in cleaning her fingernails... (full context)

Mick beats her forehead with her fist. She hates that she is “mad all the time”... (full context)

...to love. He hasn’t even been able to give his strange, ineffable fatherly love to Mick. (full context)

Mick Kelly Character Analysis

Mick Kelly Quotes in The Heart is a Lonely Hunter

Part 1, Chapter 3 Quotes

Part 1, Chapter 6 Quotes

Part 2, Chapter 1 Quotes

Part 2, Chapter 5 Quotes

Part 3, Chapter 3 Quotes

Mick Kelly Character Timeline in The Heart is a Lonely Hunter