The principal character, the landlady, in Page's 1943 poetry "The Landlady," gives readers an unpleasant sense. This is due to the speaker's intricate and frightening portrayal of the landlady in the poem. The speaker recounts the landlady herself, as well as her interactions and relationships with her boarders, throughout the poem. The speaker is a first-person narrator who tells the story of his attempts to win over the heart of the landlady. He starts out by flattering her and then moves on to bullying and harassing her until she finally rejects him. Although the speaker is not named in the poem, many readers have speculated that he is a version of Page himself. Others have suggested that the speaker is a composite of several different people within Page's own life. No matter who the speaker is, he is certainly a person who knows the landlady's affairs very well - perhaps even better than she does herself. In conclusion, the speaker in "The Landlady" is a disturbing figure who gets deeper and deeper into trouble as the poem progresses. He begins by insulting the landlady with words such as "slattern" and "strumpet," but later becomes a threat to others' lives as well.