Anders in Cleopatra and Frankenstein: Character Analysis

Overview

Anders is a Danish photographer and longtime friend of Frank’s who serves as the art director of a women’s fashion magazine before an opportunity to lead the West Coast team arises. Formerly a model in the 1980s, he carries the residue of that early fame—hollow cheekbones, a Nordic cool, and a lingering sense of being replaceable. When he accidentally bids $12,000 on Cleo’s painting at a benefit auction, he begins a two-week affair with her while Frank is away filming in South Africa. The relationship, built on secrecy and intense physical intimacy, forces Anders to confront his guilt, his stalled artistic ambitions, and his inability to commit fully.

Plot Role

Anders functions as a narrative catalyst for the unraveling of Frank and Cleo’s marriage. His affair with Cleo (Chapter Ten: February) gives her a temporary escape from the toxic patterns she and Frank have created. But Anders also represents a conflict between loyalty and desire. He has known Frank for over two decades; his betrayal weighs heavily on him. After the affair ends, he relocates to Los Angeles and begins a relationship with a model, yet his unresolved feelings for Cleo resurface at Danny Life’s art party (Chapter Fifteen: May). There, Cleo confronts him for cutting off contact, and he admits he acted out of self-preservation. His role is largely reactive: he enters Cleo’s life, disrupts it, and then withdraws, leaving emotional wreckage.

Motivations and Traits Shown Through Actions

The evidence reveals several key traits:

Avoidance and cowardice: When Cleo asks him to promise he will be “there” for her if she leaves Frank, Anders deflects and leaves quickly to see Jonah (Chapter Ten). Later, in the restaurant bathroom, he has a violent sexual fantasy about hurting Cleo, suggesting his anger and frustration are turned inward and outward destructively.
Guilt and self-loathing: After the fantasy, he feels a wave of relief and disappointment, but also a need to punish himself. The discovery at the flea market of an old magazine featuring a model who looks like him but is credited under a different name reinforces his fear of being interchangeable.
Desire for connection vs. fear of intimacy: He loves Jonah, his ex-girlfriend’s son, but admits he “wasn’t guaranteed love.” His relationship with Cleo is passionate but clandestine; he fantasizes about a life with her (uptown apartment, Jonah liking her) while simultaneously pulling away.
Artistic stall: Once a model, now an art director, he rarely talks about his own creative work. The novel implies he has not fully realized his artistic potential, paralleling Cleo’s own creative block.

Chronological Arc

Chapter Two: June – Anders is introduced at Cleo and Frank’s wedding party. He tells a story about being paralyzed in an elevator after muscle relaxants, which underscores his tendency toward passivity and fear of losing control. He is “almost unfairly attractive” and emanates a “Nordic cool.”
Chapter Ten: February – The affair begins. Anders and Cleo spend two intense weeks together. On the day Frank returns, Cleo reveals her suspicion that Frank loves Eleanor. Anders dismisses her theory. He later misses Frank’s call, receives a voicemail, and experiences a violent fantasy. In the flea market, he sees his own face credited to another model. He and Jonah play soccer; he offers to move to LA.
Chapter Twelve: Still March – Santiago confronts Anders about his relationship with Cleo during a hike in LA. Anders confesses he loves her and breaks down. They reconcile after finding his lost puppy. Anders has clearly relocated to LA by this point, taking the editor-in-chief role.
Chapter Fifteen: May – At Danny Life’s art party, Cleo sees Anders. He approaches her, claiming he stopped contacting her because she didn’t leave Frank. She dumps ice water on him. Their confrontation is bitter; Anders offers a weak apology. He leaves with a new girlfriend, a model.
Chapter Seventeen: January – Frank visits Cleo in Rome; Anders is mentioned only in passing. His absence from the final scenes underscores his tangential role in the novel’s resolution.

Relationships

With Cleo

The affair begins through a chance accident—Anders bids $12,000 on her painting. Cleo is drawn to his sensitivity and his alternative to Frank’s brashness. Anders, in turn, sees in Cleo a chance to burn his life down and start fresh. But he cannot sustain the risk: when Cleo demands a promise of support, he withdraws. In their last direct encounter, he tries to justify his silence, but Cleo sees only his cowardice.

With Frank

Theirs is a twenty-year friendship built on shared history and work. Frank calls Anders “my brother” and openly jokes with him. The betrayal cuts across this bond. Anders repeatedly considers how Frank would react: he fears Frank’s anger but also hopes Frank might forgive him, especially if Frank himself is in love with Eleanor. The friendship is never fully repaired within the novel’s timeline.

With Jonah

Anders is a surrogate father figure to Christine’s son. Their scenes together reveal Anders’s softer side: he buys Jonah an expensive soccer ball, worries about his language, and tries to teach empathy. His love for Jonah is one of the few unambiguous goods in his life. Even so, Anders admits he has never been great at being an authority figure, and he feels his love is not guaranteed.

Key Decisions and Consequences

Decision	Consequence
Bidding on Cleo’s painting	Initiates the affair that destabilizes his friendship with Frank and his own peace of mind.
Avoiding Cleo after the affair ends	Causes hurt and resentment when they meet again; Cleo dumps ice water on him.
Moving to Los Angeles	Fulfills a professional aspiration but distances him from Jonah and from New York’s art scene.
Confessing his love to Santiago	Allows him emotional release but does not change his circumstances; he remains in LA.
Not telling Frank about the affair	Preserves the friendship superficially but creates a lasting secret that haunts multiple characters.

Theme and Symbol Connections

Art and Commerce: Anders moves from modeling to art direction; his career is shaped by commerce rather than pure creativity. The magazine he works for is a fashion publication, and his move to LA is motivated by a business expansion, not an artistic calling.
Love and Marriage: Anders’s affair with Cleo illustrates the messiness of extramarital desire. He craves the ideal of love (a life with Cleo, Jonah liking her) but cannot handle the reality of its demands.
Addiction and Recovery: While Anders is not an addict, his behavior parallels addictive patterns: the affair gives him a high, and he struggles with withdrawal when it ends. His violent fantasy suggests a need to expel pent-up tension.
Gender Identity and Performance: Anders was a male model, a profession that commodifies gendered appearance. His past as a “twice-removed” model (seeing his face on another’s credit) hints at the performative nature of identity.
Mental Illness and Trauma: Though less explicit than with other characters, Anders’s history of being “passed around” by older men in the modeling industry suggests unprocessed trauma. His paralysis story and violent fantasy point to suppressed psychological distress.

Book-Specific Questions and Answers

1. What triggers Anders’s affair with Cleo?
He accidentally bids $12,000 on her painting at a benefit auction (Chapter Ten). Cleo calls him, amused, and visits his apartment; the attraction becomes a two-week affair.

2. Why does Anders stop speaking to Cleo after Frank returns?
He believes Cleo should have left Frank as she promised. When she doesn’t, he interprets it as a sign she is not fully committed, so he distances himself to protect his own heart and his friendship with Frank.

3. How does Anders’s violent fantasy reveal his psychological state?
In a restaurant restroom, he imagines brutally assaulting Cleo (Chapter Ten). This fantasy reflects his internal struggle: he idealizes her but also resents her for putting him in an impossible position. It demonstrates his guilt, self-loathing, and difficulty managing anger.

4. What does the flea-market magazine scene symbolize?
Anders finds an old i-D magazine with a model who looks like him but is credited under a different name (Chapter Ten). It reinforces his fear of being replaceable and his fractured sense of self, stemming from his modeling days when his identity was commodified.

5. Does Anders ever reconcile with Frank?
The novel does not depict a direct reconciliation. By the end, Anders lives in Los Angeles, and Frank is in a new relationship with Eleanor. Their friendship remains fractured, though Frank’s voicemail to Anders suggests he is unaware of the affair’s full extent.