In the short story Janus by Ann Beattie the central character is not a real character at all but in fact is an inanimate object The cream colored ceramic bowl serves as the main character throughout the story and is correlated to the Roman God Janus that is identified primarily with doors or other places of passage and is also represented as being two faced Janus is one of two characters with names which is also evident of her importance throughout the story The author uses the character of And