Beezus Quimby

Beatrice "Beezus" Quimby is a character from the Henry Huggins and Ramona series of books by Beverly Cleary. She is a friend of Henry and the big sister of Ramona. Ramona had a hard time saying "Beatrice" as a young child and thus called her "Beezus." She was then known as "Beezus" to her friends and family. "Beezus and Ramona" is the only book in the series, so far, that concentrates on her point of view. She was named after her mother, Dorothy's sister, Beatrice Day Kemp.

Compared to Ramona, Beatrice is the responsible good student in the family. She takes the burden of being the big sister seriously but is sometimes jealous of the attention Ramona gets, such as the family putting Ramona's art and school work on the refrigerator. She also mildly rebels against her image as the sensible sister at times. In "Ramona and Her Mother", she saves her allowance so she can get her hair cut in a beauty salon rather than have it cut at home by her mother. She also gets her ears pierced without asking her parents for permission in "Ramona's World".

Beezus struggles when it comes to projects involving artistic creativity. She has a hard time in her afternoon art classes and dreads creative writing assignments. Yet she helps out in the kitchen at an early age, making a carrot salad when the family forgot to turn on the crockpot and helping prepare for a New Year's Day brunch hosted by her parents.