Anthony Trollope

Excerpts from Anthony Trollope's introduction: It may perhaps be fairly said that the Commentaries of Caesar are the beginning of modern history. He wrote, indeed, nearly two thousand years ago; but he wrote, not of times then long past, but of things which were done under his own eyes, and of his own deeds. ... It is the object of this little volume to describe Caesar's Commentaries for the aid of those who do not read Latin, and not to write Roman history ...

An Old Man's Love is Trollope's last complete novel, finished seven months before his death and written in almost constant pain and ill-health. The 'old man' of the title, however, is just 50 years old and has never had a days' illness. William Whittlestaff becomes guardian to Mary Lawrie, the orphaned and penniless daughter of an old friend, and gradually finds himself falling in love with her. But Mary has already given her heart to the young John Gordon who has gone to seek his fortune in the Kimberley diamond fields... It may be suspected he had Kate Field (an American girl whom he met in Italy in 1860) and himself in mind when in old age he wrote An Old Man's Love, which tells of the fondness - half protective and half passionate - of a man of fifty for a girl some thirty years his junior.

In the fourth of the 'Palliser' stories, Trollope follows Phineas Finn's return to the dangerous world of Westminster politics. When his political rival is murdered, Phineas is thrown under suspicion and eventually finds himself standing trial at the Old Bailey. The situation is complicated by the presence of two women in his life: his old flame Lady Laura, whose estranged husband is determined to destroy Phineas's reputation, and the wealthy and enimgatic widow, Madame Max.

The quiet life of an English clergyman is disturbed by rumors about the source of his income.

When Reverend Josiah Crawley, the impoverished curate of Hogglestock, is accused of theft it causes a public scandal, sending shockwaves through the world of Barsetshire. The Crawleys desperately try to remain dignified while they are shunned by society, but the scandal threatens to tear them, and the community, apart.Drawing on his own childhood experience of genteel poverty, Trollope gives a painstakingly realistic depiction of the trials of a family striving to maintain its standards at all costs. With its sensitive portrayal of the proud and self-destructive figure of Crawley, this final volume is the darkest and most complex of all the Barsetshire novels.

In the second volume from Trollope’s series of six ‘Palliser’ novels, we probe deep into the life of British politics. The story is told from the standpoint of a young Irish MP whose private and public affairs become entangled. Trollope’s genius for making such matters exciting is displayed in full as he explores Phineas’s political ambitions, his romantic attachments and the steep learning curve he has to climb in both. As usual in these novels, there is a large cast of delightful supporting characters, enlivened further by the author’s rich sense of their comic possibilities. This talent for detail is combined with a magisterial overview which lifts the book above parochial politics, making it of interest to any reader interested in the study of personality and action.

Mr Peacocke, a Classical scholar, has come to Broughtonshire with his beautiful American wife to live as a schoolmaster. But when the blackmailing brother of her first husband - a reprobate from Louisiana - appears at the school gates, a dreadful secret is revealed and the county is scandalized. Ostracised by the community, the pair seem trapped in a hopeless situation - until the combative but warm-hearted headmaster of the school, Dr Wortle, offers his support, and Mr Peacocke embarks upon a journey to America that he hopes will lay to rest the accusations once and for all. A perceptive exploration of Victorian morality, Dr Wortle's School (1881) also contains echoes of Trollope's own life, and his personal affection for the vivacious Bostonian Kate Field.

With the publication of this volume we complete the series of Trollope's six Barsetshire novels in the Everyman Library.

Plantagenet Palliser, the Duke of Omnium and former Prime Minister of England, is widowed and wracked by grief. Struggling to adapt to life without his beloved Lady Glencora, he works hard to guide and support his three adult children. Palliser soon discovers, however, that his own plans for them are very different from their desires. Sent down from university in disgrace, his two sons quickly begin to run up gambling debts. His only daughter, meanwhile, longs passionately to marry the poor son of a county squire against her father's will. But while the Duke's dearest wishes for the three are thwarted one by one, he ultimately comes to understand that parents can learn from their own children. The final volume in the Palliser novels, The Duke's Children (1880) is a compelling exploration of wealth, pride and ultimately the strength of love.

The concluding episode in Trollope's magnificent sequence of six Barsetshire novels narrates the trials of Joseph Crawley, the obsessive rector of Hogglestovk, as he struggles to clear his name from accusations of theft.

With an Introduction and Notes by Peter Merchant. Canterbury Christ Church College. The tough-mindedness of the social satire in and its air of palpable integrity give this novel a special place in Anthony Trollope's Literary career. Trollope paints a picture as panoramic as his title promises, of the life of 1870s London, the loves of those drawn to and through the city, and the career of Augustus Melmotte. Melmotte is one of the Victorian novel's greatest and strangest creations, and is an achievement undimmed by the passage of time. Trollope's 'Now' might, in the twenty-first century, look like some distant disenchanted 'Then', but this is still the yesterday which we must understand in order to make proper sense of our today.

Reports from the West Indies, North America, Australia and New Zealand, and South Africa by the quintessential Victorian voyager, an adventurous and energetic sightseer with a fine sense of humor and irony.

It is in this book that we first meet Plantagenet Palliser, later to become Duke of Omnium, but the forces of attention concerns two women and their lovers: Lady Glencora and Alice Vavasour.

In the course of last century, Anthony Trollope's fictional county of Barset has become one of English literature's most 'real', most celebrated landscapes. Framley Parsonage--the fourth of his engrossing Barsetshire novels--concerns itself with the drastic misjudgements of an amiable but naive and overly ambitious young clergyman. Through its shrewd and excellent social comedy and subtle, sometimes wicked, grasp of political and ecclesiastical manoeuvering, Trollope brings a whole local universe to convincing and triumphant life. (Book Jacket Status: Not Jacketed)

The Way We Live Now is Anthony Trollope's radical exploration of the dangers associated with speculative capitalism, edited with an introduction and notes by Frank Kermode in Penguin Classics.Augustus Melmotte is a fraudulent foreign financier who preys on dissolute nobility - using charm to tempt the weak into making foolish investments in his dubious schemes. Persuaded to put money into a notional plot to run a railroad from San Francisco to Santa Cruz, the capricious gambler Felix Carbury soon becomes one of his victims. But as Melmotte climbs higher in society, his web of deceit - which also draws in characters as diverse as his own daughter Marie and Felix's mother, the pulp novelist Lady Carbury - begins to unravel. A radical exploration of the dangers associated with speculative capitalism, this is a fascinating satire about a society on the verge of moral bankruptcy.Frank Kermode's introduction explores the real-life inspiration for Trollope's masterly satire. This edition also includes detailed notes.Anthony Trollope (1815-82) had an unhappy childhood characterised by a stark contrast between his family's high social standing and their comparative poverty. He wrote his earliest novels while working as a Post Office inspector, but did not meet with success until the publication of the first of his 'Barsetshire novels', The Warden (1855). As well as writing over forty novels, including such popular works as Can You Forgive Her? (1865), Phineas Finn (1869), He Knew He Was Right (1869) and The Way We Live Now (1875) Trollope is credited with introducing the postbox to England.If you enjoyed The Way We Live Now, you might like William Makepeace Thackeray's Vanity Fair, also available in Penguin Classics.'Trollope's masterpiece ... its examination of how hopes of easy money can corrupt remains relevant today' Observer