TROLLOPE, Anthony

Nationality: English. Born: London, 24 April 1815; son of the writer Frances Trollope. Education: Harrow School, Middlesex, 1822-25 and 1831-33; Winchester College, Hampshire, 1825-30. Family: Married Rose Heseltine in 1844; two sons. Career: Classical usher at a school in Brussels, 1834; worked for the British Post Office, 1834-67: surveyor's clerk, later deputy surveyor, in Bangher, Clonmel, and Belfast, Northern Ireland, 1841-54; chief surveyor, Dublin, 1854-59; chief surveyor of the Eastern District, London, 1859-67; suggested the use of letter boxes; made official visits to Egypt, 1858, the West Indies, 1858-59, and the U.S., 1861-62, 1868; lived at Waltham House, Hertfordshire, 1859-71, in London, from 1872, and at Harting Grange, Sussex, until 1882; a founder, Fortnightly Review, 1865; editor, Pall Mall Gazette, 1865-66, and St. Paul's Magazine, 1867-70; Liberal parliamentary candidate for Beverley, 1868; traveled in Australia and New Zealand, 1871-72, Australia, 1875, and South Africa, 1877. Died: 6 December 1882.

Publications

Collections

The Trollope Reader, edited by Esther Cloudman Dunn and Marion E. Dodd. 1947.

The Oxford Illustrated Trollope, edited by Michael Sadleir and Frederick Page. 15 vols., 1948-54.

Complete Short Stories, edited by Betty Jane Breyer. 5 vols., 1979-83.

Later Short Stories, edited by John Sutherland. 1995 .

Short Stories

Tales of All Countries. 2 vols., 1861-63.

Lotta Schmidt and Other Stories. 1867.

An Editor's Tales. 1870.

Why Frau Frohmann Raised Her Prices and Other Stories. 1882.

Novels

The Macdermots of Ballycloran. 1847; edited by Robert Tracy, 1989.

The Kellys and the O'Kellys; or, Landlords and Tenants: A Tale of Irish Life. 1848.

La Vendee: An Historical Romance. 1850.

Barsetshire series:

The Warden. 1855; edited by David Skilton, 1980.

Barchester Towers. 1857.

Doctor Thorne. 1858.

Framley Parsonage. 1861.

The Small House at Allington. 1864; edited by James R. Kincaid, 1980.

The Last Chronicle of Barset. 1867; edited by Stephen Gill, 1981.

The Three Clerks. 1858; edited by Graham Handley, 1989.

The Bertrams. 1859.

Castle Richmond. 1860; edited by Mary Hamer, 1989.

Orley Farm. 1862.

The Struggles of Brown, Jones, and Robinson, by One of the Firm. 1862.

Rachel Ray. 1863; edited by P. D. Edwards, 1988.

Palliser series:

Can You Forgive Her? 1864; edited by Andrew Swarbrick, 1982.

Phineas Finn, The Irish Member. 1869; edited by Jacques Berthoud, 1982.

The Eustace Diamonds. 1872; edited by W. J. McCormack, 1983.

Phineas Redux. 1874; edited by John C. Whale, 1983.

The Prime Minister. 1876; edited by Jennifer Uglow. 1983.

The Duke's Children. 1880; edited by Hermione Lee, 1983.

Miss Mackenzie. 1865; edited by A. O. J. Cockshut, 1988.

The Belton Estate. 1866; edited by John Halperin, 1986.

The Claverings. 1867(?).

Nina Balatka. 1867.

Linda Tressel. 1868.

He Knew He Was Right. 1869; edited by John Sutherland, 1985.

The Vicar of Bullhampton. 1870; edited by David Skilton, 1988.

Sir Harry Hotspur of Humblethwaite. 1871.

Mary Gresley. 1871.

Ralph the Heir. 1871; edited by John Sutherland, 1990.

The Golden Lion of Granpère. 1872.

Lady Anna. 1873; edited by Stephen Orgel, 1990.

Harry Heathcote of Gangoil: A Tale of Australian Bush Life. 1874.

The Way We Live Now. 1875.

The American Senator. 1877; edited by John Halperin, 1986.

Christmas at Thompson Hall. 1877; as Thompson Hall, 1885.

Is He Popenjoy? 1878; edited by John Sutherland, 1986.

How the Mastiffs Went to Iceland. 1878.

The Lady of Launay. 1878.

An Eye for an Eye. 1879.

John Caldigate. 1879.

Cousin Henry. 1879.

Dr. Wortle's School. 1881; edited by John Halperin, 1984.

Ayala's Angel. 1881.

The Fixed Period. 1882.

Marion Fay. 1882.

Kept in the Dark. 1882.

Not If I Know It. 1883.

The Two Heroines of Plumplington. 1882.

Mr. Scarborough's Family. 1883; edited by Geoffrey Harvey, 1989.

The Landleaguers (unfinished). 1883.

An Old Man's Love. 1884.

Plays

Did He Steal It? 1869; edited by R. H. Taylor, 1952.

The Noble Jilt, edited by Michael Sadleir. 1923.

Other

The West Indies and the Spanish Main. 1859.

North America. 2 vols., 1862; edited by Robert Mason, 1968.

Hunting Sketches. 1865.

Travelling Sketches. 1866.

Clergymen of the Church of England. 1866.

The Commentaries of Caesar. 1870.

Australia and New Zealand. 2 vols., 1873;

Australia edited by P. D. nEdwards and R. B. Joyce, 1967.

Iceland. 1878.

South Africa. 2 vols., 1878; revised abridgement, 1879.

Thackeray. 1879.

The Life of Cicero. 2 vols., 1880.

Lord Palmerston. 1882.

An Autobiography, edited by H. M. Trollope. 2 vols., 1883; edited by Michael Sadleir, 1947.

London Tradesmen, edited by Michael Sadleir. 1927.

Four Lectures, edited by Morris L. Parrish. 1938.

The Tireless Traveller: Twenty Letters to the Liverpool Mercury 1875, edited by Bradford A. Booth. 1941.

The New Zealander, edited by N. John Hall. 1972.

Trollope-to-Reader: A Topical Guide to Digressions in the Novels of Trollope, edited by Mary L. Daniels. 1983.

Letters, edited by N. John Hall and Nina Burgis. 2 vols., 1983.

The Irish Famine: Six Letters to the Examiner 1849-1850, edited by Lance Tingay. 1987.

Trollope the Traveller: Selections from Anthony Trollope's Travel Writings. 1995.

Editor, British Sports and Pastimes. 1868.

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Bibliography:

Trollope: A Bibliography by Michael Sadleir, 1928, revised edition, 1934; The Reputation of Trollope: An Annotated Bibliography 1925-1975 by John C. Olmsted, 1978; The Trollope Collector: A Record of Writings and Books about Trollope by Lance Tingay, 1985; Trollope: An Annotated Bibliography of Periodical Works by and about Him in the United States and Great Britain to 1900 by Anne K. Lyons, 1985.

Critical Studies:

Trollope: A Commentary by Michael Sadleir, 1927, revised edition, 1945; The Trollopes: The Chronicle of a Writing Family by Lucy Poate Stebbins and Richard Poate Stebbins, 1945; Trollope by B. C. Brown, 1950; Trollope: A Critical Study by A. O. J. Cockshut, 1955; Trollope: Aspects of His Life and Work by Bradford A. Booth, 1958; The Changing World of Trollope by Robert Polhemus, 1968; Trollope: The Critical Heritage edited by Donald Smalley, 1969; Trollope by James Pope-Hennessy, 1971; Trollope: Artist and Moralist by Ruth Roberts, 1971, as The Moral Trollope, 1971; A Guide to Trollope by Winifred Gerould and James Gerould, 1975; Trollope: His Life and Art by C. P. Snow, 1975; The Language and Style of Trollope by John Williams Clark, 1975; Trollope and His Contemporaries: A Study in the Theory and Conventions of Mid-Victorian Fiction by David Skilton, 1976; The Novels of Trollope by James R. Kincaid, 1977; Trollope and Politics: A Study of the Pallisers and Others by John Halperin, 1977, and Trollope Centenary Essays edited by Halperin, 1982; Trollope: The Artist in Hiding, 1977, and A Trollope Chronology, 1989, both by R. C. Terry, and Trollope: Interviews and Recollections edited by Terry, 1987; Trollope: His Art and Scope by P. D. Edwards, 1977; Trollope's Later Novels by Robert Tracey, 1978; Trollope's Palliser Novels: Theme and Pattern by Juliet McMaster, 1978; Trollope by Arthur Pollard, 1978; Trollope, 1980, and Trollope: The Barsetshire Novels: A Casebook, 1983, both edited by T. Bareham; Trollope and His Illustrators by N. John Hall, 1980, and The Trollope Critics edited by Hall, 1981; The Art of Trollope by Geoffrey Harvey, 1980; The Novel-Machine: The Theory and Fiction of Trollope by Walter M. Kendrick, 1980; Trollope in the Post Office, 1981, and The Chronicler of Barsetshire: A Life of Trollope, 1988, both by R.H. Super; The Trollope Critics edited by N. John Hall, 1981, and Trollope: A Biography by Hall, 1991; The Reasonable Man: Trollope's Legal Fiction by Coral Lansbury, 1981; The Gentleman in Trollope: Individuality and Moral Conduct by Shirley Robin Letwin, 1982; The Androgynous Trollope: Attitudes to Women Amongst Early Victorian Novelists by Rajiva Wijesinha, 1982; Trollope: Dream and Art by Andrew Wright, 1983; Trollope and the Law by R. D. McMaster, 1986; Trollope: Barchester Towers by Graham Handley, 1987; Writing by Numbers: Trollope's Serial Fiction by Mary Hamer, 1987; Trollope by Susan Peck MacDonald, 1987; Women in Trollope's Palliser Novels by Deborah Denenholz Morse, 1987; Trollope and Comic Pleasure by Christopher Herbert, 1987; The Chronicler ofBarsetshire: A Life of Trollope by R. H. Super, 1988; Trollope and Character by Stephen Wall, 1988, as Trollope: Living with Character, 1989; A Guide to Trollope by A. Craig Bell, 1989; Trollope: A Victorian in His World by Richard Mullen, 1990; Trollope by Victoria Glendinning, 1993; Trollope: A Biography by John N. Hall, 1993; The Penguin Companion to Trollope by Richard Mullen, 1996; Trollope and Victorian Moral Philosophy by Jane Nardin, 1996; Trollope and Women by Margaret Markwick, 1997.

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Anthony Trollope is not regarded as a great short story writer, and since he wrote 47 substantial novels his output of shorter fiction is often ignored. He did, however, produce 42 short stories that have usefully been divided, in an edition of his works, into five categories.

The first category is called "Editors and Writers." Trollope was of course a writer all his life, and between 1867 and 1870 he was editor of the St. Paul's Magazine. This gave rise to eight stories, of which "The Spotted Dog" is the longest, best, and best known, concerning the struggles of authorship and the trials of editorship. A persuasive account is given, in the Grub Street mode, of those who turn to their pens as a last resort in a financially desperate situation and of the difficulties an editor faces in trying to get rid of such importunate people.

The second category, which also numbers eight items, is that of Christmas stories. These were a highly popular genre in mid-Victorian times, and Trollope, although he professed dislike of the clichés involved, managed to turn out some respectable examples. The happy ending required evidently went somewhat against the grain (in his best fiction Trollope sees life as too complex for simple resolutions), but in these tales of hitches in young love being smoothed out by goodwill and Christmas cheer, he manages to put forward his most optimistic side. Again, typically for Trollope whose forte was the extended narrative, the longest story is the best: "Two Heroines of Plumplington" is a simple tale of paternal objection to the suitors of two young women; love triumphs in the end quite predictably, so we are forced to see that the interest in the story centers around character portrayal and handling of dramatic scene rather than around the plot.

In the third category are the ten stories based on Trollope's extensive travels round the world. In these we see a grimmer world than in the English Christmas scenes but also a world of immense vigor and some comic potential. Whether in the Middle East, Jamaica, or Belgium, Trollope's English abroad are empire-builders and tourists of the middling sort whose exploits are more likely to concern marriage, meals, and getting value for money out of the natives than anything more elevated or political. As with the stories of editors and writers we have here a strong strain of pleasant autobiography, but there is also a bleaker dimension, for the mid-Victorian travelers and colonialists risked their lives to a degree almost unimaginable in the late twentieth century. Students of the British imperial period would do well to read "Returning Home" or "George Walker at Suez."

The fourth category comprises eight stories about travel and foreigners, less about Empire and tourism than about the quirks and coincidences of daily life. Mostly set in Europe, they foreshadow some of E. M. Forster's preoccupations with the meaning of the English experience of the continent. Confrontations between the different cultures inevitably generate tensions that make worse the small but infuriating problems that beset Trollopian characters. "The Journey to Panama" is a superb example of realism in which the everyday, in the close confines of a ship, becomes almost intolerable for one whose major preoccupation, love, is going wrong.

The eight stories in the fifth category (called "Courtship and Marriage") are closer to Trollope's more usual territory; as in his novels he is concerned here with the whole complex social and personal comedy of human pairing. "Alice Dugdale" could be read as a miniature version of a number of his novels, and "The Parson's Daughter of Oxney Colne" is as good a short story as many by Hardy or other recognized masters of the genre.

Trollope's stories are always entertaining if sometimes slightly predictable. They do not conform to our usual expectations of the genre, however, in that they are not neat or pithy or cryptic or rounded off with a piquant twist, Trollope being incapable of writing except at length. Instead they are somewhat inconclusive slices of life wrapped up rather faster than the author would evidently have liked. But Trollope's greatest strength was his ability to bring characters together and allow us to watch them interacting. This he does in every story he wrote, immediately and vigorously.

These stories offer unusually frank insights into aspects of Victorian society; most of them were written in the 1860s, and they could usefully be set alongside the paintings of the period. We find sentimentality in them ("Mary Gresley") and a certain preoccupation with Christian themes (charity in "The Widow's Mite"), but for the most part they help to make the Victorians more normal to us.

—Lance St. John Butler