Who Was Anthony Trollope?
Anthony Trollope (1815-82) is another Victorian novelist who just missed greatness. The son of a barrister, he was born in London, educated at Harrow and Winchester, and obtained an appointment in the Post Office. After an unpromising start he rapidly improved, and rose high in the service.
A prolific novelist, Trollope began his career with Irish tales such as The Kellys and The O’Kellys (1848), which had little success, and then produced the Barsetshire novels on which his fame rests. This series, in which many of the same characters appear in several novels, deals with life in the imaginary country of Barsetshire and particularly in its ecclesiastical centre, Barchester. It began with The Warden (1855); then came Barchester Towers (1857), Doctor Thorne (1858), Framley Parsonage (1861), The Small House at Allington (1864), and finally The Last Chronicle of Barset (1866-67). Later Trollope turned to the political novel in the manner of Disraeli, but without the latter’s political insight. Among his works in this kind were Phineas Finn (1869) and Phineas Redux (1874). One of his most interesting books is An Autobiography (1883).
Trollope is the novelist of the middle and upper-middle classes. With urbane familiarity and shrewd observation, he presents an accurate, detailed picture of their quiet, uneventful lives in a matter-of-fact way which gives his works the appearance of chronicles of real life. His main concern is with character rather than plot, but his characters, though clearly visualized and described in great detail, lack depth, and Trollope never handles the profounder passions. The framework of his novel is a series of parallel stories moving with the leisureliness of everyday life. His style, efficiently direct, simple, and lucid, is seen to particular advantage in his dialogue. A vein of easy satire runs through many of his novels, and he makes skilful use of pathos. Within limited scope he is a careful craftsman whose works retain their popularity.
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