ANTHONY TROLLOPE.
The name of Trollope was as familiar to the last generation of readers as it is to the present. Mrs. Fanny Trollope—she married in 1809 Anthony Trollope, barrister-at-law—having lost her husband, applied herself to literature. In 1832, the year of the Reform Bill in England, she published her first book. It was about the United States, where she had lived for some time, and was called 'Domestic Life of the Americans.'
In England, it was read and enjoyed. In the States, the people did not like it—they did not appear to advantage in the book; but it made the reputation of the lady who had written it; and Mrs. Fanny Trollope continued to apply herself to the manufacture of interesting and clever books, her chef-d'œuvre being 'The Widow Barnaby.' The authoress died at Florence in 1863; and in the outskirts of that city her eldest son, Thomas Adolphus Trollope, has made his home.
Her second son, the subject of this notice, has made England his home, and the English people his study.
Anthony Trollope seems to have 'thrown back' one generation. His grandfather was a parson; and it is in delineating the phases of clerical life, from the bishop to the curate, that this popular writer excels. Bishop Proudie, Archdeacon Grantley, the Rev. Obadiah Slope, Mr. Crawley of Hogglestock, are creations of his genius that have their originals in life. They are photographic portraits of men his readers know: nature clothed with the form of art: and from this exquisite truthfulness they derive their interest.
The conversations of the characters in his books are exactly the dialogues one hears in everyday life. One man turns to Trollope for his recreation, because 'it is exactly like life, you know.' Another man says: 'When I pick up a novel, I want to be taken above everyday life. I want the ideal. I don't find this in Trollope.' And so he does not read Trollope's
