Trollope at age 40
A Syllabus
For a Study Group at the Oscher LifeLong Learning Institute at American University
Day: Nine Wednesday afternoons over 10 weeks, 1 to 2:50 am, Temple Baptist Church
Dates: Classes start Oct 1st; last day Dec 10th.
Dr Ellen Moody
Description of Course
This study group will read will four of Trollope’s novels: An Eye for an Eye (written 1870), Nina Balatka (written 1865), Phineas Finn, (written 1866) and Lady Anna (written 1871), a group of short stories spanning Trollope’s career, one of which is the Barsetshire type. We will see that Barsetshire is but one phase of Trollope’s career: he began as an Anglo-Irish novelist, saw himself as exploring the political and social life of Great Britain as well as those countries across the globe connected to or affected by British customs and people. We will see him as a man making a career of writing among men and women making careers out of other professions and marriage. We’ll be reading passionate romances centered on ethnic and class conflict, colonialism, his foreign travel and ironic comedies about the way the world works, parliamentary life and interactions between law and reality. His characters encompass the fabulously rich and the abysmally impoverished. The class will also watch select excerpts from Simon Raven’s 1974 Pallisers, a mini-series which mirrors the ways Trollope is often read, and if possible Henry Herbert’s 1973 Malachi’s Cove, a cinematic adaptation of one of Trollope’s finest short stories, set in Cornwall.
Texts. Students are asked to bring a copy of the novel or stories we are discussing for the week to class.
Trollope, Anthony. The Complete Shorter Fiction, ed. Julian Thompson. NY: Carroll and Graf, 1992. ISBN: 0786700211. ———————–. An Eye for an Eye, ed. John Sutherland. NY: Oxford UP, 1992. ISBN 0192829106 It’s available in a Penguin and on-line http://www.gutenberg.org/files/16804/16804-h/16804-h.htm ———————. Nina Balatka, ed. Robert Tracy NY: Oxford UP, 1991. ISBN 0192827235. It is available as Classic Reprint, and Folio Society. Any of the 3. ———————-. Phineas Finn, ed. Jacques Berthoud. NY: Oxford, 1982. ISBN 0192815873 There are many editions and it’s on-line. http://web.archive.org/web/20080829221818/http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/TroFinn.html .Any edition will do. ———————-. Lady Anna, ed. Stephen Orgel NY: Oxford, 1990. ISBN 0192821342. It is available in a Dover edition and on line: http://web.archive.org/web/20081201213913/http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/TroAnna.html Any of the 3.
Format: Study group meetings will be a mix of informal lecture and group discussion.
October 1st: Introduction: Trollope, life, career, attitudes towards; An Eye for an Eye
October 8th: Class cancelled (for a conference I must go to)
October 15th. Nina Balatka and “La Mere Bauche,” “Ride Across Palestine.”
October 22nd. “Returning Home,” “Aaron Trowe,” “Parsons Daughter at Oxney Colne”
October 29th Phineas Finn
November 5th Phineas Finn
November 12th Phineas Finn and 5 clips from Phineas Finn portions of 1974-75 The Pallisers mini-series
November 19th Phineas Finn, “The Spotted Dog” and “Why Frau Frohman Raised her Prices”
November 26th: Day before Thanksgiving, no class held
December 3rd: Lady Anna (Chs 1-24, Installments 1-6)) and “Malachi’s Cove”
December 10th: Lady Anna (Chs 25-48, Installments 7-12) and “Christmas at Thompson Hall”
Further on-line materials: Ellen’s website Anthony Trollope: British Novelist: Essays on Trollope’s fiction and travel books; bibliographies; group readings Trollope in the Magazines: the original and recent illustrations to his novels; his non-fiction articles Commentaries and summaries on the Pallisers and other films adapted from Trollope: mostly blogs Ellen and Jim have a blog, two, under category Trollope, blogs on Trollope and his writing
“Malachi’s Cove” is based on a real cover and dangerous high cliffs in Cornwall near the famous Lizard Peninsula: Halzephron Cove: here’s a YouTube of a man on holiday experiencing it:
Ellen
Ellen And Jim Have A Blog, Two 
Reblogged this on the trollope jupiter and commented:
Looks interesting…
Thank you for reblogging the syllabus. Ellen
I love Trollope and wish I could take your course, but it is geographically impossible.
Thank you for saying that. I’ll probably be making a blog or so now and then about the class or its content. How lucky we can connect this way at any rate.
Well, I’d take the course like a shot. It’s a pity about the Atlantic Ocean being a barrier.
I aim to read most of the books you are studying. I’ve spent an enjoyable hour wandering around your Trollope writings and Tyler’s review. Thanks for livening up my afternoon.
On the 3rd week of the course, the important topic of manliness in Trollope was brought up: I’ve written a paper and it’s been put on the Victorian Web called Trollope’s Comfort Romances for Men: Heterosexual Male Heroism in Trollope’s novels.
http://www.jimandellen.org/trollope/comfortromance.html
Here’s my argument:
In many Victorian texts, successful manliness is equated with “courage, resolution, and tenacity,” “the repression of the self,” “financial independence,” and doing useful work. In Trollope’s novels, however, the use of the term “manliness” and all its cognates usually refers to a more narrowly-conceived social behavior. When the young Trollope had insufficient “juvenile manhood,” he was not able to exercise a self-government sufficient to hide his social predicament and to maintain the respect of others. It is important to be emphasize Trollope is making a case against conventional norms. The character who is ugly, awkward, dressed wrongly, relatively poor, and even not quite a gentleman is frequently presented as nonetheless admirably manly. Trollope repeatedly dramatizes stories which reveal that when a woman chooses a partner based on how well he enacts conventional social norms for heterosexual male sexuality, she courts emotional disaster
And in Phineas Finn as we shall see Violet is extremely reluctant to marry Lord Chiltern because he does enact a number of conventional norms and does not enact some of those she and Lord Brentford most value: self-control is one, doing useful work in the world another.
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