TROLLOPE, Anthony

"Three hours a day will produce as much as a man ought to write"

Born into a family of precarious finances, Trollope’s early life was one of social awkwardness and frequent impoverishment.  After a somewhat peripatetic school career he found employment with the General Post Office, the salary for which did not improve his comparative poverty.  However in 1841 he was transferred to Banagher, Ireland, as a deputy postal surveyor, a move which was to mark a considerable change in both his fortunes and his attitudes.  He became less socially maladroit, got married and joined the local hunt but it was during the long train journeys he took around Ireland as part of his surveying duties, that he started to write.  He wrote in an ordered and deliberate manner about politicians, the clergy and family life, of love, greed and corruption. “Every day for years, Trollope woke in darkness and wrote from 5:30 a.m. to 8:30 a.m., with his watch in front of him.” In this manner he produced forty-nine novels in thirty-five years. His most well known series of novels include The Barsetshire Chronicles and The Pallisers.

In 1859 Trollope moved back to London, resigning from the civil service in 1867 and unsuccessfully standing as a Liberal parliamentary candidate in 1868.  After his political failure he spent the remainder of his life concentrating entirely on his literary endeavors.

Trollope’s work can probably be summed up by Nathaniel Hawthorne when he wrote to his publisher in 1860 "Have you ever read the novels of Anthony Trollope? They precisely suit my taste; solid, substantial, written on strength of beef and through inspiration of ale”

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