Thackeray

Trollope, Anthony, 1815-1882Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.8

Word count: 362K words
Chapters: 37

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Thackeray by Anthony TrollopeAuthor: Trollope, Anthony, 1815-1882,Language: English, Class: PR: Language and Literatures: English literature, Release Date: Jun 21, 2006

Editor's review

This is Anthony Trollope's critical biography of his contemporary, the novelist Thackeray—a work in which one writer assesses another. Trollope was both a prolific novelist and a longtime observer of the literary world; from the perspective of a fellow novelist, he traces the arc of Thackeray's writing and the qualities of his works. The commentary offers appreciation of individual books as well as reflections on the art of fiction and the function of social satire. Rather than relying on curious anecdotes, the book sketches the portrait of a satirical writer in a plain, restrained style, giving readers a representative example of nineteenth-century English literary criticism. For readers familiar with works such as Vanity Fair, it offers a close reading by a contemporary; for scholars studying Victorian literary criticism and the relationships among writers, it is a valuable primary source. The Project Gutenberg electronic edition is easy to search, making it suitable for consulting specific chapters with particular questions in mind.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Literary readers who have read Thackeray and want a contemporary’s assessment
Students of Victorian literary criticism and writer relationships
Readers interested in Trollope’s nonfiction writing
English majors who want to build a store of English literary criticism texts

Not a good fit for

Readers completely new to Thackeray and his works, without background knowledge
Readers expecting a systematic biographical life narrative or gossipy anecdotes
General readers who find English reading difficult and want light stories

Reading tips

Read a major Thackeray work before this book; the critical discussion will then be easier to follow.
Use a chronology of Thackeray’s works and read the chapters alongside the corresponding stages of his career.
Distinguish Trollope’s personal judgments from scholarly consensus and read critically.
Excerpt passages of criticism as reference models for writing about English literature.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book a biography of Thackeray?

It is closer to a critical biography, focusing on assessing Thackeray's works and the characteristics of his writing rather than laying out his life in detail. Readers should not approach it expecting a full biography.

Can I understand it without having read Thackeray?

You can read it, but your understanding will be reduced. Much of the commentary addresses specific works; if you first read representative novels such as Vanity Fair and then return to Trollope's judgments, the payoff will be more concrete.

What was the relationship between the author and his subject?

Trollope and Thackeray were both nineteenth-century English novelists, contemporaries and fellow professionals. The book therefore carries the perspective of one novelist observing another, and Trollope's own literary tastes are visible in the commentary.

Comments

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About the author

Trollope, Anthony, 1815-1882 Author

Anthony Trollope (1815–1882) was a prolific English novelist of the Victorian era, with 83 works held in this collection. He is best known for the Barsetshire novels, including The Last Chronicle of Barset, Barchester Towers, and Framley Parsonage, which are set in a fictional English county and portray the daily life, social manners, and power struggles of the clergy and gentry. Other major works, such as The Way We Live Now, The Prime Minister, Orley Farm, and Can You Forgive Her?, turn to politics, business, and marriage, revealing with careful restraint and gentle irony the tension between social convention and personal ambition. Public information is limited, yet his plain narrative style, large casts of clearly drawn characters, and depiction of Victorian social structure retain lasting value for readers.