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5.0étoiles sur 5
Like it happened yesterday., Jui 27 2002
This book was my first encounter with the works of Anthony Trollope. While it is not entirely surprising that Trollope's legacy is overshadowed by the ones of contemporaries like Dickens, Austen, Elliot and Thackeray, this book gives such a juicy historic precursor to the Enron and WorldCom scandals, that it deserves a spot on the current bestsellers list.In detailing the rise and fall of the swindler-turned-tycoon Melmotte and the pathetic tendency of the bankrupt gentry to simultaneously woo and despise him, Trollope gives us a satire for the ages. Moreover, the repeated dogma that it's OK to do the wrong thing and have the wrong friends as long as everybody else is doing it, is also right on the money. While Theodore Dreiser took the psychological analysis of the swindler to a whole other level in his "The Financier", Melmotte is still a wonderfully well rounded crook. The second memorable character is lady Carbury. Trollope shaped her and her literary aspirations after his own mother. While I was not too impressed with the exposure of the "literary world" that her character allowed, the lady is a nice archetype of the survivor, who yet is willing to sacrifice everything for her loser son. Apart from these main characters, archetypes, there is a large supporting cast adding themes of love, betrayal, abuse and manipulation. While many of the players provide the context of a society sucking up to Melmotte, the great number of themes and intrigues leads to too much diffusion of the central theme. While characters like Roger Carbury and Ms. Hurtle are well rounded, the resolution of their "issues" is rather lackluster. In his portrayal of the demise of the British gentry after passage of the two reform bills Trollope has drawn parallels with the decline of the roman Empire and includes many a reference to good old Horatius. A lot of the book can be encompassed in the non-included quote: ad spectatum veniunt, veniunt spectantur ut ipse (=they come to the spectacle, (yet) come to be seen themselves). In addition, this book provides one of the best examples that I have encountered, that you can't be doing the wrong thing as long as everybody else is doing it. A good, entertaining and fairly easy read.
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4.0étoiles sur 5
Looking to know Trollope...try elsewhere, Avril 16 2002
... Too many plots, characters not given enough space to breathe, and way too much wrap-up yields a less than satisfying experience. But Trollope is a great writer, and when he's on top, as he is often throughout this book, he is untouchable. The Beargarden is astonishing, and has anyone ever written about so many different wastrels and made them all unique? Georgina and her brother Dolly could make a novel themselves. Poor Marie....desperate to be loved. Very touching stuff.But the main story gets lost under so much weight that the overall novel loses its focus and just stunbles to a number of unconvincing conclusions. My favorite book is He Knew He Was Right. The sub-plots there enhance the story, and the characters are more vivid and less simplistic. If you're here after the PBS series, note please...that series is adapted from this novel. There is a lot missing and a lot changed (all to the worse, I would argue). If you are new to Trollope, I would suggest The Palliser series or HKHWR. This is much less worth the time, though still a sparkling read with brilliant flashes. Anti-Semitism? People are too touchy. The characters are certainly narrow-minded bigots, but Trollope himself is clear and potent. The "old, fat Jew" is among the most noble, most intelligent, and touching characters in Trollope. A gentleman, a sincere man, and one touched by the ugliness of his world but rising majestically above it.
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4.0étoiles sur 5
The Way We Still Live Now, Mars 10 2002
The Enron collapse shows that, as long as we continue to enjoy the benefits of capitalism in the West, Trollope's most famous novel will continue to be timely. This has often been called Trollope's best novel: while it does not contain his best writing (which would be found in individual chapters of PHINEAS FINN and THE LAST CHRONICLER OF BARSET), nor is it his funniest (BARCHESTER TOWERS), it is his most consistently engaging in its details of a railway bubble in mid-Victorian London. The great financier at the center of it, Augustus Melmotte, rises from obscurity to be asked to host a dinner for the visiting emperor of China (which forms a splendid setpiece for the novel) on the eve of his financial ruin. The novel is very exciting and enjoyable, and shows Trollope straining the hardest to meet the standards set by his admitted hero, Thackeray; although this certainly doesn't meet the level of VANITY FAIR, it's still pretty good. There is a bit of a trouble that Trollope has too many subplots going and winds up spending hundreds of pages at the end (long after the work's main action is over) having to resolve them. One of the very best of these ongoing stories, the desperate attempts of the contemptibly snobbish (but still oddly sympathetic) Georgiana Longstaffe to find a husband, is as a result resolved much too suddenly and unsatisfactorily. I would still recommend THE WAY WE LIVE NOW as a fine read--and as a very splendid introduction to Trollope.
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