Can You Forgive Her?

I am so pleased to say that I have finally discovered why so many readers love Anthony Trollope. In fact, if it isn’t wrong to say so after reading just the one book, I am now one of them. I’d picked up one or two books over the years and they hadn’t quite worked. It wasn’t that I didn’t like them but I didn’t love them, they weren’t the right books; I had to find the right place to start, the right book at the right time at the right time, and this book was that book.

I found that I loved the way Trollope wrote, taking such trouble to introduce his characters, making me understand why he was telling their story and guiding me so carefully through it, being present without ever being intrusive.

He cared, and he made me show more care.

The ‘Her’ of the title is Alice Vavasor. She was engaged to Mr John Grey, who was wise, thoughtful, wealthy and handsome. He was genuinely good man, and a very fine catch. But Alice had doubts. It wasn’t that she didn’t love him; her doubts were about the life they would live together, a life that she feared she would find dreadfully dull.

Kate Vasnovour, Alice’s cousin and dearest friend, hoped that Alice would marry her brother, George. They had been engaged, George and Alice, but Alice had broken off the engagement, on account of something that George did. But Kate continued to promote the match, because she loved George, she loved Alice, and she was quite sure that they would be happy.

Alice did break her engagement to Mr Grey. She thought she was doing the right thing, that she should honour her earlier engagement, but her family were appalled.

Kate thought it wise to go away for a little while, and so she went to stay with her Aunt Greenow, in the country. Mrs Greenhow had married an very elderly, very wealthy husband, and he had died shortly afterwards, leaving her a young, wealthy and very eligible widow. Two vey different men were rivals for her hand: Mr Cheesacre, a portly but prosperous farmer, eager to show what a fine husband he would make; and Captain Bellfield, a handsome, poor, unemployed soldier, who was maybe playing things a little more cleverly. Mrs Greenhow was having a lovely time, enjoying the trappings of a grieving widow, and loving being the centre of attention.

That was the light relief, and it was wonderfully entertaining.

George proposed to Alice and, though she was still worried that she had behaved badly to Mr Grey, she accepted. Because she had decided that the best thing she could do was to try to curb George’s worst excesses, try to help him to make something of his life. George’s wanted to get into parliament, but he lacked the necessary means; Alice did have the means and she promised that she would use her fortune to support his political career. She kept her promise, but success brought out the worst in George. Alice soon realised that she had made a terrible mistake, but she wanted to do the right thing she wanted to keep her promises.

Alice retreated to the country, to stay with another cousin, Lady Glencora Palliser. Glencora was the richest heiress in England, she was young, she was pretty, she was vivacious, and she was the new wife of Plantagenet Palliser, one of the most promising young politicians in the country. But she wasn’t happy. Her family had steered her very firmly her away from the handsome, charming and dissolute Burgo Fitzgerald, and towards an eminently suitable marriage. But Glencora found Plantagenet stiff and boring, and he seemed to find her frivolous and silly. She told herself that she was still in love with Burgo, and she dreamed of running away with him.

Trollope brings together these stories, stories of three very different women, beautifully. Their situations have similarities and they have differences, and they all have to make decisions about the future, about which path they will take; decisions made difficult by conflicts between family duty, social acceptance, personal principles and their own happiness.

He managed every element of the plot, he attended to every detail. My only, minor, criticism would be that there were moments when he overplayed the comedy.

It was fascinating to watch the characters become clearer, as I spent more time with them and as circumstances showed different sides of them. The story grew, it became deeper, and I was pulled further and further in.

I loved the contrasts: the comic relief against the serious drama; the steady Alice against the high-spirited Glencora; the good men, Mr Grey and Palliser against the bad men, George Vasnavour and Burgo Fitzgerald. And though I use the words ‘good’ and ‘bad’ because I can’t find better adjectives, but Trollope was much more subtle that that; all four men were fallible human beings, with different strengths and weaknesses.

And I could forgive Alice; though I didn’t feel it was my place to judge her, because she was simply a young woman without a mother to guide her, and she tried to do the right thing but she struggled to know what the right thing was.

I was involved. I cared. Sometimes I knew what would happen, but often I was surprised. I felt so many emotions. And I knew that I would miss this world and these people when the story was over.

There were country houses, there were London streets, their were foreign tours, there was a disputed will, and in the end there would be marriage ….

And Trollope breathed life into it all, into every single thing in this book.

It’s a big book but it didn’t feel like a big book, and I’m already reading another big book, the next book in the series. show less

2011, Blackstone Audiobooks, Read by Simon Vance

“What's a woman to do?” (Ch 6)

Indeed! Trollope introduces a delightful cast of women in Can You Forgive Her, all of whom have their own ideas as to the age-old dilemma. Heroine Alice Vavasor cannot make up her mind at all as to what a woman should do. Twice engaged to her cousin George Vavasor, and twice engaged to John Grey, she eventually marries. But she could not possibly have made the decision more complicated. Kate Vavasor, cousin to Alice, is firmly of the mind that her role is to manage the affairs of others, in particular those of her cousin and her loathsome brother, George. Unfortunately for all concerned, Kate seems not qualified to manage her own affairs, never mind those show more of others. Lady Glencora Palliser, also cousin to Alice a wealthy heiress, does what a woman in her position was expected to do: marry a title and yet more wealth. Alas, she is in love not with her husband, Plantaganet Palliser, but with the worthless Burgo Fitzgerald. And Arabella Greenow, Alice’s aunt and an impressively forward thinker, determines that a woman’s best course of action is to marry young to a wealthy old man, wait out the “old,” secure the “wealthy,” and then enjoy the luxury of doing precisely as she pleases!

“Her marriage for money had been altogether successful. The nursing of old Greenow had not been very disagreeable to her, nor had it taken longer than she had anticipated. She had now got all the reward that she had ever promised herself, and she really did feel grateful to his memory. I almost think that among those plentiful tears some few drops belonged to sincerity.” (Ch 47)

Trollope’s staple political landscape is inhabited by Plantaganet Palliser, John Grey, and George Vavasor. Palliser, heir to the enormously wealthy Duke of Omnium and wholly preoccupied with politics, aspires to be Chancellor of the Exchequer. Grey, a well-educated gentleman of modest means, seeks the parliamentary seat at Silverbridge. And finally, George Vavasor, a disinherited, despicable, scoundrel, and the perfect foil to both Palliser and Grey, hopes to secure any seat he can, by any means he can.

I adored Can You Forgive Her! Hands down, my favourite character is the charming and irrepressible Lady Glencora. She is Trollope at his absolute finest, and I often could not help but laugh aloud at her spirited chatter. I read the Barsetshire series last year and loved them, but, if Can You Forgive Her is any indication, I’m going to absolutely treasure the Palliser novels! Highly recommended. show less

Anthony Trollope is virtually unknown in Germany; I had never heard of him before I saw him mentioned somewhere as John Major’s favourite author. According to the records of the German National Library, there were no translations before 1957. This is a pity, because he is so much more accessible than other Victorian authors.
His style is less flowery or convoluted than Eliot, Dickens, and their ilk, and his female characters are not at all what I’m used to in Victorian novels. In this particular instance, we have three either contemplating marriage or settling into it: Alice, Glencora and Arabella. The most striking thing for me is that they are pretty clear-eyed, almost resigned about marriage being the least bad option for a woman show more in these days, and trying to make the best of it.
One other thing I noticed is that this is a strictly middle and upper class world: the odd maid-cum-confidante apart, the lower orders are mere decoration. show less

It’s been a year since I finished Anthony Trollope’s Chronicles of Barsetshire, and it was such a joy to return to his depiction of Victorian England in The Pallisers. In Can You Forgive Her?, Trollope shows the good, bad, and ugly of marriage through three different situations. Young Alice Vavasor, egged on by her cousin Kate, breaks off her engagement to John Grey in favor of Kate’s brother George. Lady Glencora “Cora” Palliser was recently forced by her family to break off a relationship with handsome, dashing Burgo Fitzgerald, to marry the prosperous and ambitious Plantagenet Palliser. Her comfortable lifestyle can’t make up for a dull and so far childless relationship. Finally, the widow Arabella Greenow toys with two show more different suitors and provides comic relief in the novel.

Alice’s reputation is sorely damaged, yet she remains oblivious to this and insists on providing financial support to George as he runs for parliament, even though they are not yet married, the sums are significant, and he proves himself to be a cad of the highest order. John Grey, meanwhile, is never far away and continues to have feelings for Alice. Cora finds solace in friendship with Alice as her husband largely ignores her and enlists others to keep Cora in check as he focuses on his work.

In an unusual move for the time, the story is told almost entirely from a female perspective. The women are strong characters with money and opinions of their own. However, Trollope cannot envision a world free from Victorian conventions, so naturally the only successful outcomes involve marriage. Still, I can forgive Trollope for being a product of his time, and I can forgive the eponymous heroines whose actions, both scandalous and annoying, made for a very good story. show less

After a three and a half year hiatus, I’ve returned to Trollope and I am so glad I did. I read the Barsetshire series shortly after joining LT. I don’t think I had even heard of Trollope before becoming active here, but I fell in love with his writing immediately. [Can You Forgive Her?] is the first book in Trollope’s Palliser series. I had a little trepidation about reading the Palliser novels because I have heard that they get a bit bogged down in British politics of the day. This may be a problem for me in subsequent novels in the series, but this one had very little politics, and it was all very easy to comprehend as it mainly had to do with the ambitions of the characters rather than actual political theories or maneuverings. show more

At the heart of the novel is the character Alice Vavasor. She is an otherwise steady and wise young woman having problems deciding on a husband. As the novel opens she is engaged to the smart, handsome, steady, and slightly boring John Grey. In her past, she had a short engagement to her wild and interesting cousin, George Vavasor. His behavior resulted in her breaking off the engagement. George’s sister, Kate, still hopes to reunite her brother and Alice and they go on a trip to Europe together with John Grey’s blessing. Long story short, Alice decides to break off her engagement with John Grey to the horror of all of her relations. The novel explores her subsequent decisions and moral dilemmas and her actions are the reason for the title, [Can You Forgive Her?]. To resolve the novel, the reader waits to see if her friends can forgive her, John Grey can forgive her, the reader can forgive her, and most importantly, can Alice forgive herself?

All of this moralizing and the mood changes of Alice could have gotten old, except that of course Trollope has several other story lines going on. In fact, there are two other love triangles. My favorite character, Lady Glencora, is struggling to reconcile herself to a marriage with rising political star, Plantagenet Palliser. She is still in love with a handsome but penniless man named Burgo Fitzgerald, but her family convinced her to bring her enormous wealth to a more “deserving” husband, Palliser. She and Alice become friends and their lives intertwine. Added to this is the more humorous and light love triangle between Kate and Alice’s older Aunt Greenow. She is recently widowed and wealthy. She has two suitors vying for her hand in marriage.

I love Trollope’s writing. He writes fantastic female characters that are more than just caricatures or love interests. I also absolutely love his authorial commentary. I love knowing what he thinks about the characters he has created and the subtle foreshadowing he does. I’m really excited about continuing the series! show less

It seems that everyone but Alice Vavasor can forgive Alice for waffling over her engagements. (Except for her cousin George, but by the end of the book readers won't care what George thinks about anything!) But can the reader forgive her? Or is it Lady Glencora we're supposed to forgive? Or perhaps even Mrs. Greenow? All three women face similar circumstances. Each must decide which of two men to accept. Will they follow their hearts or their heads? Will they accept or reject advice? Will any choice lead to happiness, or is it just a matter of choosing the lesser of two evils?

I couldn't help comparing Alice to both Anne Elliot in Jane Austen's Persuasion and Lily Dale in Trollope's The Small House at Allington. Both Anne and Alice are show more motherless with fathers who have largely abdicated their parental responsibilities. Anne follows the guidance of a family friend in deciding whether to accept or reject a suitor, while Alice refuses to be guided by any but her own inclinations. Neither course of action works out well for these women. Alice is better suited for Lily Dale's life than is Lily Dale. She has money of her own and would not be a burden to other family members if she chose not to marry.

Aunt Greenow, recently widowed by a much older wealthy husband, provides comic relief. While she is the master of every situation and everyone does her bidding, she manages to make people think it's their idea to do what she wants them to do. The suspense for the reader is not in what might happen, but in how it will unfold.

Lady Glencora is my favorite of the three women. She may not know much about politics, but she understands people and she isn't easily fooled. My affinity for Lady Glencora is probably proof that I wouldn't have been cut out to be a society wife in Victorian England either.

I read this years ago but remembered very little of it. I was probably too young to appreciate it the first time around. Now I'm eagerly looking forward to discovering the pleasures ahead in the remaining books in the Palliser series. show less

I sometimes wonder - not terribly seriously - if the whole academic industry which has formed itself around Trollope has done this as a face saving exercise to justify the time investment for this brilliant, compelling series of novels (I mean the Pallister sequence), which have never gained the same ‘serious’ reputation as Dickens, Balzac, Dostoevsky. And make no mistake, one can testify seriously to the intellectual merits of the books - only those that are going on outdated critical reputation ever seem to argue they are lightweights - but there still seems a bit of view that by reading them one is somehow taking a less virtuous course than even say some of La Comédie humaine, or Les Rougon-Macquart which they most closely show more resemble.
I worried about this sort of thing a lot when younger. But coming to the first book in the series I now positively revel in his narrative genius, authorial voice, acute characterisation and humour. It is a page turner in the best sense of the phrase and even in its roots were in a less than successful play - melodrama would be an accurate description - (just read some of the appalling blank verse from the ‘The Noble Jilt’ quoted by Stephen Wall in his Introduction!) what Trollope eventually did with that material is genuinely inspired. show less