Victorians! discussion

The Way We Live Now
By Anthony Trollope

Ch. 1-10 (Aug 20-26)
In this section we are introduced to many characters and their families. Most notably, the Carburys, the Melmottes, and the Longstaffes. We are also introduced to a business scheme, and a gaming club.

1. What do you make of Lady Carbury based on her letters? How does this implicate certain practices in the publishing business?
2. Do you foresee any romantic embroilments based on these chapters? Are you rooting for any pairings in particular?
3. What do you make of the Melmottes and their place in society?
4. What are your suspicions about The Great Vera Cruz Railway?
5. Which character is your favorite so far and why? Which is your least favorite and why?

4. What are your suspicions about The Great Vera Cruz Railway?

I need not have suspicions, because the author says clearly that it is a fraudulent scheme. Trollope hints at quite a lot of things to come, I think: my impression is that he intentionally takes suspense out of the plot - this is not what he is aiming at.

5. Which character is your favorite so far and why? Which is your least favorite and why?

So far, I don’t like any of the characters … the Carbury family plus Paul appear weak. Melmotte and Fisker at least know what they want. Roger Carbury is stiff and old-fashioned, a bit of a monomaniac. Felix is drawn in solid dark colours, I don’t expect character development in him. Lady Carbury is the most colourful character so far, but the colours aren’t very nice. I hope for some growth in the two young girls - Marie and Hetta: maybe they will start to think for themselves.

Trollope's writing just pulls me on and into the story. Often in novels, it is one character with whom one bonds, for whom one fears and hopes, who pulls me along. It is not so here, at least for me. Maybe it is the impression that all characters are deeply entangled in their different games and the curiosity how - or if - they will disentangle themselves.

Entangled and disentangled are great descriptors for the story so far. There is a clear sense of something dangerous being woven before our eyes.

I, too, feel pulled along by curiosity rather than investment in any one character. (Although, I have some hopes for Roger Carbury.)

Renee wrote: "There is a clear sense of something dangerous being woven before our eyes ."

very well put ... and very cleverly done by Trollope, isn't it? He is a master in gripping the reader's attention. We will see whether he can hold us in his grip over the 90 chapters to come.

You think by this time in his career Trollope was fed up with editors and publishers and their ways ? In the first few pages there are two whose judgment and reviews are contaminated by lust and bribery !

I'm already wondering if this conversation isn't the heart of the story and moral (Roger & Hetta):

" ... are the Melmottes people with whom you would wish to be connected ?"

"I don't know."

"I should be sorry to think that you should ... be seen at the Melmotte's."

"I think ... mama will take care that I am not taken where I ought not to be taken."

"I wish you to have some opinion of your own as to what is proper for you ... I am old-fashioned, Hetta."

"And we belong to a newer and worse sort of world."

The age-old topic of whether our world is going to the dogs in the name of "social progress".

We are introduced to a lot of characters in these first ten paragraphs and as Sabagrey says so well, none of them grab me as being worth rooting for so far. Maybe they are all potential victims of an unscrupulous world in one way or another, revealing to me that nothing much has changed since then.

I have enjoyed Trollope’s depiction of the feckless young aristocrats and their hangers on. The lounge lizard Sir Felix seems slightly over the top even for me in the way he treats his mother and couldn’t care less about anything or anyone but himself.



“Just so, mother; — but how about the twenty pounds?”

I can understand why Sir Felix turned out as he did. He inherited his mother’s slyness and skills of truth distortion (but not her intelligence) and his father’s penchant for moral reprehensibility.

Sir Felix seems like he could provide the most enjoyment for me but I will be laughing at him rather than bursting a blood vessel in the style of Roger Carbury.

Roger Carbury might be a stiff old bore but at least he seems to be the voice of reason in a world that’s going mad. He has the guts to tackle difficult issues and provide some blunt honesty when most of the other characters are trying to hide what they really mean and/or feel.

To describe Paul Montague as ‘weak’ is almost an insult to a wet lettuce. He has some sort of excuse every time he gives in, which seems to be every time the person he is talking to opens his/her mouth. The only thing he does stick at is his love for Hetta.

Poor Hetta, stuck in the middle of it all. Being financially ruined by her brother and pursued by a ponderous old walrus and a dithering kipper. I really hope someone better comes along for her.

Trev wrote: "Sir Felix seems like he could provide the most enjoyment for me but I will be laughing at him rather than bursting a blood vessel in the style of Roger Carbury."

My problem is that I react to reading about gambling with nausea - real, physical. - I really don't know why: there's no history of gambling with neither friends nor family, nor me. It' just disgusting as an idea. - and I'm afraid there will come much more talk of gambling - and speculation, which is basically the same thing - in this book. I hope that I can keep my mental distance, and that Trollope has some remedies on offer (justice? redemption? - there are limits to my sense of the satirical in this case; I may have a Roger-Carbury-gene myself)

To describe Paul Montague as ‘weak’ is almost an insult to a wet lettuce.

LOL. I love this expression and will memorise it! But Hetta is not much better than a 'wet lettuce' herself at this stage, as far as we know anything about her - which is not much. It is beyond me at this stage why *anyone* should be in love with her.

I love the way Trollope just throws us right into the story with all these well-developed characters. I also have no real favorite character, although Roger Carbury might grow on me if he can loosen up a bit. There is definitely disaster looming with the fraudulent Vera Cruz railroad, and although I liked Paul Montague at first, his inability to stand up to his partners dooms him in my eyes. Being the great Dickens fan that I am, I keep wondering what he would have done with this story. He and Trollope had an uneasy relationship and such different styles, but I suspect the subject matter would have been interesting to him also.

Nancy-
If you haven’t yet read Dickens’s Little Dorrit, you may want to move it up on your TBR list. I find myself constantly thinking about the second half of that novel as I read this one.

Thanks, Rene. I’ve read Little Dorrit, but it was years ago. I’ll move it up in my To-Be-Reread list.

Nancy wrote: "Being the great Dickens fan that I am, I keep wondering what he would have done with this story. He and Trollope had an uneasy relationship and such different styles, but I suspect the subject matter would have been interesting to him also."

I like most of Trollope's novels that I have read so far, and I have problems with Dickens. Just recently, I failed to finish Little Dorrit. It just did not hold my interest. I won't say that Trollope is 'better', but for me his characters, and his style, are more modern, more familiar.

I thought of you when I made my comments, Sabagrey. They are indeed very different, but I enjoy them both.

Nancy wrote: "I thought of you when I made my comments, Sabagrey. They are indeed very different, but I enjoy them both."

Hetta, so far, appears to me to be a very Dickensian character - which is not a compliment when it comes to young females: some colourless bag of unspecified virtues, invariably including unquestioning devotion to an undeserving parent.

Trev wrote: "We are introduced to a lot of characters in these first ten paragraphs and as Sabagrey says so well, none of them grab me as being worth rooting for so far. Maybe they are all potential victims of ..."

This drawing of the lounging Felix is perfect!!

sabagrey wrote: "Nancy wrote: "I thought of you when I made my comments, Sabagrey. They are indeed very different, but I enjoy them both."

Hetta, so far, appears to me to be a very Dickensian character - which is ..."

At least Trollope gives us some explanation for her Dickensian torpor…

“Henrietta had been taught by the conduct of both father and mother that every vice might be forgiven in a man and in a son, though every virtue was expected from a woman, and especially from a daughter. The lesson had come to her so early in life that she had learned it without the feeling of any grievance. She lamented her brother’s evil conduct as it affected him, but she pardoned it altogether as it affected herself. That all her interests in life should be made subservient to him was natural to her; and when she found that her little comforts were discontinued, and her moderate expenses curtailed because he, having eaten up all that was his own, was now eating up also all that was his mother’s, she never complained. Henrietta had been taught to think that men in that rank of life in which she had been born always did eat up everything.”

I like that he calls out the double standard in which she was raised.

For me, I am liking the premise and cast of characters thus far. While none of them are particularly admirable, I see lots of room for character development as Trollope throws all sorts of issues and obstacles in their way.

I think the three women have the most potential, actually. Lady Carbury is interesting--given my penchant for chocolate, I keep on wanting the family name to be Cadbury and I have to remind myself that it is not time for dessert. Anyway, she was married young and widowed young and instead of just finding another husband, she is trying to get an income and life for herself. I find that admirable and more power to her as she uses every trick she can to promote her work. The narrator says she works hard at her writing and I believe him. Her weakness is that scoundrel Felix, but every good character needs a weakness.

Marie is also promising -- I predict she marries and regrets it mightily and figures out what to do about it.

Hetta does seem to be a Dickensian heroine--loyal to a fault, but maybe she has hidden layers of spunk.

I also think Paul is a promising character. Yes, he is a bit of a wet rag, but he is young and easily bamboozled, but I think he has the capacity to learn and he knows what he wants.

I think Fisker is portrayed very stereotypically American of the time. Brash, loud, flashy, etc.

The whole railroad scheme is abhorrent but typical of the time. Not unlike the IOUs that the Beargarden boys use to prop up their extravagances.

I think we've got a marvelous story in front of us, and I'm eager to see how it unfolds.

Lol. Yes, Fisker is the stereotypical ugly American. He is unattractive on many levels.

Renee wrote: "At least Trollope gives us some explanation for her Dickensian torpor… .."

For anyone above 14 to accept and to think what one has been taught to accept and think IS the Dickensian torpor, not its explanation.

The woman was false from head to foot, but there was much of good in her, false though she was.

Although I have some sympathy for Lady Carbury, particularly in respect of her previous existence with her now dead husband, I cannot overlook her serious weakness in respect of her son.

’ Even during the career of his folly she had hardly ventured to say a word to him with the purport of stopping him on his road to ruin.  In everything she had spoilt him as a boy, and in everything she still spoilt him as a man.  She was almost proud of his vices, and had taken delight in hearing of doings which if not vicious of themselves had been ruinous from their extravagance. ‘

It is one thing being false to editors and the like, even stooping to coquettishness it seems, but being false with those in her own family who wish to help her is, I think, unforgivable.

’ In all these troubles she constantly appealed to Roger Carbury for advice,—which, however, she never followed. 

The lady herself might say it is because she loves Sir Felix but would any mother who really loves her son be able to bear the cruel disrespect her shows her? If it only affected him, perhaps she could, but in dragging her and his sister down, Lady Carbury is displaying an unjust favouritism, even if she does have to exist in a patriarchal society.

’ It is not that he will not obey me.  A mother perhaps should not expect obedience from a grown-up son.  But my word is nothing to him.  He has no respect for me.  He would as soon do what is wrong before me as before the merest stranger."

I don’t think it is in her to be ‘cruel’ to be kind, but time will tell. In the meantime her miserable, false life will continue.

The Beargarden appears to me to be like the Railroad Scheme on a small scale. The young men play for money, only not for real money, but I.O.U.s, and everyone knows that there is no real money behind them - they just exchange slips of paper like Monopoly banknotes.

In earlier times, gambling debts were 'debts of honour' - a gentleman may owe money to his tailor or barber who were 'only' commoners, but what he lost to other gentlemen at the card table had to be paid. The gambling at the Beargarden then is one of the symptoms of the moral decadence that Trollope alludes to with the title of the novel.

sabagrey wrote: "The Beargarden appears to me to be like the Railroad Scheme on a small scale. The young men play for money, only not for real money, but I.O.U.s, and everyone knows that there is no real money behi..."

The Beargarden also appears in The Duke's Children,one of Trollope’s Palliser novels. On the Trollope society website, the contextual notes for that novel provides some interesting background for The Beargarden and for clubs in general. For example it is thought that Trollope based the club on the ‘Savage’ club, a club that still operates today.

Here are a few relevant extracts from the notes…….

’ In his many descriptions of London, Trollope mentions a number of actual Clubs, some of which he was a member of himself. In other cases real clubs are given fictitious names while others are created totally out of Trollope’s fertile imagination. In The Duke’s Children, The Beargarden re-appears having already been introduced in The Way We Live Now. Thought to be based on the Savage Club, early descriptions tend to suggest that it usually provides a corrupting influence on its young members………..

……..’ Founded in 1857, Savage Club Members addressed each other as Brother Savage and the establishment had the reputation for being the leading Bohemian Gentlemen’s Club in London. The Beargarden employed the familiar blackballing process for deciding whether or not to accept any new member. Each existing member could cast a black or a white ball to indicate rejection or acceptance and there was no appeal.’……..

…………’ Clubs could become venues for betting for high stakes where, failure to quickly settle ones debts could be immediate grounds for exclusion. In real establishments such as Brooks’s and Whites it was not uncommon for sums of around £3,000 to be lost on the throw of the dice, the probability of a change in the weather or the outcome of almost any trivial occurrence that could not be guaranteed or accurately calculated. This was at a time when the annual salary of a servant might not exceed £10 a year and £3,000 could comfortably purchase a large estate.…….’

The webpage for the contextual notes can be found at the link below, but there are minor spoilers throughout the article if you have not read ‘The Duke’s Children.’

https://trollopesociety.org/works/duk...

I have also started this novel now and just finished this section and I must say what a difference to Mary Barton this is. Thinking of the poorest and then seeing how these gentlemen are just throwing their money (almost literally) out of the window is to me hard to bear.

Similar to some of you I have not found anyone so far to whom I could warm up. I respect Lady Carbury (and Jane, I also have to think of Cadbury chocolates all the time 😂) for having tried to build up an independent life, but I think I would be devastated / frustrated/ desperate with a son like Felix instead of adoring him as she seems to do.

So my hopes are also in Roger Carbury, and Paul has possibilities for a positive development.
Hetta is definitely a “Victorian girl”. Let us see what will become of her.

You mentioned Dickens and Little Dorrit. I was actually more thinking of Martin Chuzzlewit which contains this fraudulent insurance scheme, very rough Americans and the dream to make your fortune there, and a lot of not particularly lovable characters.

The gambling topic does not make me physically sick (I am sorry if you have to feel like that), but rather makes me angry or irritated.I always have that, but especially with characters I rather enjoy and like. This whole club of gentlemen makes me feel frustrated with human mankind. As I only finished Mary Barton last week, this contrast is so huge.

Just one further thought…
Might not Roger Carbury be a little like Colonel Brandon in Sense and Sensibility? In love with a young girl, who in her turn is devoted to a young man who disappoints her, so that she in the end realizes what she has in that older man…but this is all speculation for a possible plot ☺️

I can absolutely sympathize with your culture shock, Heidi. It is very hard to go from one slice of society to another. The contrast IS huge. And, although, I think Trollope is describing the behaviors and attitudes within the club towards a point, Trev has pointed out that his fictional Beargarten is based on an existing club.

I love the idea of Rodger Carbury as a Colonel Brandon!