Trollope Conference

Way back in the heatwave of last July I attended a Conference about Trollope at the University of Exeter. This was a big step for me as social contact is always difficult and I knew that there were only 2 people I knew - from Trollope-l - attending; I say knew but I only knew them through the net prior to the Conference - although I have come to the conclusion that one can get to 'know' someone through the net just as much , if not more than, in physical space. Neither of those people - Ellen and Clare - was to be resident. But I found the whole experience a great pleasure. Meeting Ellen and Clare was a highlight, but all the people I talked to were kind and pleasant and delightful. It was an odd experience in that the majority of those attending were women, the majority were American and the majority were academics - I think I was in a minority of one as an English, non-academic male! (which is probably a salutary experience). I have no doubt that there was networking going on but I was happily oblivious to it - I would have been an irrelevance in any case! So for me it was a great pleasure. I did suffer later over the few interventions I made because as always I played them back in my head as me making a fool of myself but this cost was well worth paying.

And of course there were many fascinating papers and discussions! Ellen has written of some of these far better than I ever could at...

http://www.jimandellen.org/trollope/ExeterConference.html

  I will try not to go over ground which she has covered - better than I ever could. I agree that the opening address by Robert Polhemus on The Lot Syndrome was one of the most fascinating talks of the Conference. I was definitely inspired to go and read his book although I have not done so yet.

In the first of the seminar sessions I attended a different one to Ellen so I will attempt some summaries.

The Panel was entitled Dangerous Liaisions - Family Sagas.

The first paper was given by Lynn Parker and was concerned with sibling relationships. Lynn noted that this was present in Dickens and exemplified Nicholas Nickleby where whenever the brother and sister separate bad things happen, when they are together good. As an example from Trollope she took Can You Forgive Her and the brother/sister/lover plot (George/Kate/Alice - a plot almost entirely excluded from the television adapatation of the novel which I am watching at the moment and we are discussing on Trollope-l). Lynn explored the character of Kate - her extreme self-abnegation, her love for George - but does she also want to retain Alice by tying him to George? Trollope Lynn noted presents Kate as almost proposing to Alice. She notes how in the childhood fight George has protected Alice's 'jewels' against an assailant armed with a chisel! Kate confesses she is married to her brother - she needs Alice to free her. Lynn pointed out that Trollope links sisterly devotion and self-sacrifice to moral virtue. She then  moved on to Phineas Finn where Laura's sisterly devotion to Chiltern is more diffuse; but George and Chiltern are linked in their violence' however where George goes to the bad, Chiltern is transformed. Lynn argues that Trollope uses Phineas to take away the incest theme. She noted how the book ends with Phineas marrying his sister's friend - his sister is quite willing to sacrifice her friend's interest on her brother's behalf. Lynn argued that the passage bewteen sister (Barbara) and friend (Mary) is strongly homo-erotic (I must admit I had no memory of this - need to re-read Phineas Finn). Lynn concluded by arguing that Trollope exposes the dangers of sibling relationships and exposes doubts about the brother/sister/lover plot in CYFH but then returns to it in PF. I found this the most interesting of the three papers.

Christine Poulson: Remarriage and The step-family

Christine Poulson opened with an explanation that there was a hostility to re-marriage in the 19thC, a hostility to step-fathers but above all a hostility to step-mothers and women remarrying. She argued that there was a double standard in Trollope where it is fine for a widower to marry again in certain circumastances and adduced as examples of widower heroes Major Grantlye in LCB and Phineas in Phineas Redux. On the other hand she adduced the way in which Olivia Proudie's marriage to a widower with 3 children (Framley Parsonage) is treated as a running gag. Christine argued that Trollope dosen't see remarriage as necessarily problemmatic, there are few actual step-mothers in Trollope and the most searching examinations occur in The American Senator and the short story Alice Dugdale. Material inheritance is always an important part of the question as in Orley Farm and Marion Fay and she argued that it is in the latter that we see the closest Trollope comes to a wicked step-mother. All these arguments and characters take their place in a larger contemporary deabte about authority (I am not sure about the Olivia Porudie argument - after all she is hardly a major character and in some ways the Proudies en bloc are a running gag ; we can counterpoise the Widow Greenow in CYFH who is a much more important character and if not a heroine is certainly a positive character).

Jenni Bourne Taylor : Legitimacy as Legal Fiction

Trollope's later novels repeatedly return to the question of who can legitimately inherit; the bastard is the lynchpin of a debate about legal and moral rights. Jenni Bourne Taylor argued that a number of political and social issues are reflected in these late novels and actual legal and parliamentary cases are in the background. In Mr Scarborough's Family the idea of legitimacy is pursued to its conclusion of nihilism. Other novels in which these themes emerge are Lady Anna, Ralph the Heir and Is he Popenjoy. (I regret my notes on this talk are very limited - this may be due to my lack of acquaintance with these novels or to the fact that I was flagging in the stifling heat -  I will be generous to myself and pick the latter).

I did not either keep any notes as to the discussion. There is a different reason for this. I was working up to ask a question which I did - I asked Lynn about the brother/sister/lover relationship in Framley Parsonage. There of course we have the rotten, if tragic Sowerby, his sister Mrs Smith and the delightful Miss Dunstable. What is of great interest is Trollope's reiteration is that Mrs Smith - contemptuous of her pathetic husband - is 'good' in her love for her brother, even while she is willing to sacrifice her (only) friend to him. She is almost redeemed by this sibling affection. What are the proper limits of sibling love. Unfortunately my question - wholly unintentionally - embarrassed Lynn who did not know Framley Parsonage. I felt quite awful about this. Fortunately when I met her later and apologised she was very kind! And it had the excellent outcome that I got to know her. But I was distracted from the rest of the general discussion.

tags: books  trollope  exeter