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INFORMATION TO USERS While the most advanced technology has been used to photograph and reproduce this manuscript, the quality of the reproduction is heavily dependent upon the quality of the material submitted. For example: • Manuscript pages may have indistinct print. In such cases, the best available copy has been filmed. • Manuscripts may not always be complete. In such cases, a note will indicate that it is not possible to obtain missing pages. • Copyrighted material may have been removed from the manuscript. In such cases, a note will indicate the deletion. Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, and charts) are photographed by sectioning the original, beginning at the upper left-hand corner and continuing from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. Each oversize page is also filmed as one exposure and is available, for an additional charge, as a standard 35mm slide or as a 17"x 23" black and white photographic print. Most photographs reproduce acceptably on positive microfilm or microfiche but lack the clarity on xerographic copies made from the microfilm. For an additional charge, 35mm slides of 6"x 9" black and white photographic prints are available for any photographs or illustrations that cannot be reproduced satisfactorily by xerography. Order Number 8718677 "Grace of character": The gentleman in Anthony Trollope's Palliser novels Lewis, Juariita Florence, Ph.D. The University of North Carolina at Greensboro, 1986 U MI 300 N. Zeeb Rd. Ann Arbor, MI 48106 INFORMATION TO USERS While the most advanced technology has been used to photograph and reproduce this manuscript, the quality of the reproduction is heavily dependent upon the quality of the material submitted. For example: • Manuscript pages may have indistinct print. In such cases, the best available copy has been filmed. • Manuscripts may not always be complete. In such cases, a note will indicate that it is not possible to obtain missing pages. • Copyrighted material may have been removed from the manuscript. In such cases, a note will indicate the deletion. Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, and charts) are photographed by sectioning the original, beginning at the upper left-hand corner and continuing from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. Each oversize page is also filmed as one exposure and is available, for an additional charge, as a standard 35mm slide or as a 17"x 23" black and white photographic print. Most photographs reproduce acceptably on positive microfilm or microfiche but lack the clarity on xerographic copies made from the microfilm. For an additional charge, 35mm slides of 6"x 9" black and white photographic prints are available for any photographs or illustrations that cannot be reproduced satisfactorily by xerography. "GRACE OP CHARACTER": THE GENTLEMAN IN ANTHONY TROLLOPE'S PALLISER NOVELS "by Juanita Florence Lewis A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy Greensboro 1986 ^Tp*ry-tr*r\trc± H "htr Dissertation Adviser APPROVAL PAGE This dissertation has been approved by the following committee of the Faculty of the Graduate School at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro. A Dissertation Adviser J/A ivltA ^ 1 Committee Members jQ±sL±<±(' £•^<,11 /A.VV><L. llVfc Date of4 Acceptance by Committee 11 Date of uFi rial Oral' Examination ii LEWIS, JUANITA FLORENCE, Ph.D. "Grace of Character": The Gentleman in Anthony Trollope's Palliser Novels. (1986). Directed by Dr. William G. Lane. 315 pp. In An Autobiography Trollope writes that the Palliser novels portray "a perfect gentleman": what kind of man he is, how he thinks of himself in relation to others, and what kinds of values determine his conduct. It is generally accepted that the gentleman is important in all of Trollope!s fiction, but little attention has been given to how Trollope uses the term gentleman or what it means in different contexts in the novels. Trollope's idea of the gentleman is derived from a cultural tradition that blends classical influences; the medieval knight's code of chivalry, honor, and loyalty; and the tradition of the courtier. Trollope's literary treat ment of the gentleman is influenced by the early Victorian reaction to the dandy and by the novels of Jane Austen and Thackeray. Courtship and marriage is a major theme in the novels because it allows Trollope to explore a character's fundamental values and the extent to which a character balances the claims of self with social and moral duties to others. The Palliser novels are especially good for evaluating both Trollope1s idea of the gentleman and his portrayal of the gentleman over time. Through its numerous characters and several plot lines, this interrelated series of six novels creates a complex and densely peopled social world in which surfaces and outward signs can too easily become 2 substitutes for content, substance, and worth. Yet the novels also demonstrate that the moral life is still possible in this complex and rapidly changing world. Trollope shows the development of Plantagenet Palliser, "a perfect gentleman," in three major roles—husband, public servant, father—and explores the ways Palliser1s moral and ethical values determine his actions. As Palliser faces several private and public crises, he does not surrender his values: he affirms them. Throughout the series, the comparison of Palliser to other husbands, public servants, and fathers reveals the" attitudes of mind and spirit necessary for Trollope's ideal gentleman. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I am indebted to the members of my dissertation committee for their assistance and advice: Professors Walter H. Beale, Ronald D. Cassell, Donald G. Darnell, and William G. Lane. I owe special thanks to Professor Cassell, who allowed me to write on the novels of Disraeli and Trollope for his history class; that was when I began to appreciate Trollope and the Palliser novels and when I discovered the interest that became the subject of my dissertation. Throughout the writing process Professors Darnell and Lane gave excellent criticism that helped simplify my task and make the process enjoyable. Professor Darnell kindly agreed to direct the final reading phase during my director's absence. I am particularly grateful to my director, Professor Lane, for his tolerant patience as I worked through ideas and approaches and for his making himself readily available to provide assistance and direction. Had it not been for Dr. Lane's kindness and professional courtesy, this project would never have been completed. iii TABLE OP CONTENTS Page APPROVAL PAGE ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS iii CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION 1 II. THE GENTLEMAN PROM CASTIGLIONE TO TROLLOPE 20 III. NONGENTLEMEN: AMBITION FOR PLACE AND POWER 79 IV. CADS, SCOUNDRELS, AND RAKES 131 V. PLANTAGENET PALLISER: THE PERFECT . GENTLEMAN 213 BIBLIOGRAPHY 299 iv 1 CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION Among Anthony Trollope's forty-seven novels are two series of six novels each, the Barsetshire and the Palliser series. The novels within each series are linked by plots, places, and reappearing characters; and the Barsetshire novels, especially the last two, provide transitional links to the second series. The Barsetshire series, published from 1855 to 1867, has remained the most popular of Trollope's novels, but the Palliser novels, published from 1864 to 1880, have gained increasing critical attention. The Palliser series consists of Can You Forgive Her? (1864-1865), Phineas Finn, the Irish Member (1869), The Eustace Diamonds (1873), Phineas Redux (1874), The Prime Minister (1876), and The Duke's Children (1880). Contemporary criticism of these novels was frequently negative, and modern critical comment has not always agreed with—indeed has at times entirely discounted—Trollope's own view of these novels and their purposes. Adopting the title Michael Sadleir used in his 1927 classification of Trollope's novels, twentieth-century readers have most often seen the Palliser series as "political novels" and have consequently evaluated them in terms of their portrayal of political events and personalities and their 2 treatment of political ideas. For the last thirty years, however, since A.O.J. Cockshut's 1955 study, readers have paid increasing attention to the characters in the novels and their relationships with each other; marital relation ships, particularly that of Plantagenet and Glencora Palliser, have "been emphasized. 2 There is, however, a unifying theme for the six Palliser novels that has received virtually no attention. This theme, the ideal of the gentleman, provides structural unity and pulls together; the separate threads of the many plot lines running through the Palliser novels to create the pattern of the perfect gentleman, Plantagenet Palliser. Although the ideal of the gentleman as a unifying theme for the Palliser series has not been explored, readers have identified that ideal as a major concern in TroHope's novels. C. J. Vincent, for example, wrote in "Trollope: A Victorian Augustan" (1945): What is the noblest work of an Englishman? It is to live like a gentleman. Like his eighteenth century predecessors, Trollope is interested in manners, in morals, and in the relations of men to other men. In a sense his novels form a courtesy book, a kind of nineteenth century II Cortegiano, in which he sets forth the good man living the good life. And yet his characters are never prigs, nor are they ideals impossible of realization. (417) In Trollope's Later Novels Robert Tracy twice identifies the creation of a gentleman as both the unifying theme and the instructional purpose of the Palliser novels. Tracy describes the Palliser series as really a single novel, 3 a long and multiplotted but carefully structured novel of society. This novel would condemn romantic individualism and exalt both English society and the ideal product and support of that society, the English gentleman.