Customer Reviews

He Knew He Was Right (Penguin Classics)

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The Penguin Classic edition of He Knew He Was Right has a wonderful introduction. Frank Kermode provides a fascinating explanation of how the constraints of Victorian society limited the ways in which Trollope could write about "sexual jealousy," and how a relatively mild (by today's standards) incident (here, calling a woman by her "Christian" (first) name) could be the basis for suspicion of "infidelity." Kermode also provides an illuminating discussion comparing hero Louis Treveylan's obsession and jealousy with that of Othello. Finally, Kermode relates the novel to others of the period, both those by Trollope and those of his contemporaries.

While the focus of the novel is the main character's mental deterioration resulting from his unreasonable jealousy and increasing isolation, both from society and reality, Trollope also provides a cast of interesting women faced with possible marriage partners. At a time when a woman's only "career" opportunity was to make a successful marriage, the women in He Knew He Was Right each react differently to the male "opportunities" that come their way. Kermode notes that Trollope was not a supporter of the rights of women, yet he manages to describe the unreasonable limitations on, and expectations of, women in a sympathetic light.

The "main story," of Trevelyan and his wife, is actually one of the least compelling of the man-woman pairings in the novel. What I mean is that while their story IS compelling, the others are substantially more so. This is a wonderful book. And, personally I'd like to note that I laughed out loud while reading it. This was on a cross-country airplane flight, and I got some strange looks for laughing at what appeared to be a thick "serious" novel.

In his autobiography, Trollope zips past this story. I couldn't put it down, and read the last 40 moving and exhausting pages aloud to my wife. The Pallisers can get a bit wearying at times, though I love them all. But there is nothing tiresome in here; this book roars with its two intersecting plots and the relatively unique idea of making a sympathetic character, one whom you truly care for and about, a complete, irredeemable fool.

Several strong secondary characters, all just a little more complex than they seem, combine with a knock-out plot and vivid main characters, to make this my favorite Trollope novel. The man who will not accept the good around him but prefers to see the bad...? How's that for an eternal theme?

This is the most dazzling of the ten Trollope novels I've read. The way the story unfolds is a marvel: a seemingly minor domestic disagreement mushrooms to envelope in-laws, family friends, policemen, lawyers, scrappy whist-playing old ladies in the country, Tuscan villagers, American bluestockings, kidnappers. And we watch a dozen Victorian women -- old, young, married, widowed, wooed and unwooed -- struggle for meaning and happiness in their lives under the impossible social and economic strictures governing their relations with men and each other. All of which is rendered with a light, confident touch free of cant or didacticism, and the interest and energy are sustained from first page to last. I especially loved the Stanbury group. Old Miss Stanbury, with her high principles and her foul mouth, is a wonderful creation.

I would say, though, that to call the story a "study of sexual jealousy" is a bit of a strain. It's about what the title says it's about. It's more a study of male domination gone haywire, and of women's limited, but not negligible, power to resist it. I tend to accept Trollope's own judgment -- that in the character of Louis Trevelyan he failed to accomplish what he set out to do. But he greatly underrated how masterful is what he accomplished instead.

When most people think of Anthony Trollope they usually think of Glencora and Plantangenant Palliser but Trollope had other stories and this is one of the best. He Knew He Was Right is partially Othello set in Victorian London. Louis is insanely jealous and drives his wife to misery. The lady is innocent but thanks to gossip and a Iago figure Louis can't see reason. That's the main story but since this is Trollope there a host of deligtful side characters all bursting with life and stories of their own. I loved this book.

In the eyes of Louis Trevelyan, the attention that his wife gives to Colonel Osborne, a friend of her father's, looks like infidelity. The more Louis Trevelyan voices his suspicions and demands obedience, the more his wife stubbornly protests and resents her husband's lack of trust. This is the central conflict on which Trollope builds this novel, the situation that offers so much tension, and the disagreement that takes nearly 1000 pages to resolve.

Similarities to Shakespeare's "Othello" are evident, and acknowledged by Trollope himself. Trollope does not attempt to include an Iago, however; instead he provides a noxious private investigator named Bozzle who is paid by Trevelyan to observe and report instances of the wife's supposed infidelity.

Not every page in the book details what Trollope calls Trevelyan's "absurd obsession". Louis and Emily Trevelyan's marriage is contrasted to many that are in the offing or being proposed or being avoided throughout the narrative. As other reviewers have mentioned, it is a welcome shift in the narrative when the scene changes to Exeter where lives Miss Stanbury, an imperious elderly lady and a hapless young curate whose search for a wife inflames deadly rivalry between two sisters.

Unfolding it all is Anthony Trollope, as genial and companionable an author as any from the nineteenth century. Giving every character what we call in Australia a "fair go", he even works the miracle of making a very minor character one of the most memorable. Priscilla Stanbury, ageing, impoverished and with no prospect of marriage, speaks of her sister's betrothal. "To enjoy life as you do is, I suppose, out of the question for me. But I have a satisfaction when I get to the end of the quarter and find that there is not half-a-crown due to any one. Things get dearer and dearer but I have a comfort even in that. I have a feeling that I should like to bring myself to the straw a day." This prospect alludes to the farmer of the fable who reduced the fodder he gave his horse until at last it was surviving on a single straw a day. Then it died.

Trollope's novels are wonderfully apt for reading aloud and for dramatizing. A successful TV adaptation of "He Knew He Was Right", directed by Tom Vaughan, appeared in 2004.

For many people, Trollope is a writer to stay away from. They assume he wrote terribly twee novels about vicars and tea cosies (which is half true). But anyone who has read "He Knew Was Right" will know just how progressive and real Trollope is. This incredibly insightful study of a marriage reveals a great deal not only about Victorian society but about the eternal struggles between men and women. It's a mystery to me why this book is not better known.

He Knew He was Right was authored by Anthony Trollope (1815-1882) after he had resigned his high position with the British Post Office. The novel is long but never boring. At the core of the novel is the tragic tale of Louis Trevelyn who wrongly insists his innocent as a dove wife Emily is reputedly carrying on a romantic liason with an old family friend Colonel Osborne.
Along with the domestic tragedy of Trevelyns there is are
several other stories of romance.
a. The triangle between Emily's sister Nora and her suitors
Messrs Glascock and Hugh Stanbury.
b. The choice Dorothy Stanbury must make between the oily clergyman Mr. Gibson and Mr. Brooke Burgess.
c. An affair between Mr. Glascock and the American filly Caroline Spaulding touring Europe-fascinating comments on Anglo-American perceptions of each other's native lands!
d. The hilarious tale of the oafish Rev. Gibson and the two
sisters from "hell" Arabella and Camilla French. This guy is torn between two lovers who almost tear him apart in their jealous quest for his timorous soul!
Perhaps the most memorable character is old aunt Stanbury who fascinates the reader with her ideas and matchmaking schemes in the West country town of Exeter.
Trollope's novel was recently seen on a marvelous BBC production ! I was delighted when my AmaZon delivery arrived per request with a DVD of the series in addition to the novel!
As an old English major I regret to say I never heard Trollope discussed! Why not? In my opinion he is in the top tier of Victorian novelists along with the inimitable Charles Dickens;
the intellectual genius George Eliot; the Bronte sisters and
Thackery and Hardy.
If you are only familiar with Trollope's Barsetshire and
Parliamentary novel series then add this winner to your reading
list. This novel is Trollope at the top of his game!

The main theme of this excellent novel is how the unreasonable jealousy a husband harbors towards his wife causes him to slide into madness. Louis Trevelyan falls in love with and marries Emily Rowley. An old friend of Emily's father, a Colonel Osborne, continues to pay visits to her after Trevelyan has complained and asked her to put a stop to it, which she refuses to do; what irks Trevelyan most is Osborne's insistence on calling his wife by her Christian name. When Emily can't stand her husband's jealous behavior anymore, she takes their small son and leaves him. Trevelyan is convinced his behavior was just and decides to kidnap their son to get him away from Emily. (This scene is the most exciting and dramatic scene in the book.) He goes to Italy with his son, where he goes totally mad. Emily follows, however, and gets him to return to England where he dies.

There are many subplots (some critics believed there were too many of them), most of them having to do with various couples on the verge of marrying. Trollope was frequently a champion of his female characters, and that is certainly the case here, especially with regard to Emily. She is somewhat prideful, but that is her only fault. Other woman characters usually have very wise (and unflattering) things to say about men in general.

Trollope wrote most of this book while visiting America for the second time, a visit he found much less appealing than his first; many of the American characters such as Jonas Spalding reflect some of Trollope's own displeasures. It's true that Trollope didn't care much for this novel, an opinion few would share with him (he was his own harshest critic). It is actually one of his very best books. His dissection of Trevelyan is brilliant and there's an excitement from the kidnapping of Louis to the end that is greater than in most of his other works. It's an excellent novel.

Trollope is the ideal Victorian, celebrating the conventional, but with a thoroughly worldly appreciation of the darker side of human psychology that's best kept bottled up. In this novel, he promotes over and over -- with not just one but three admirable ingenues who live happily ever after -- the virtues of romantic marriage, while putting his fourth heroine in a catastrophic union where stubborn self-assertion leads to separation, irrational jealousy, parental kidnaping and tragic dissolution. All unfolds with Trollope's characteristic insightful, gentle and funny writing style. The novel's 822 pages turn as easily as an entertainment, but with enough moral gravitas and incisive description of the world of the 1860's to keep the reader thinking and pondering amidst the pleasure of reading this wonderful novel.

This is not one of Trollope's best novels, but it is one of his longest, at 99 chapters and over 800 pages. The subject is marriage and how to spoil it by jealousy and stubbornness and how to use self-fulfilling prophecies destructively.
The marriage war is fought in times before level playing fields were introduced. Main heroine Emily Trevelyan is at a serious disadvantage in legal terms. Her husband can legally order her to obey him. Law is of course backed up by scripture. Divorce has only recently been made a legal option. (The book was written in 1867/68.)
Rules for courtship among the upper strata of society are very detailed and strict, but not properly codified. Despite the lack of formal definitions, people generally know what is wrong or right, and only very rich or otherwise independent people have the guts to ignore or bypass the rules.
Louis Trevelyan is the man of the novel's title, the one who knew he was right. Men are good at knowing they were right. I know what I am talking about. I am right most of the time. It is a heavy burden.
Apart from the Trevelyans' conflict, which is at the centre of the plot, we observe several other women's situations. There is Emily's sister Nora, who is somewhat in love with her impecuniary hero Hugh, while a rich man courts her. Her rejection of the rich man has similarities to James' Isabel Archer in Portrait of a Lady.
There is Hugh's rich aunt Jemima; she was jilted in youth by a banker, but then made rich by her jilter in his testament. Now, as a rich old maid, she is the terror of the family and the meanest Tory caricature that I have met in Trollope so far. Her mission in life is interference. She wants to link up Hugh's meek sister Dorothy with her favorite clergyman.
While the side shows develop in their various ways, the main show goes deeper down the ditch step by step. The main difference to modern times is the concept of `obedience' in marriage, which one doesn't hear much about nowadays. However it has not vanished entirely, as I know from a few examples. Apart from this aspect of changing times, the mechanisms of matrimonial quarrels as developed here are remarkably fresh.