Can You Forgive Her?
The question that haunts this novel is one Victorian women were forbidden to ask: what should a woman do with her life? Alice Vavasor finds herself engaged to the respectable John Grey, yet haunted by her wild cousin George, whose reckless charm represents everything society warns her against. As Alice wrestles with duty, desire, and her own ambition, she becomes the center of a web that also entangles Lady Glencora Palliser, married to a rising political figure but chafing against the constraints of her position, and the vivacious widow Mrs. Greenow, who refuses to mourn according to expectations. Trollope weaves together three stories of women navigating love, marriage, and the limited choices available to them in a world that prescribes their roles before they can choose them. The novel operates on two levels: as a sharp examination of the political maneuvering surrounding a parliamentary election and as a quietly radical portrait of women questioning the foundations of their lives. It endures because Trollope treats his female characters not as social types but as thinking, feeling beings whose internal conflicts feel startlingly modern, even across a century and a half.
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“She was as one who, in madness, was resolute to throw herself from a precipice, but to whom some remnant of sanity remained which forced her to seek those who would save her from herself.””
— Anthony Trollope
“In this world things are beautiful only because they are not quite seen, or not perfectly understood. Poetry is precious chiefly because it suggests more than it declares.””
— Anthony Trollope
“Little bits of things make me do it;”
— Anthony Trollope
“Men and women ain't lumps of sugar. They don't melt because the water is sometimes warm.””
— Anthony Trollope
“It seems to me that if a man can so train himself that he may live honestly and die fearlessly, he has done about as much as is necessary.””
— Anthony Trollope
“You shall be my pet, and my poppet, and my dearest little duck all the days of your life.””
— Anthony Trollope
“I like to have a plan," said Mr. Palliser. "And so do I," said his wife,--"if only for the sake of not keeping it.””
— Anthony Trollope
“My dear, the truth must be spoken. I declare I don't think I ever saw a young woman so improvident as you are. When are you to begin to think about getting married if you don't do it now?""I shall never begin to think about it, till I buy my wedding clothes.””
— Anthony Trollope
“She was not softly delicate in all her ways; but in disposition and temper she was altogether generous. I do not know that she was at all points a lady, but had Fate so willed it she would have been a thorough gentleman.””
— Anthony Trollope
