Chronicles of Barsetshire

As regular readers of this blog are aware, my reading list for this past April consisted entirely of novels dealing with a dystopian theme. Those same readers should also know that the final novel on that list was The Fixed Period by Anthony Trollope. Prior to this, I had never heard of this English novelist of the Victorian era. However, I was so impressed with The Fixed Period, I wanted to learn more about Mr. Trollope.

His best known work is a series of novels collectively known as the Chronicles of Barsetshire. I immediately downloaded all six novels in the series from Project Gutenberg and began reading the first in the series, The Warden , on the first day of this month. As I write this, I've finished the first and second (Barchester Towers ) and about 25% of the third novel in the series, Doctor Thorne .

The first two in the series deal with of the coming and goings of a small group of Church of England clergymen in the fictional city of Barchester - particularly Mr Septimus Harding (the Warden of Hiram's Hospital in book one) and his sons -in-law.

Several characters appear in both novels, although two characters from book one are killed off by Trollope, with a few new characters appearing in the second novel.

As much as I enjoyed the first two novels in the series, I didn't think Trollope could pull off writing six novels on these same characters. Fortunately, the series takes a turn with the third novel dealing with a local physician, Doctor Thomas Thorne.

So far, the only negative thing I can say about the series is the concentration on English social class structure in the Victorian era. At this point, I can't tell if Trollope is for it, or against it.

Never the less, I'm enjoying my stroll around Barsetshire and I'm looking forward to the next three in the series.