Audiobook · read by volunteers
Can You Forgive Her?
Anthony Trollope (1815–1882)
Read by Laura Koskinen, Christine Blachford, Kirsten Ferreri, Lee Ann Howlett, rachelellen, Lucy Burgoyne (1950-2014), Maire Rhode, Jason Mayoff, Sage Tyrtle, Giles Baker · 80 chapters · 32 h 16
About the book
Alice Vavasour is engaged to the steady, worthy John Grey, but she has also once been drawn to her fiery cousin George, and she cannot quite make up her mind. At the same time, Plantagenet Palliser, a rising politician with a serious sense of duty, marries the wealthy and high-spirited Lady Glencora, who still thinks of another man. Anthony Trollope weaves these stories together with scenes from drawing rooms, country houses, election campaigns and family quarrels. Who is to blame when a woman hesitates, and who is willing to forgive? Over eighty chapters, the novel asks questions about marriage, money and independence, and answers them with humour and compassion. A team of volunteer readers shares this very long, very rewarding recording. It is a leisurely, human story that rewards the listener who settles in for the long haul.
Introduction
Anthony Trollope lived from 1815 to 1882. He worked for the Post Office for more than thirty years and, in his spare time, produced an astonishing number of novels, writing for a set number of hours each morning before breakfast. Can You Forgive Her? appeared in 1864 and was the first of his six Palliser novels, a series that follows a family of politicians and their circle through the public and private life of Victorian England.
Here the main interest is in two parallel stories of women who must choose between a husband and another path. Trollope is attentive to the pressures on them from family, money and social expectation, and he does not judge them harshly. He also introduces Plantagenet Palliser, who will remain a central figure of the later books, and who is seen here in the early years of a political career. The title is a question to the reader, and the answer is left for each listener to decide.
This LibriVox production is a very long recording, at more than thirty-two hours, divided into 80 chapters and shared among a team of volunteers. It rewards patient listening, much as a long serial novel did for its first readers. For anyone who enjoys the world of Victorian society, politics and marriage, it is a long and generous pleasure.
Because the book is so long, it can become a companion over many weeks. The characters grow familiar, their dilemmas feel real, and the pleasure of the plot comes as much from conversation and gentle irony as from any dramatic event. It also sets the stage for the five novels that follow.
Public domain
Anthony Trollope died in 1882: the work is in the public domain in Switzerland, more than 70 years after the author’s death.
The LibriVox volunteers dedicated this recording to the public domain.
Sources : LibriVox page · Files at the Internet Archive · Original text