Book description
Mr Peacocke, a Classical scholar, has come to Broughtonshire with his
beautiful American wife to live as a schoolmaster. But when the
blackmailing brother of her first husband - a reprobate from Louisiana -
appears at the school gates, a dreadful secret is revealed and the
county is scandalized. Ostracised by the community, the pair seem
trapped in a hopeless situation - until the combative but warm-hearted
headmaster of the school, Dr Wortle, offers his support, and Mr Peacocke
embarks upon a journey to America that he hopes will lay to rest the
accusations once and for all. A perceptive exploration of Victorian
morality, Dr Wortle's School (1881) also contains echoes of Trollope's
own life, and his personal affection for the vivacious Bostonian Kate
Field. Anthony Trollope (1815 - 1882) enjoyed considerable acclaim as
a novelist during his lifetime, publishing over forty novels and many
short stories. The Warden, the first of his novels to achieve success
was succeeded by the sequence of 'Barsetshire novels' and the six
brilliant Palliser novels. His novels have remained well-loved today.
Mick Imlah, formerly Junior Lecturer in English at Magdalen College,
Oxford, is a published poet and works at the TLS.
