Henry James on Anthony Trollope

“Trollope's genius is not the genius of Shakespeare, but his heroines have something of the fragrance of Imogen and Desdemona.”

“His great, his inestimable merit was a complete appreciation of the usual... Trollope, therefore, with his eyes comfortably fixed on the familiar, the actual, was far from having invented a new category; his great distinction is that in resting there his vision took in so much of the field. And then he felt all daily and immediate things as well as saw them; felt them in a simple, direct, salubrious way, with their sadness, their gladness, their charm, their comicality, all their obvious and measurable meanings. He never wearied of the pre-established round of English customs—never needed a respite or a change—was content to go on indefinitely watching the life that surrounded him, and holding up his mirror to it.”