Anthony Trollope’s Novels and their Reception on the Nineteenth-Century German Market

Abstract

It is an unusual phenomenon when two remarkably productive authors, who have worked side by side for a considerable time and enjoy a comparable popularity ‘at home’, are received in quite different circumstances on literary markets abroad. When a critic exclaimed in The Graphic of 1870 regarding Charles Dickens: “What other story teller, English or foreign, ever maintained so great and increasing a popularity for six and thirty years!”2 British contemporaries may very well – with a bit of chronological leeway – have come up with Anthony Trollope’s name for an answer. Despite obvious differences in subject matter and their narrative techniques, both writers commanded a comparable popularity with the British reading public.3 Their acceptance on the German market differs considerably though. While Dickens proved immensely popular throughout the nineteenth century,4 this brief study aims to demonstrate that Trollope’s works met a quite different reception on the German market. Based on the representation of Trollope’s works, both in English and in translation, by German publishing houses, the following case study seeks to sketch the climate of Trollope’s critical reception in Germany and ponder possible reasons for his rather limited popularity with readers in the German language community.