Palliser novels
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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The Palliser novels are novels written in series by Anthony Trollope. They were more commonly known as the Parliamentary novels prior to their 1976 television dramatisation by the BBC broadcast as The Pallisers. Marketed as "polite literature" during their initial publication, the novels encompass several literary genres including: family saga, bildungsroman, picaresque, as well satire and parody of Victorian (or English) life, and criticism of the English government's predilection for attracting corrupt and corruptible people to power.
The common threads throughout the series are the wealthy aristocrat and politician Plantagenet Palliser, and his wife, Lady Glencora. The plots involve British and Irish politics in varying degrees, specifically in and around Parliament. The Pallisers do not always play major roles, and in The Eustace Diamonds they merely comment on the main action.
The series overlaps with Trollope's Chronicles of Barsetshire, also a series of six novels, which deal with life in the fictional county where the Palliser family is politically important.
Trollope considered Can You Forgive Her?, Phineas Finn, Phineas Redux and The Prime Minister to be the four novels that constitute the Palliser series.
