Sign in with Facebook
Domestic Manners of th...
Loading...
Domestic Manners of the Americans
Published in 1832, the book presents a lively portrait of early 19th-century America as observed by a woman of rare intelligence and keen perception. Trollope left no stone unturned, commenting on American dress, food, speech, politics, manners, customs, the landscape, architecture, and more — often critically but always with considerable insight and literary flair.
Hardcover, 454 pages
Published
June 1st 1974
by Peter Smith Publisher
(first published 1832)
Friend Reviews
To see what your friends thought of this book,
please sign up.
This book is not yet featured on Listopia.
Add this book to your favorite list »
Community Reviews
(showing
1-30
of
312)
One of the few, old travel books you always hear of, so when I saw it on the shelf, I bought it. One can see why it upset the Americans of the 1840's. The references to slavery would sure enrage one half the country and the the final chapter would take care of the rest. Excepting, maybe, some New Yorkers. Of course, her views are from one used to England's settled villages and towns and stratified social order and one religion. (Compare her views on established religion with DeTocqueville's obse...more
Like all early 19th century books written by intellectuals that thought highly of themselves, they can have a difficult prose. But once you get past that, it is enjoyable, especially if you read it (for free) on google books with the original typography (or as original as it gets: my copy, I believe, was from a very early 20th century reprint, still with many of the Victorian era nuances).
That period in America was filled with so much optimism. So different and hard to believe 100 years later wa...more
That period in America was filled with so much optimism. So different and hard to believe 100 years later wa...more
Mrs. Trollope came to America because her family was facing bankruptcy. Not willing to live within their means, an inheritance being counted on before it was hatched, is snatched away by an uncle who marries late in life and sires a son. Oops, what is Mr. Trollope to do? His aristocratic wife, Frances, travels with her three children, a friend, Fanny Wright, and a painter to America. There in 1827, she is going to restore the family fortune and takes part in a museum but giving guests more of wh...more
This cheerfully impertinent book is a travel diary of Frances Trollope, mother of the novelist Anthony Trollope, during her travels in the United States in the late 1820s. While tart and condescending, it is also an interesting document about the early republic, filled with descriptions of towns, customs, manners, and politics.
Mrs. Trollope had no love for America and its rough, democratic citizens, although she made some shrewd observations. She was repulsed by the institution of slavery, and h...more
Mrs. Trollope had no love for America and its rough, democratic citizens, although she made some shrewd observations. She was repulsed by the institution of slavery, and h...more
There are times when Frances Trollope seems just too prissy – offended by the easy (over)familiarity of her rough American neighbours. ‘Mohawk, as our little village was called, gave us an excellent opportunity of comparing the peasants of the United States with those of England’ – we are not now accustomed to considering Americans of any age as ‘peasants’. One can imagine the Americans that she met considering her stand-offish and typical of the English from which they had sundered over half a...more
I loved this book. It really gave me an insight into the roots of our culture. And make no mistake: this woman is spot-on. And she's still spot-on.
The problem and the thing that makes it a one of a kind gem is that it's told by an Englishwoman. The conceit that makes Trollope ridiculous is the idea that after leaving England, we would automatically want to be just like them. We'd travel in ships for months, fight the natives, make roads, FIGHT THEM OFF etc, and set up another England. And we wou...more
The problem and the thing that makes it a one of a kind gem is that it's told by an Englishwoman. The conceit that makes Trollope ridiculous is the idea that after leaving England, we would automatically want to be just like them. We'd travel in ships for months, fight the natives, make roads, FIGHT THEM OFF etc, and set up another England. And we wou...more
Frances Trollope was, as Mark Twain put it, "handsomely cursed and reviled by this nation." Yet she did no more than tell the truth as she knew it. Dame Trollope came from England in 1827 to make her fortune by opening a department store on the American frontier. She settled in the booming town of Cincinnatti, Ohio, then with a population of 20,000, where she thought a fortune could easily be made. Failing to see the real needs of the settlers she didn't yet know, she did not make that fortune a...more
Sep 17, 2009
Tina.
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
for-class,
read-in-2009
I love Fanny Trollope. She's like a cool aunt everyone wish they'd have. Funny, smart, opinionated, and what I like best, unapologetic.
Here's what she says about Buffalo:
"Of all the thousand and one towns I saw in America, I think Buffalo is the queerest looking; it is not quite so wild as Lockport, but all the buildings have the appearance of having been run up in a hurry, though every thing has an air of great pretension; there are porticos, columns, domes, and colonnades, but all in wood. Ev...more
Here's what she says about Buffalo:
"Of all the thousand and one towns I saw in America, I think Buffalo is the queerest looking; it is not quite so wild as Lockport, but all the buildings have the appearance of having been run up in a hurry, though every thing has an air of great pretension; there are porticos, columns, domes, and colonnades, but all in wood. Ev...more
When this book was published in 1832 it caused an instant storm of controversy.It is a scathing,often witty,yet beautifully written account of the foibles and failings of America as Mrs Fanny Trollope saw them...she's from England.Actually,it was praised in Europe!It was "BANNED" in the USA for almost a century.Francis is the mother of the Literary great Anthony Trollope_to many works to name here..re:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_....
This book is an incisive and perceptive description of...more
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_....
This book is an incisive and perceptive description of...more
Apr 09, 2013
Eddy Allen
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
arts-and-historical
"I am convinced there is no writer who has so well and accurately (I need not add, so entertainingly) described [America] ... as you have done"—Dickens to Fanny Trollope, 1842 When Fanny Trollope set sail for America in 1827, she took with her three of her children and a young French artist. She left behind her son Anthony, growing debts and a husband going slowly mad from mercury poisoning. But her hopes of joining a Utopian community of emancipated slaves were soon dashed, and she and her chil...more
http://www.bookcrossing.com/journal/4...
Although there was some enjoyment in seeing how much more in a froth Mrs. Trollope could put herself, eventually it just became tiresome. Despite the fulsome introduction that we shoudl all know Mrs. Trollope's works better, I mostly found her an unbearable snob. I found a quote by her son, Anothny Trollope to the effect of 'Mrs. Trollope is a keen observer but she understands little.' I think that sums it up. If it isn't as she would do it in England, it...more
Although there was some enjoyment in seeing how much more in a froth Mrs. Trollope could put herself, eventually it just became tiresome. Despite the fulsome introduction that we shoudl all know Mrs. Trollope's works better, I mostly found her an unbearable snob. I found a quote by her son, Anothny Trollope to the effect of 'Mrs. Trollope is a keen observer but she understands little.' I think that sums it up. If it isn't as she would do it in England, it...more
Fanny Trollope has an amazing, albeit arch and very British, way of describing Americans she meets during her time in the US...which boils down to -- the women are all religious fanatics and the men spit way too much. Her sentences go on far too long, her use of commas is prodigious, and her view of England as being far superior to America in every way is typical. But man...can she get mean and funny in her commentaries. And her description of Cincinnati, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Washington DC,...more
Domestic Manners of the Americans is an 1832 travel book by Frances Trollope, which follows her travels through America and her residence in Cincinnati, at the time still a frontier town. I encountered this book as part of a freshman English composition class at the University of Wisconsin. It was among several works by authors from Europe that we read including De Tocqueville and Martineau.
The book created a sensation on both sides of the Atlantic, as Frances Trollope had a caustic view of the...more
The book created a sensation on both sides of the Atlantic, as Frances Trollope had a caustic view of the...more
Frances Trollope (mother of the novelist Anthony) ventures from England to Cincinnati in 1829 and spends a few years trying to make her fortune as the proprietor of an emporium (unsuccessful), along the way describing the domestic manners of the Americans.
They’re none too good. Lots of spitting. Prudish separation of the sexes, and no sophisticated conversation anywhere. Hogs in the streets. Impossible to keep a reliable servant. And, of course, there’s the problem of slavery: “But it is impossi...more
They’re none too good. Lots of spitting. Prudish separation of the sexes, and no sophisticated conversation anywhere. Hogs in the streets. Impossible to keep a reliable servant. And, of course, there’s the problem of slavery: “But it is impossi...more
Might be more appropriate to say that I liked parts of it. Trollope's descriptions of the natural settings she and her family traveled through are lovely and her frustration with the treatment of Native Americans, African Americans and women resonate with the modern reader. On the other hand, most other discussion is along the lines of the oft-repeated belief that England is the best country in the world for X, Y and Z. While for theaters and cultural life, this certainly would have been true at...more
I like this even more than I thought I would after picking it for its historical value and because the writer was the mother of one of my favorite novelists of all time, Anthony Trollope. I can only imagine what Americans at the time must have thought of this funny book that often maligns their culture and habits! :) I discovered this for free in the Kindle store, where other quirky reads of the nineteenth century can also be acquired without any charge as well.
This book is rather good fun for anyone who's been to America and might happen to be, as my boyfriend would put it 'a little wary of the natives'. (Being American, he can get away with saying things in ways that would get those of us not blessed to originate from this country accusations of Trollopising).
Anyway, I most definitely enjoyed it, and can't help but think that Fanny Trollope would have been very amusing company. I like her style a lot, and I only wish there'd been even more of the li...more
Anyway, I most definitely enjoyed it, and can't help but think that Fanny Trollope would have been very amusing company. I like her style a lot, and I only wish there'd been even more of the li...more
Some of use are clueless and brilliant at the same time. Yet few of us are also as determined as Fanny Trollope, who saved her family from financial ruin by putting together her travel notes into an international best-seller.
A fascinating slice of early American life. Good writing. Even better backstory.
A fascinating slice of early American life. Good writing. Even better backstory.
A great start adding an alternative to the much used travelogue mode. However, it gets bogged down by what is expected of it both in terms of an English-person in America and a woman in that period. The result is that it never really manages to be challenging in any way.
Scathing critique on the early Americans. She lived for almost two years very close to my own home town, and I was embarrassed but amused at how little (for the most part) people have changed since she was downright horrified by them almost 200 years ago.
This was awfully fun to read. The whole idea of throwing a proper English lady into the western frontier of America in the 1820s is bound to produce something hilarious-- and this delivers. Clever, incisive, observant, sometimes ill-informed, but often prophetic. It doesn't really matter though, because the way she says things is brilliant.
I can see why it was so popular on both sides of the Atlantic. Most of her complaints, such as they are, would probably make an American of that era-- maybe a...more
I can see why it was so popular on both sides of the Atlantic. Most of her complaints, such as they are, would probably make an American of that era-- maybe a...more
Much better than I thought it would be from the many references to it, yet quite boring from page to page - perhaps one would have suggested to Mrs. Trollope (Anthony's mother)had one been alive then that she not spend a f u l l two years of her visit in Cincinatti. Still, full of good stuff, including a report that even in the sticks, it was well known that Jefferson seduced his slaves, smiled indulgently when his offspring ran away, and was in general the kind of shit that he appears to be in...more
Good picture of early conditions in America.
Absolutely hilarious.
Fanny Trollope came to America in the 1820s and what she found she did not like. She thought many parts of the country were beautiful, but strongly disliked the people. All the spitting, the segregated sexes, the slavery, etc. It was funny to read how “American” people were after just 60 years of being a new country – no accents, loud and fast talking and eating, poor manners, etc. I loved this book! Her description of the Alleghenies Mountains and Niagara Falls were spot on and very inspiring.
I only gave this book three stars because I don't think it deserves more, but what a fun read. Mrs. Trollope was not a wise woman, and I doubt she was a likeable one, but her misadventures traveling across the United States, unwittingly insulting its hospitable and long-suffering people, have a certain charm. Especially fun to read as a fan of her son Anthony's books, and having recently enjoyed "Life on the Mississippi."
Trollope's account of her travels in the US in the antebellum years, starting with her voyage up the Mississippi to New Orleans, with the long reaches of marshes and mud near the Gulf, should not be missed. It is scintillating and acerbic. Her vivid writing brings alive the relatively primitive conditions of American towns and cities.
It starts out well, then just goes on and on about the same things. She forgets that we Americans split from England for several reasons, one of which is that we had become so different than the English who ruled us.
Well, old mother Trollope wasn't too taken with the American settlers, that much is obvious. But more than just the moral musings of an Englishwoman, this book provides a great snapshot of american social history.
This is a delightful travel account of travel in the US in the early 1800s. The author, Fanny Trollope, is the mother of Anthony Trollope, and one can easily see where his talent came from.
There are no discussion topics on this book yet.
Be the first to start one »
