Trollope 1st Edition Summer in Western France, 1st edition, 2 vols, 1841 Beautifully Fully Bound in Fine Calf with Gilt Decoration 10 Etched Plates by A. Hervieu, Presented to Colonel Lord Brownlow Thomas Montagu Cecil {Colonel of the Scots Guards}

One of our most popular purchases from The Lanes Armoury, for gifting at Christmas, will always be our finest novels, by iconic authors. An heirloom for generations to come, that combines to be a fabulous read as well as an antiquarian joy of considerable beauty.

A very handsome pair of beautiful, antique, fully calf leather bound 1st edition leather volumes, in nice condition for age, with natural colour aging to pages, some foxing, from one of the of the most highly rated family of English authors, the Trollope's of Kepple Street, London. Frances, Thomas and Anthony

A Summer in Western France, 1st edition, 2 vols, Thomas Adolphus Trollope, with 5 etched plates by A. Hervieu, 2 hand-coloured lithograph frontis., and etched title-page vignettes, gilt tooled red morocco, spines Henry Colburn, London, 1841,

Presented to Colonel Lord Brownlow Thomas Montagu Cecil {Colonel of the Scots Guards} in 1844 upon his graduation from Eton, by John Marjoribanks

This is Thomas Trollope's account of his experiences during a Summer spent in Western France with detailed topographical & historical recordings as well as the interesting diversions into the folklore & mythology of this region of France. It has been edited by Frances Trollope, celebrated author of 'Domestic Manners of the Americans.'

Trollope was born in Bloomsbury, London on 29 April 1810, the eldest son of Thomas Anthony and Frances Milton Trollope. (A younger brother was Anthony Trollope, the novelist.) He was educated at Harrow School and Winchester College. He first started writing before he went to Oxford University after a trip to New York with his father. He matriculated at St Alban Hall, Oxford, in 1829, aged 19, and graduated B.A. from Magdalen Hall, Oxford, in 1835. He taught briefly at Birmingham's King Edward's Grammar School, before he gave in to his mother's idea of forming a writing partnership. They travelled to Italy, which gave rise to some of the material for the 60 volumes of travel writing, history and fiction that he wrote that decade. This was in addition to a large amount of periodical and journalistic work.

Trollope married twice: his first wife was the writer Theodosia Garrow who was staying with his mother, Fanny Trollope, in Florence. The newly married couple had one daughter, Beatrice. Their home was visited by travelling British intelligentsia as well as by leading Italian nationalist figures. They lived at the Villino Trollope on the square that was then called the Piazza Maria Antonio, now the Piazza dell'Indipendenza, in Florence. Their house was decorated with carved furniture, inlaid walls, majolica ceramics, marble floors and pillars, suits of armour and a 5,000-book library.

Their new villa was bought in part with Theodosia's inheritance. Their house was considered the centre of the expatriate society in Florence. Theodosia was known for her poetry, her translations and her articles on household matters, and she also contributed letters to the Athenaeum advocating freedom for Italy.

The Trollopes' daughter played with Pen, the son of Robert and Elizabeth Browning, when they too became part of the Anglophone society in 1847. Comparisons of the two households showed the Browning household as more intense, with the Trollopes more carefree. All of her guests were in danger of appearing, in some disguised way, in his mother's novels.

His second wife was the novelist Frances Eleanor Ternan, whom he married on 29 October 1866: they then lived at the Villa Ricorboli. From 1873 the new couple again created a house known for its hospitality, but this time in Rome. Trollope lived in Italy for most of his adult life, but retired to Devon, England, in 1890. He died at Clifton, near Bristol, on 11 November 1892. His memoirs, What I Remember, were published in three volumes between 1887 (vols. 1 & 2) and 1889 (vol. 3).

Code: 25973