- Doctor Wortle's School
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Doctor Wortle's School, alternatively Dr. Wortle's School or Dr Wortle's School, published in 1881, is a novel by Anthony Trollope, his fortieth book.
Plot summary
The novel takes place in the respectable, fictional parish of Bowick, Victorian England, with the main plot concerning itself with the renowned Dr. Wortle's Christian seminary academy. The community's morals are outraged and the school's credibility wounded upon the discovery that Mr. and Mrs. Peacocke, a respectable American couple hired to the academy by Wortle, are indeed improperly married. Their wedlock was rendered asunder by their chance meeting, some years prior, of Mrs. Peacocke's first husband, an abusive drunkard named Colonel Ferdinand Lefroy. Hearing that an ambiguous Colonel Lefroy was killed during the Civil War, the two rightfully assumed it was Ferdinand and married. Yet it is their strange persistence in living as husband and wife, even after the shocking revelation, that creates a scandal. Wortle, though religious, sympathizes with the Peacockes and is understanding of their love for each other and hatred for Colonel Lefroy. The book is thus of the interest in providing multiple stories: that of Wortle's attempt to rebuild his reputation, provide rebuttal for malicious slander and all the while insist he was right in hiring the Peacockes; Mr. Peacocke's journey to America in search of Ferdinand's true status; the sexual concerns of the Wortles' daughter Mary and the insights of the community members who see the intentional bigamy as a sin.
External links
- "The Westminster review, Volume 116" - Google Books
- "A life of John Calvin: a study in the shaping of Western culture" - Google Books
Works by Anthony Trollope Single novels The Macdermots of Ballycloran (1847) · The Kellys and the O'Kellys (1848) · La Vendée: An Historical Romance (1850) · The Three Clerks (1858) · The Bertrams (1859) · Castle Richmond (1860) · Orley Farm (1862) · The Struggles of Brown, Jones & Robinson (1862) · Rachel Ray (1863) · Miss Mackenzie (1865) · The Belton Estate (1866) · The Claverings (1867) · Nina Balatka (1867) · Linda Tressel (1868) · He Knew He Was Right (1869) · The Vicar of Bullhampton (1870) · Sir Harry Hotspur of Humblethwaite (1871) · Ralph the Heir (1871) · The Golden Lion of Granpère (1872) · Harry Heathcote of Gangoil (1874) · Lady Anna (1874) · The Way We Live Now (1875) · The American Senator (1877) · Is He Popenjoy? (1878) · John Caldigate (1879) · An Eye for an Eye (1879) · Cousin Henry (1879) · Ayala's Angel (1881) · Doctor Wortle's School (1881) · The Fixed Period (1882) · Kept in the Dark (1882) · Marion Fay (1882) · Mr. Scarborough's Family (1883) · The Landleaguers (1883) · An Old Man's Love (1884)
Novel series Chronicles of Barsetshire: The Warden (1855) · Barchester Towers (1857) · Doctor Thorne (1858) · Framley Parsonage (1861) · The Small House at Allington (1864) · The Last Chronicle of Barset (1867)
Palliser novels: Can You Forgive Her? (1865) · Phineas Finn (1869) · The Eustace Diamonds (1873) · Phineas Redux (1874) · The Prime Minister (1876) · The Duke's Children (1880)Short stories/
Short story collectionsTales of All Countries--1st Series (1861) · Tales of All Countries--2nd Series (1863) · Malachi's Cove (1864) · Lotta Schmidt & Other Stories (1867) · An Editor's Tales (1870) · Christmas at Kirkby Cottage (1870) · Catherine Carmichael (1878) · Why Frau Frohmann Raised Her Prices and other Stories (1882) · The Two Heroines of Plumpington (1882) · Not If I Know It (1882)
Non-fiction The West Indies and the Spanish Main (1859) · North America (1862) · Hunting Sketches (1865) · Travelling Sketches (1866) · Clergymen of the Church of England (1866) · On English Prose Fiction as a Rational Amusement (1869) · The Commentaries of Caesar (1870) · Australia and New Zealand (1873) · New South Wales & Queensland (1874) · South Africa (1878) · How the 'Mastiffs' Went to Iceland (1878) · Iceland (1878) · Thackeray (1879) · Life of Cicero (1880) · Lord Palmerston (1882) · An Autobiography (1883) · London Tradesmen (1927) · The New Zealander (1972)
Plays "Did He Steal It?" (1869) · "The Noble Jilt" (1923)
Categories:- 1881 novels
- Novels by Anthony Trollope
- Novel stubs
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