SOURCE: “Trollope and Stories: ‘Of Course, That's Only My Story’,” in Romanticism and Anthony Trollope: A Study in the Continuities of Nineteenth-Century Literary Thought, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1990, pp. 215-49.

In the following essay, Swingle investigates the contention that Trollope reformulates the same plot in many of his novels. Swingle maintains that the variations accented by these repetitions are significant in that they reveal lessons and themes Trollope hoped to highlight, such as the instability of human nature.

I

Trollope's proclivity for plot repetition probably accounts in part for why he is rarely considered a writer of the absolutely first order. Trollope tells variations of the same story over and over again. Dedicated Trollopians like to try ignoring this seeming artistic tic, often by proposing that plot is not what matters in reading Trollope.¹ But the repetition tends to trouble other readers, raising questions for them...