Palliser novels

The Palliser novels are six novels by Anthony Trollope.

The common thread is the wealthy aristocrat and politician Plantagenet Palliser and (in all but the last book) his wife Lady Glencora. The plots usually involve English politics in varying degrees, specifically in and around Parliament.

The books are:

• Can You Forgive Her? (1864)
• Phineas Finn (1869)
• The Eustace Diamonds (1873)
• Phineas Redux (1874)
• The Prime Minister (1876)
• The Duke's Children (1879)

The series stands in contrast to Trollope's Chronicles of Barsetshire, also six novels, which deal with life in a more rural fictional county.

The series is alluded to in Anna Karenina, which deals with a similar theme.

Adaptations

In 1974 the BBC adapted the Palliser novels as a twenty-six part serial The Pallisers, also using some material from Trollope's Barsetshire novel The Small House at Allington (1864). The series starred Susan Hampshire as Lady Glencora M'Cluskie and Philip Latham as Plantagenet Palliser. Sudeley Castle, once the home of Catherine Parr, sixth wife of Henry VIII, was the location used for Matching Priory, the Pallisers' country residence.

Other cast members in the adaptation included:

• Donal McCann as Phineas Finn
• Derek Jacobi as Lord Fawn
• Roger Livesey as the Duke of St Bungey
• Anna Massey as Lady Laura Kennedy
• Barbara Murray as Madame Max Goesler
• Jeremy Irons as Frank Tregear
• Bryan Pringle as Mr Monk
• Anthony Andrews as Lord Silverbridge
• Fabia Drake as the Countess of Midlothian
• Peter Sallis as Mr Bonteen
• June Whitfield as Mrs Bonteen
• Anthony Ainley as the Reverend Mr Emilius
• Donald Pickering as Dolly Longestaffe
• Sonia Dresdel as the Marchioness of Auld Reekie
• Moray Watson as Barrington Erle
• Martin Jarvis as Frank Greystock
• Terence Alexander as Lord George de Bruce Carruthers
• Penelope Keith as Mrs Hittaway
• Clifford Rose as Quintus Slide

• Lynne Frederick as Isabel Boncassen
• Mel Martin as Violet Effingham
• Roland Culver as the Duke of Omnium
• Sarah Badel as Lizzie Eustace
• Jeremy Clyde as Gerard Maule
• Sheila Ruskin as Emily Wharton
• Edward Hardwicke as the Prince of Wales
• John Ringham as Major Tifto
• Caroline Mortimer as Alice Vavasor
• Gary Watson as George Vavasor
• Donald Eccles as Squire Vavasor
• Kate Nicholls as Lady Mary Palliser
• Anna Carteret as Lady Mabel Grex
• Stuart Wilson as Ferdinand Lopez
• Carolyn Jones as Patience Crabstick
• Helen Lindsay as Mrs Carbuncle
• Rachel Herbert as Lady Dumbello
• Barry Justice as Burgo Fitzgerald

This production is also available on DVD. The rights for distribution are owned by Acorn Media UK.

There was also a 12-part BBC Radio 4 "Classic Serial" dramatisation in 2004, which has been re-broadcast a number of times on BBC Radio 7. The serial was narrated by David Troughton as Trollope, with Ben Miles as Plantagenet Palliser and Sophie Thompson as Lady Glencora.