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Fanny
'Hugely enjoyable to read' Literary Review
304 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 2003
1 person is currently reading
231 people want to read
About the author
Edmund White
139 books913 followersEdmund Valentine White III was an American novelist, memoirist, playwright, biographer, and essayist. He was the recipient of Lambda Literary's Visionary Award, the National Book Foundation's Lifetime Achievement Award, and the PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction. France made him Chevalier (and later Officier) de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 1993.
White was known as a groundbreaking writer of gay literature and a major influence on gay American literature and has been called "the first major queer novelist to champion a new generation of writers."
White was known as a groundbreaking writer of gay literature and a major influence on gay American literature and has been called "the first major queer novelist to champion a new generation of writers."
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Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews
August 10, 2012
Edmund White, as talented as he is, still sometimes writes as if he wants to prove to people that he did his research beforehand. His biography on Genet was exhaustively detailed – so much so that it took me months of picking it up and putting it down to get through it (I commented back then that I didn’t need to know about absolutely every piece of feces Genet was fixated on.) Fanny sometimes falls into this trap of overexplaining.
Fanny is based on fact, but it is fiction. Fanny refers not to one, but two women of the early 19th century. Fanny Wright was a Scottish heiress and Utopia adherent. At times she was free love; other times she was communist, and she ran her fortune to ground trying to start up her own commune and help others with their political fantasies.
Fanny Trollope was the mother of the famous writer. She writes, because her sick lawyer husband couldn’t keep the family finances together. (In fact, she’s narrating this “messy” account of her time with Wright; the book’s wobbly gimmick is that it was compiled from the old Trollope’s unedited manuscripts.) Trollope also fancied herself a “Utopianist.”
There is some strong indication that these two Fannys knew each other; in White’s fictional novel (with a library of fact thrown throughout), Trollope became fascinated with Wright’s ideas and followed her around the globe, becoming a groupie until the commune plan fell apart and the writer became a bit of an adversary to the heiress.
Are you overloaded with fact yet? Wait until White throws in European aristocracy like Lafayette and American free love adherents like Robert Owen. Then, of course, we need to know about Continental class systems, American slavery, the setup of Cincinatti, the arrangement of Memphis, the levels of a typical Missippi steamboat, the birth of the Creole language, the start of Haiti, and other stuff.
Still, there is some fascinating storytelling going on here. White also knows that we cannot escape our time we live in, so he doesn’t let his women escape their era. Both Wright and Trollope are strong women in a world that still values men. Their ideas of race are still very parental and controlling. The protagonists’ battles for racial and social equality are hampered by their inabilities to see how they themselves constantly support the expectations of the class system.
Throughout the novel, Trollope espouses equal rights while complaining that her hired servant girl doesn’t want to work. She has some nasty thoughts about black people, too. Finally, Trollope insults Wright for using her looks to influence situations, because both women are unable to see themselves as groundbreakers in 19th century society. One uses schemes and writing to keep her family from complete destitution; the other uses sex (Camille Paglia would be proud.)
Still, I wish the book – with its forays into descriptions of architecture and portrait painting and food – would’ve been shorter. White’s skill as a writer is undoubted; his skill as an editor is still in question.
Fanny is based on fact, but it is fiction. Fanny refers not to one, but two women of the early 19th century. Fanny Wright was a Scottish heiress and Utopia adherent. At times she was free love; other times she was communist, and she ran her fortune to ground trying to start up her own commune and help others with their political fantasies.
Fanny Trollope was the mother of the famous writer. She writes, because her sick lawyer husband couldn’t keep the family finances together. (In fact, she’s narrating this “messy” account of her time with Wright; the book’s wobbly gimmick is that it was compiled from the old Trollope’s unedited manuscripts.) Trollope also fancied herself a “Utopianist.”
There is some strong indication that these two Fannys knew each other; in White’s fictional novel (with a library of fact thrown throughout), Trollope became fascinated with Wright’s ideas and followed her around the globe, becoming a groupie until the commune plan fell apart and the writer became a bit of an adversary to the heiress.
Are you overloaded with fact yet? Wait until White throws in European aristocracy like Lafayette and American free love adherents like Robert Owen. Then, of course, we need to know about Continental class systems, American slavery, the setup of Cincinatti, the arrangement of Memphis, the levels of a typical Missippi steamboat, the birth of the Creole language, the start of Haiti, and other stuff.
Still, there is some fascinating storytelling going on here. White also knows that we cannot escape our time we live in, so he doesn’t let his women escape their era. Both Wright and Trollope are strong women in a world that still values men. Their ideas of race are still very parental and controlling. The protagonists’ battles for racial and social equality are hampered by their inabilities to see how they themselves constantly support the expectations of the class system.
Throughout the novel, Trollope espouses equal rights while complaining that her hired servant girl doesn’t want to work. She has some nasty thoughts about black people, too. Finally, Trollope insults Wright for using her looks to influence situations, because both women are unable to see themselves as groundbreakers in 19th century society. One uses schemes and writing to keep her family from complete destitution; the other uses sex (Camille Paglia would be proud.)
Still, I wish the book – with its forays into descriptions of architecture and portrait painting and food – would’ve been shorter. White’s skill as a writer is undoubted; his skill as an editor is still in question.
May 12, 2013
A rollicking "memoir" of Mrs Francis Trollope, would-be biographer of the late Fanny Wright, abolitionist, feminist, lover, free-thinker and out-and-out rogue - Edmund White beautifully captures the gossipy tell-all sensibility of the early 19th century as he thrusts us head-first into Mrs Trollope's world including a splendid portrait of America in the 1820s - a world where the ideals of democracy have been crushed by incompetence and greed, where utopian thinkers are trying to revive those dashed hopes in colonies that are equally unsustainable and where aging heroes like Lafayette and Jefferson still are players, though now doing walk-on parts rather than being centre-stage. Lovely to read on a rainy day in May!
December 20, 2024
I enjoyed this novel immensely which surprised me because I was very wary of tackling another historical novel by White after the extent of my disappointment with his 'Hotel of Dreams'. If you have any such reservations forget them, this is a wonderful novel.
I have only a passing knowledge of the period and its major characters, including Fanny Trollope and have not read her famous book 'Domestic Manners of the Americans', but I don't think if you read this novel in absolute ignorance you would have any difficulty being captivated and drawn in to the life of both major characters Fanny Trollope and Fanny Wright. Fanny Trollope dominates the novel (which is presented as her biography of her one time friend Fanny Wright) because she is by far the most human of the two Fanny's. On the surface Fanny Trollope should be easy to dismiss and even dislike because she is a conservative holding the most conventional views and attitudes. Fanny Wright on the other hand is a radical, ahead of her times (aren't they always) who dreams of building the new Jerusalem here on earth with equality for women, blacks, working men and who despises religion and patriarchal family life. Her intentions are the best and her principals are laudable. But Fanny Trollope is the one who grows and changes in many ways because her heart is in the right place. She has her preconceptions and prejudices but no fixed principals because she sees people not theories while Fanny Wright will make a hell and call it heaven (my apologies to Tacitus) to advance her principals and theories. For Trollope, the sentimentalist, people matter, for Wright what matters is theory.
I wouldn't want you to imagine the novel is either didactic or preachy, White has done an immense amount of research and clearly loves the period and both Fanny Trollope and Wright. He doesn't quote either of their writings but uses them and his research to create characters that are believable even when he resorts to inventions, such as Trollope's trip to Haiti. This is historical fiction at its best - I have certainly criticized writers of historical fiction who loose touch with reality and invent what would appeal to today's readers and thus create stories were history becomes no more then a dressing up box - that is easy. But what White does, to write fiction that, even when invented, emerges from and of the period it is set in is the wort of genius.
There are a few infelicitous areas in the novel but so minor as to be unimportant, they do not spoil or bedevil the work unless you are a really dogmatic pedant (and I can be pedantic so ignoring anachronisms is not my usual stance). I adored this book - it is wonderful fiction writing and superb historical fiction and an example of what great historical fiction can be. If only more authors who tackled the genre would follow White.
Finally is this a gay novel? There is a tiny, potential, gay sub plot but to call it a gay novel would have to be based on the assertion that everything a known and proclaimed gay author writes is gay. Such a view was proclaimed but I wonder if anyone still believes it? I am happy to argue the toss and be convinced if anyone feels I am wrong in not shelving this novel under 'Literature-Queer-interest' please let me know.
I have only a passing knowledge of the period and its major characters, including Fanny Trollope and have not read her famous book 'Domestic Manners of the Americans', but I don't think if you read this novel in absolute ignorance you would have any difficulty being captivated and drawn in to the life of both major characters Fanny Trollope and Fanny Wright. Fanny Trollope dominates the novel (which is presented as her biography of her one time friend Fanny Wright) because she is by far the most human of the two Fanny's. On the surface Fanny Trollope should be easy to dismiss and even dislike because she is a conservative holding the most conventional views and attitudes. Fanny Wright on the other hand is a radical, ahead of her times (aren't they always) who dreams of building the new Jerusalem here on earth with equality for women, blacks, working men and who despises religion and patriarchal family life. Her intentions are the best and her principals are laudable. But Fanny Trollope is the one who grows and changes in many ways because her heart is in the right place. She has her preconceptions and prejudices but no fixed principals because she sees people not theories while Fanny Wright will make a hell and call it heaven (my apologies to Tacitus) to advance her principals and theories. For Trollope, the sentimentalist, people matter, for Wright what matters is theory.
I wouldn't want you to imagine the novel is either didactic or preachy, White has done an immense amount of research and clearly loves the period and both Fanny Trollope and Wright. He doesn't quote either of their writings but uses them and his research to create characters that are believable even when he resorts to inventions, such as Trollope's trip to Haiti. This is historical fiction at its best - I have certainly criticized writers of historical fiction who loose touch with reality and invent what would appeal to today's readers and thus create stories were history becomes no more then a dressing up box - that is easy. But what White does, to write fiction that, even when invented, emerges from and of the period it is set in is the wort of genius.
There are a few infelicitous areas in the novel but so minor as to be unimportant, they do not spoil or bedevil the work unless you are a really dogmatic pedant (and I can be pedantic so ignoring anachronisms is not my usual stance). I adored this book - it is wonderful fiction writing and superb historical fiction and an example of what great historical fiction can be. If only more authors who tackled the genre would follow White.
Finally is this a gay novel? There is a tiny, potential, gay sub plot but to call it a gay novel would have to be based on the assertion that everything a known and proclaimed gay author writes is gay. Such a view was proclaimed but I wonder if anyone still believes it? I am happy to argue the toss and be convinced if anyone feels I am wrong in not shelving this novel under 'Literature-Queer-interest' please let me know.
August 7, 2009
A most intriguing book. It's narrated in first person by the Victorian English writer Francis Trollope, who was one of thos Europeans who toured antebellum America (a la Tocqueville) & wrote up their impressions for a curious European audience. She is supposedly writing a biography of the 19th-century European & American reformer Fanny Wright, but she keeps getting sidetracked by her own story. Trollope is in many ways obtuse, but the fascinating thing is how White somehow manages to reveal to us through her voice things (such as her son's homosexuality) that she herself does not know. It's a writing trick that I don't see how it works, but it does.
September 7, 2019
This book is written as the fictionalized unfinished manuscript of Francis Trollope writing about Fanny Wright. Francis Trollope was the mother of Anthony Trollope; in fact she was a prolific writer in her own right (although I think her son's writing is more enduring). Despite having seven (!) children, she led an adventurous and travel-filled life; she met Fanny Wright in the 1820s when her family was experiencing financial difficulties. Fanny Wright was close to Gilbert du Motier, the Marquis de Lafayette, a famous French general who participated in the American Revolution. Fanny Wright was an atheist, a feminist, an abolitionist, a social reformist. She had an idea for a utopian society, and Francis Trollope decided that this was an opportunity for her family to escape some of their financial difficulties - start a new life in America! She and three of her children sailed for America when Francis was 48 years old. Her husband and two eldest sons stayed behind. Life in America was hard, and their financial difficulties worsened. Fanny Wright's social experiments were largely failures. Francis Trollope moved back to Europe after 5yrs in America. She wrote a famous book on American society that ensured her family's financial security.
Edmund White cleverly writes about the two Fannys - both extraordinary. In White's hands, Francis Trollope has a great voice - she believes in honesty (sometimes brutal), and her personality shines through. She was feisty and liberal - one leaves the novel wanting to be her friend as she seems to have so much fun! She struggles to portray and understand Fanny Wright, who was stoic. Despite overlapping liberal views (Wright advocated for universal education, birth control, sexual freedom, liberal divorce laws, etc), the two women were independent and spoke their minds and these views were sometimes at odds. The book reads like a biography or even a journal/diary.
Edmund White cleverly writes about the two Fannys - both extraordinary. In White's hands, Francis Trollope has a great voice - she believes in honesty (sometimes brutal), and her personality shines through. She was feisty and liberal - one leaves the novel wanting to be her friend as she seems to have so much fun! She struggles to portray and understand Fanny Wright, who was stoic. Despite overlapping liberal views (Wright advocated for universal education, birth control, sexual freedom, liberal divorce laws, etc), the two women were independent and spoke their minds and these views were sometimes at odds. The book reads like a biography or even a journal/diary.
August 8, 2020
A rather strange book.
An author known for his gay/AIDS semi-autobiographical works, has written a faux historical biography of a slightly obscure 19th century proto-feminist, as written by another now obscure 19th century contemporary... it's quite tongue in cheek, with editor's notes and horrified family edits included.
I'm not sure this was where I should have started with Edmund White, but I was intrigued...
An author known for his gay/AIDS semi-autobiographical works, has written a faux historical biography of a slightly obscure 19th century proto-feminist, as written by another now obscure 19th century contemporary... it's quite tongue in cheek, with editor's notes and horrified family edits included.
I'm not sure this was where I should have started with Edmund White, but I was intrigued...
June 30, 2023
Yeah, just not a fan of White. While parts of this were funny and very well written (the guy’s writing as an “older” woman in the 1820’s), per usual it’s very “we’re so much more civilized than others” – and this was supposed to be parody. Won’t stop me from reading anything else the guy puts out, though.
June 10, 2025
Beautifully written, delightful historical novel by a master stylist.
May 29, 2012
When I bought "Fanny" at a little book store in North Branch last year, I was sorely misled by the enticing synopsis on the back. I was under the impression that this novel followed a woman named Frances Trollope and her lover, the feminist Fanny Wright, which can be deduced when it says Trollope entered a "sensual adventure" to America with her flame-haired companion. Well, I was wrong. This isn't cool lesbian historical fiction, its just effing pretentious and void of any emotion or intrigue.
I just couldn't get into the story and there was so much history I wasn't familiar with. Mrs. Trollope is an aging mother living in England in the 1820's who has made some money as an author, but she is looking for her next topic. She meets Fanny Wright, a younger woman who is passionate about feminism (yeah, right- feminism didn't even exist as a term at that time, and Fanny Wright is NOT a feminist), abolition, and free love. I don't even know, she's a spoiled baby who attaches herself to older men and uses their money to fund her idealistic plans, then when they fall through she blames everyone but herself. She takes Trollope to America with Trollope's children and a homosexual French painter who, unbeknowst to the clueless Trollope, is boning her youngest son. In America, Fanny tries to start some sort of freed slave colony, which is an epic racist failure, and then Trollope has an affair with a black man named Jupiter, which is the only good, emotional part of the novel, and it ended so quickly.
The novel drags on forever, gets lost in its own pretentious "brilliant" witticisms, and focuses too much on the unimportant. The ending was crap and it should've ended when Trollope's children passed, but there was some shit with a seance and I was SO BORED. This book is lame and misleading. Unless you're really into the time period and the history (I don't even know what the history is, it is a weird blend of French and British religious and political theories along with 1800's New Orleans and Cincinnati culture), don't read this misleading book. It isn't a frolicking feminist lesbian romance, it is a total drag.
I just couldn't get into the story and there was so much history I wasn't familiar with. Mrs. Trollope is an aging mother living in England in the 1820's who has made some money as an author, but she is looking for her next topic. She meets Fanny Wright, a younger woman who is passionate about feminism (yeah, right- feminism didn't even exist as a term at that time, and Fanny Wright is NOT a feminist), abolition, and free love. I don't even know, she's a spoiled baby who attaches herself to older men and uses their money to fund her idealistic plans, then when they fall through she blames everyone but herself. She takes Trollope to America with Trollope's children and a homosexual French painter who, unbeknowst to the clueless Trollope, is boning her youngest son. In America, Fanny tries to start some sort of freed slave colony, which is an epic racist failure, and then Trollope has an affair with a black man named Jupiter, which is the only good, emotional part of the novel, and it ended so quickly.
The novel drags on forever, gets lost in its own pretentious "brilliant" witticisms, and focuses too much on the unimportant. The ending was crap and it should've ended when Trollope's children passed, but there was some shit with a seance and I was SO BORED. This book is lame and misleading. Unless you're really into the time period and the history (I don't even know what the history is, it is a weird blend of French and British religious and political theories along with 1800's New Orleans and Cincinnati culture), don't read this misleading book. It isn't a frolicking feminist lesbian romance, it is a total drag.
January 6, 2016
This book is a bit of a departure of what you’d expect from a White’s novel. No auto-fiction here, no pre-aids or post-aids gay culture & history, no Paris fascination (well, this one just a bit). Better so, because, free from it’s classic themes, you can savour all White’s artistry. This 19th century novel is beautifully crafted, in a complex mirrored way: pretending to write a biography of her friend and pre-feminist Fanny Wright, writer Fanny Trollope tells her story and that of her family. But most important, Trollope tells us the story of the birth of a nation, the modern United States of America. Why America is so contradictory, how freedom and justice for all cohabits with slavery and segregation, how a nation can be simultaneously the cradle of democracy and of religious fundamentalism.
The magic of literature is that all this is written with style and humour and with an attention to detail that brings back to life the mores and manners of early 19th century.
The magic of literature is that all this is written with style and humour and with an attention to detail that brings back to life the mores and manners of early 19th century.
November 17, 2010
"I was so tempted to object, to say that reading was the gateway of the soul, that it was an anti-clock to banish time, that it was a wand to give us the past alive and warm and softly treading in our palm like a kitten, that reading dropped over us a veil and spirited us into a harem or clamped us in chains and put us behind bars, that it fed us on the drugged sherbets of Arabia or the raw meat of the steppes - but I bit my tongue and reflected on the chilling horrors of New World practicality."
"As I lay in bed that night I couldn't sleep at all, so busy was I remembering all the fine sallies and piquant mots; I was twitching to the right and left as I chimed in with brilliant retorts, those inspired afterthoughts the French call the "wit of the staircase," l'esprit d'escalier.
"As I lay in bed that night I couldn't sleep at all, so busy was I remembering all the fine sallies and piquant mots; I was twitching to the right and left as I chimed in with brilliant retorts, those inspired afterthoughts the French call the "wit of the staircase," l'esprit d'escalier.
July 12, 2010
Was amazed that such a freethinking woman, Franny Wright, could travel so freely and speak so openly on social reforms for workers and women in addition to the abolition of slavery in her period of history: 1795-1852. Enjoyed the humor of her biographer, Fanny Trollope. This is a novel, so I wonder about the "poetic" license taken by the author!
October 5, 2011
Fascinating and well-researched, well-written historical fiction about two well-known 19th century women: Fanny Trolloppe, the mother of the famous English novelist and the voiced narrator, and Frances Wright, the radical feminist, speaker and writer who came to America from her native Scotland and made waves.
September 20, 2008
A great history-fiction book about what the British thought about the new Americans. The main character Fanny is inspirational in her ability to survive (even though I thought she was rather rash at times!)
July 1, 2013
So this wasn't bad enough to put down but it wasn't that good, either. I probably should have put it down - I didn't like the characters, the plot wasn't captivating, and I didn't feel the writing was anything to write home about either. Oh well.
May 18, 2008
I had a hard time getting into it, and I thought the development of the story was slow going.
October 16, 2010
Would of enjoyed a bit more fact, and a little less fiction.
November 2, 2010
The reader struck again. Need I say more?
February 15, 2020
Trying to hard to be literary for its own sake, but provided interesting insights into 1820s U.S, including the establishing communities for intellectual reasons (kind of like shakers)
July 13, 2011
lots of historical information
interesting story but a bit difficult to follow at times
interesting story but a bit difficult to follow at times
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Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews