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Trilby
First published in 1894, the story of the diva Trilby O'Ferrall and her mentor, Svengali, has entered the mythology of that period alongside Dracula and Sherlock Holmes. Immensely popular for years, the novel led to a hit play, a series of popular films, Trilby products from hats to ice cream, and streets in Florida named after characters in the book. The setting reflects Du Maurier's bohemian years as an art student in Paris before he went to London to make a career in journalism. A celebrated caricaturist for Punch magazine, Du Maurier's drawings for the novel formed a large part of its appeal.
368 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1894
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About the author
George du Maurier
246 books36 followersGeorge Louis Palmella Busson du Maurier was a Franco-British cartoonist and author, known for his cartoons in Punch and for his novel Trilby. He was the father of actor Sir Gerald du Maurier and grandfather of writers Angela du Maurier and Dame Daphne du Maurier.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_d...
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_d...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 215 reviews
January 2, 2020
Simon Cowell:
"They will not let me play myself, but I can teach, I taught the girl to sing, she was nothing by herself. A good voice, but that won't make a great singer. I taught her phrase by phrase, she was my instrument. This is how it begins.
I take the money, she sings more excreble nonsense and always they pay and she gives me half. Soon she is playing in larger clubs and gets more money and I make more money. Perhaps I will find another little protegee, a string of them. I am a pimp then, a pimp with my girls,
But she betrayed me. She sang songs that were not mine. She wants to be off on her own now. I will have to find another girl, one who will not defy me in the end. One that will do as I bid, always.
I have someone in mind already. What is more, she is ready to be used. She will jump at the chance."
Not Simon. Svengali. Do you think he was SC's inspiration.
The ending is tragic.Simon Svengali dies and without his magic hypnosis and autotune, Trilby finds she cannot sing at all. She engages a singing master but her voice is just not good enough for her to perform live and it seems all is lost. But then she sees a photo of her hero, of the man himself, and for a brief moment she is transported back to the concert hall, the finale of American Idol, and she soars, it's her moment, She Can Sing. Just for a moment. Then that's that.
But then that's always the way with, the X Factor, Britain's Got Talent, American Idol isn't it? Once the hopeful stars'Svengali Simon has lost interest, they go back to the murky towns and used-car suburbs from which they came, emerging only at weekends in tribute bands and solo spots down at the pub. And possibly a spot on "Celebrity" Big Brother or similar 4th rate reality show in five years time. Trilby didn't even get that.
Great book. Very much fun to read.
"They will not let me play myself, but I can teach, I taught the girl to sing, she was nothing by herself. A good voice, but that won't make a great singer. I taught her phrase by phrase, she was my instrument. This is how it begins.
I take the money, she sings more excreble nonsense and always they pay and she gives me half. Soon she is playing in larger clubs and gets more money and I make more money. Perhaps I will find another little protegee, a string of them. I am a pimp then, a pimp with my girls,
But she betrayed me. She sang songs that were not mine. She wants to be off on her own now. I will have to find another girl, one who will not defy me in the end. One that will do as I bid, always.
I have someone in mind already. What is more, she is ready to be used. She will jump at the chance."
Not Simon. Svengali. Do you think he was SC's inspiration.
The ending is tragic.
But then that's always the way with, the X Factor, Britain's Got Talent, American Idol isn't it? Once the hopeful stars'
Great book. Very much fun to read.
October 27, 2022
Not long after it was first published in the 1890s George du Maurier’s novel became an international sensation, adapted for the stage, it lent its name to a bizarre array of goods from shoes to ice cream, all evidence of the Trilby mania that gripped its readers. It was supposedly admired by George Bernard Shaw and Henry James and sold in vast quantities. But now I’ve finally read it I really can’t understand why it was so successful. It’s a peculiar, incredibly messy piece: the plot’s thin and slow-moving; the structure shifts between sketch-like episodes, weirdly dramatic scenes, meandering conversations or diatribes about art or science; the intrusive narration sometimes suggests a fairy tale or fable but then there are strange flashes of satire or sentimentality.
The story itself is relatively straightforward, three Englishmen, known as the "three musketeers of the brush," take up painting and rent a studio in Paris. There they befriend a young, working-class girl, the orphan Trilby. An artist’s model, Trilby is caught between classes, her father was an English gentleman, her mother a bar maid. Trilby makes her living doing laundry, cleaning or posing for artists. Her comfort with posing nude apparently marks her out as a fallen woman. She’s described as tall, oddly "boyish", and, crucially, "tone deaf." The three men are also part of a circle that includes German Jew and musician Svengali, who’s set to become the villain of the piece – although he’s curiously absent from a lot of the action. Du Maurier follows this group over the course of several years, as Trilby disappears then mysteriously resurfaces as a famous diva who sings for audiences that include the crowned heads of Europe. Although the mystery element is so flatly delivered it barely makes an impression.
Du Maurier’s rambling narrative seems to be a vehicle for his confused ideas and numerous prejudices about race, women, bohemian communities, social hierarchies, and the culture of nineteenth-century Paris versus England. Everything seems to annoy him, he takes digs at class, London society, religion; throws in copious references to the literary and scientific trends and fads of the time, from mesmerism to Dickens to Darwinism, and finally lapses into the realms of syrupy melodrama. Even his anti-Semitism is muddled, with Svengali first portrayed as an appallingly negative, stereotype then later as a victim of unwarranted discrimination. I was left with a vague notion that Trilby's experiences and ultimate fate were intended to point some kind of moral but if so, I have no idea what it was. I suppose Trilby's phenomenal popularity makes it culturally significant on some level, but I thought it was uneven, incoherent and dull.
Victober 2022 Challenge - Novel plus film adaptation
The story itself is relatively straightforward, three Englishmen, known as the "three musketeers of the brush," take up painting and rent a studio in Paris. There they befriend a young, working-class girl, the orphan Trilby. An artist’s model, Trilby is caught between classes, her father was an English gentleman, her mother a bar maid. Trilby makes her living doing laundry, cleaning or posing for artists. Her comfort with posing nude apparently marks her out as a fallen woman. She’s described as tall, oddly "boyish", and, crucially, "tone deaf." The three men are also part of a circle that includes German Jew and musician Svengali, who’s set to become the villain of the piece – although he’s curiously absent from a lot of the action. Du Maurier follows this group over the course of several years, as Trilby disappears then mysteriously resurfaces as a famous diva who sings for audiences that include the crowned heads of Europe. Although the mystery element is so flatly delivered it barely makes an impression.
Du Maurier’s rambling narrative seems to be a vehicle for his confused ideas and numerous prejudices about race, women, bohemian communities, social hierarchies, and the culture of nineteenth-century Paris versus England. Everything seems to annoy him, he takes digs at class, London society, religion; throws in copious references to the literary and scientific trends and fads of the time, from mesmerism to Dickens to Darwinism, and finally lapses into the realms of syrupy melodrama. Even his anti-Semitism is muddled, with Svengali first portrayed as an appallingly negative, stereotype then later as a victim of unwarranted discrimination. I was left with a vague notion that Trilby's experiences and ultimate fate were intended to point some kind of moral but if so, I have no idea what it was. I suppose Trilby's phenomenal popularity makes it culturally significant on some level, but I thought it was uneven, incoherent and dull.
Victober 2022 Challenge - Novel plus film adaptation
December 19, 2017
One day after a long session shelf-diving on Goodreads, I came upon the title of Trilby by DuMaurier. I was pleased to discover my local library had a copy, and placed it on hold. Over a year later, I received notice that it had come in. It was a first edition in the original, now torn, binding and cover. It had apparently been removed from the shelves for restitching.
What a treasure it is, with wood block prints of DuMaurier’s characters, Taffy, Billie, Trilby, and the infamous Svengali. The words Trilby and Svengali have stayed in the English vocabulary as a result of this influential book which eventually became a wildly popular stage and theatre production, inspiring Gaston Leroux’s Phantom of the Opera and parodies.
George DuMaurier, grandfather of the English authoress Daphne DuMaurier, was a cartoonist for Punch magazine in the late 1800’s. He created a fine series of portraits, both in etchings and in words, of three British subjects enjoying la bohème lifestyle in Paris at century end when they come across a lovely, untutored artist’s model called Trilby who inspires them to great heights of emotion.
A successful cartoonist must capture in a line a frame of mind and a personal characteristic. DuMaurier succeeds well enough in both the drawings and the writing for this novel, and in several cases captures the essence of character, if not in a word, then in a paragraph. Of Trilby she was “the warmest, most helpful, and most compassionate of friends, far more serious in and faithful in friendship than in love.”
As for Little Billee, the young and talented painter who was wont to die of love for the woman who was to come under the spell of Svengali:
“Then a moment of silence and breathless suspense—curiosity on tiptoe!”(p. 316)
But I shan’t tell you the end, as it is for you to read for yourselves. But there is a lovely section towards the end in which Trilby gives her rendition of what praying is:
What a treasure it is, with wood block prints of DuMaurier’s characters, Taffy, Billie, Trilby, and the infamous Svengali. The words Trilby and Svengali have stayed in the English vocabulary as a result of this influential book which eventually became a wildly popular stage and theatre production, inspiring Gaston Leroux’s Phantom of the Opera and parodies.
George DuMaurier, grandfather of the English authoress Daphne DuMaurier, was a cartoonist for Punch magazine in the late 1800’s. He created a fine series of portraits, both in etchings and in words, of three British subjects enjoying la bohème lifestyle in Paris at century end when they come across a lovely, untutored artist’s model called Trilby who inspires them to great heights of emotion.
A successful cartoonist must capture in a line a frame of mind and a personal characteristic. DuMaurier succeeds well enough in both the drawings and the writing for this novel, and in several cases captures the essence of character, if not in a word, then in a paragraph. Of Trilby she was “the warmest, most helpful, and most compassionate of friends, far more serious in and faithful in friendship than in love.”
Whether it be an aggravation of her misdeeds or and extenuating circumstance, no pressure of want, no temptations of greed or vanity, had ever been factors in urging Trilby on her downward career after her first false step in that direction—the result of ignorance, bad advice (from her mother, of all people in the world), and base betrayal. She might have lived in guilty splendor has she chosen, but her wants were few. She had no vanity, and her tastes were of the simplest, and she earned enough to gratify them all, and to spare…So she followed love for love’s sake only, now and then, as she would have followed art if she had been a man—capriciously, desultorily, more in a frolicsome spirit of camaraderie than anything else. Like an amateur, in short—a distinguished amateur who is too proud to sell his pictures, but willingly gives one away now and then to some highly valued and much admiring friend.
As for Little Billee, the young and talented painter who was wont to die of love for the woman who was to come under the spell of Svengali:
Little Billee was small and slender, about twenty or twenty-one, and had a straight white forehead veined with blue, large dark-blue eyes, delicate regular features, and coal-black hair. He was also very graceful and well built, with very small hands and feet…And in his winning and handsome face there was just a faint suggestion of some possible very remote Jewish ancestor—just a tinge of that strong, sturdy, irrepressible, indomitable, indelible blood which is such priceless value in diluted homeopathic doses, like dry white Spanish wine called montijo, which is not meant to be taken pure; but without a judicious admixture of which no sherry can go round the world and keep its flavor intact…Fortunately for the world, and especially for ourselves, most of us have in our veins at least a minim of that precious fluid, whether we know it or show it or not. Tant pis pour les autres! [Too bad for the others!]But Little Billee’s upper middle class family approved not of his choice of artist’s model living hand-to-mouth, and so she fell under the spell of Svengali:
He had bold, brilliant black eyes, with long heavy lids, a thin, sallow face, and a beard of burnt-up black which grew almost from under his eyelids; and over it his mustache, a shade lighter, fell in two long spiral twists.
“Then a moment of silence and breathless suspense—curiosity on tiptoe!”(p. 316)
But I shan’t tell you the end, as it is for you to read for yourselves. But there is a lovely section towards the end in which Trilby gives her rendition of what praying is:
”Pray to Him? Well, not—not often—not in words and on my knees and with my hands together, you know! Thinking’s praying, very often—don’t you think so? And so’s being sorry and ashamed when one’s done a mean thing, and glad when one’s resisted a temptation, and grateful when it’s a fine day and one’s enjoying one’s self without hurting any one else! What is it but praying when you try and bear up after losing all you cared to live for? And very good praying too! There can be prayers without words just as well as songs I suppose; and Svengali used to say that songs without words are the best!”Oxford World Classics republished this novel in 1999, and Penguin Classics has a reprint published in 1995. It has been in circulation for nearly 120 years because it is a classic, and it is one you might want to have a look at one day, to see what inspired all the follow-on art: the music and plays and fashion and film and other stories.
February 22, 2014
Well, this was quite the anti-Semitic rag. Even for the norms of the time, which were notoriously lax about this sort of thing, and a publication date perilously close to the Dreyfus affair, this book has a... kick in it, shall we say.
My favourite moment of that Antisemitism was when the villain - a Jew to end all Jews, of course, although not religious, unwashed and naturally cowardly - noticing the hero all alone and dejected and "being an Oriental Israelite Hebrew Jew, could not help but spit at him." Wow, tell me more! Could you find another racial noun to add into that not-at-all-redundant chain, perhaps?
Being a Jew, or a non-Jew, or a part-Jew, is a big deal in this book in general. The author's attention to Jewishness is worthy of a strict rabbi right before a wedding. One of his protagonists, in an attempt, perhaps, to forestall claims to prejudice, is described as having a "small part of that blood which, in isolation..." well, you can imagine, "but without which no beauty is possible," or something like that. Thanks, author! Your universal acceptance is fortifying and encouraging. Whereas a Jew alone is like an ugly bulldog, you need someone in your family somewhere to have consented to tolerate one of these in order to provide, suitably diluted, many generations down the line, a good sample of a fighting dog. Yup. No racism there.
Fortunately for my conscience, the book possesses many more virtues, such as, for example, half a section - not a chapter, note, a section - in which the protagonist monologues incessantly to a dog. And, as though to remind us that it is the dog he is monologing to, uses his (the dog's) name every other sentence. The most noted part of the woman in the centre of the story, the eponymous Trilby, is her foot, of all things, being, apparently, the most perfect appendage in the universe and sufficient for the "sensitive, brilliant painter" to fall in love with her for ever. Well, I suppose one cannot expect in a book from 1893 to have a woman's merits considered, rather than her feet.
The book does have a few moments of grace to it, for example, like the author's surprising tolerance for women of the "lower" sort who sit nude for sculptors and painters in portraits of all sorts. I guess he realises that if all women were of "unimpeachable virtue" artists and sculptors of the time would be in severe trouble. There is also occasionally the glimmering of a sense of humour in there, somewhere, as when talking about the French aristocracy and attitudes towards them at the fin-de-ciecle period. But, on the whole, the fact that this was a bestseller is cause for much eyebrow raising and concern.
My favourite moment of that Antisemitism was when the villain - a Jew to end all Jews, of course, although not religious, unwashed and naturally cowardly - noticing the hero all alone and dejected and "being an Oriental Israelite Hebrew Jew, could not help but spit at him." Wow, tell me more! Could you find another racial noun to add into that not-at-all-redundant chain, perhaps?
Being a Jew, or a non-Jew, or a part-Jew, is a big deal in this book in general. The author's attention to Jewishness is worthy of a strict rabbi right before a wedding. One of his protagonists, in an attempt, perhaps, to forestall claims to prejudice, is described as having a "small part of that blood which, in isolation..." well, you can imagine, "but without which no beauty is possible," or something like that. Thanks, author! Your universal acceptance is fortifying and encouraging. Whereas a Jew alone is like an ugly bulldog, you need someone in your family somewhere to have consented to tolerate one of these in order to provide, suitably diluted, many generations down the line, a good sample of a fighting dog. Yup. No racism there.
Fortunately for my conscience, the book possesses many more virtues, such as, for example, half a section - not a chapter, note, a section - in which the protagonist monologues incessantly to a dog. And, as though to remind us that it is the dog he is monologing to, uses his (the dog's) name every other sentence. The most noted part of the woman in the centre of the story, the eponymous Trilby, is her foot, of all things, being, apparently, the most perfect appendage in the universe and sufficient for the "sensitive, brilliant painter" to fall in love with her for ever. Well, I suppose one cannot expect in a book from 1893 to have a woman's merits considered, rather than her feet.
The book does have a few moments of grace to it, for example, like the author's surprising tolerance for women of the "lower" sort who sit nude for sculptors and painters in portraits of all sorts. I guess he realises that if all women were of "unimpeachable virtue" artists and sculptors of the time would be in severe trouble. There is also occasionally the glimmering of a sense of humour in there, somewhere, as when talking about the French aristocracy and attitudes towards them at the fin-de-ciecle period. But, on the whole, the fact that this was a bestseller is cause for much eyebrow raising and concern.
January 20, 2019
Trilby was something I was looking forward to read not just because George du Maurier is Daphne du Maurier's grandfather but I had seen a silent movies long ago based on the book. The Svengali was very much part of this book but definitely this story is not just about his ability to control a young girl's mind through hypnotism but a commentary on class distinction & religion and belief in God. I love reading classic books but I always have to remind myself of the times in which these stories are written & racism which is not all of a book but is there nonetheless. It seems that the Jewish people get most of the brunt of it but also blacks are definitely not immune to being portrayed a certain way. I touch on this because Svengali the evil genius is of Jewish decent & his character and description are far from charming as are the two other Jewish females. Trilby is a young girl who is an orphaned early in life. Her younger brother is taken in by a family which Trilby is grateful. At a young age she models for artists which also leads into some unchaste affairs which she is unaware of it being immoral. She is then acquainted with three young English painters who are living in Paris Latin Quarter & a close friendship is made. She then sees her lax morals & changes this after seeing the immorality in it. Trilby meets Svengali & takes an immense disliking of him but he does cure her extreme headache. The story revolves around these characters & especially Little Billee who is a gifted painter with a special quality that charms his friends & Trilby. This is a romance with more sentiment than anything. Another classic questioning the social class rise or fall & the ability to be welcomed there. Can Trilby be accepted in Little Billee circle? Questioning God & religion is throughout this story & you get a feeling that George du Maurier is more in the lines of Darwin's thinking.
Here are some quotes-“History goes on repeating itself, and so do novels, and this is a platitude, and there's nothing new under the sun”
"They were shocking bad artists, those conceited, narrow-minded Jews, those poor old doting monks and priests and bigots of the grewsome, dark age of faith! They couldn't draw a bit-no perspective, no chiaro-oscuro; and it's a woful image they managed to evolve for us out of the depths of their fathomless ignorance, in their zeal to keep us off all the forbidden fruit we're all so fond of, because we were built like that! And by whom? By our Maker, I suppose (who also made the forbidden fruit, and made it very nice-and put it so conveniently for you and me to see and smell and reach, Tray-and sometimes even pick, alas!)."
“Pray to Him? Well, no-not often-not in words and on my knees and with my hands together, you know! Thinking's praying, very often-don't you think so? And so's being sorry and ashamed when one's done a mean thing, and glad when one's resisted a temptation, and grateful when it's a fine day and one's enjoying one's self without hurting any one else! What is it but praying when you try and bear up after losing all you cared to live for? And very good praying too! There can be prayers without words just as well as songs, I suppose; and Svengali used to say that songs without words are the best!”
“There'll be no hell for any of us-he told me so-except what we make for ourselves and each other down here; and that's bad enough for anything. He told me that he was responsible for me-he often said so-and that mamma was too, and his parents for him, and his grandfathers and grandmothers for them, and so on up to Noah and ever so far beyond, and God for us all!" Two poems I really liked-“Then the mortal coldness of the Soul like death itself comes down;It cannot feel for others' woes, it dare not dream its own;That heavy chill has frozen o'er the fountain of our tears,And, though the eye may sparkle yet, 'tis where the ice appears."Though wit may flash from fluent lips, and mirth distract the breast,Through midnighthours that yield no more their former hope of rest:'Tis but as ivy leaves around a ruined turret wreathe,All green and wildly fresh without, but worn and gray beneath”
"The Ending poem-“That blessed harbor of refuge well within our reach, and having really cut our wisdom teeth at last, and learned the ropes, and left off hankering after the moon-we can do with so little down here....A little work, a little play To keep us going-and so, good-day!A little warmth, a little light Of love's bestowing-and so, good-night!A little fun, to match the sorrow Of each day's growing-and so, good-morrow!A little trust that when we die. We reap our sowing! And so-good-bye!"
Such a difference than my last book- Madame Bovary Daughter- Trilby is a true classic which many passages need for French translation & some Latin & German. Some passage are not discernible due to dialect unknown or author's humor but they are not vast. Reading electronic makes these translation possible & full enjoyment of this gem of a book
Here are some quotes-“History goes on repeating itself, and so do novels, and this is a platitude, and there's nothing new under the sun”
"They were shocking bad artists, those conceited, narrow-minded Jews, those poor old doting monks and priests and bigots of the grewsome, dark age of faith! They couldn't draw a bit-no perspective, no chiaro-oscuro; and it's a woful image they managed to evolve for us out of the depths of their fathomless ignorance, in their zeal to keep us off all the forbidden fruit we're all so fond of, because we were built like that! And by whom? By our Maker, I suppose (who also made the forbidden fruit, and made it very nice-and put it so conveniently for you and me to see and smell and reach, Tray-and sometimes even pick, alas!)."
“Pray to Him? Well, no-not often-not in words and on my knees and with my hands together, you know! Thinking's praying, very often-don't you think so? And so's being sorry and ashamed when one's done a mean thing, and glad when one's resisted a temptation, and grateful when it's a fine day and one's enjoying one's self without hurting any one else! What is it but praying when you try and bear up after losing all you cared to live for? And very good praying too! There can be prayers without words just as well as songs, I suppose; and Svengali used to say that songs without words are the best!”
“There'll be no hell for any of us-he told me so-except what we make for ourselves and each other down here; and that's bad enough for anything. He told me that he was responsible for me-he often said so-and that mamma was too, and his parents for him, and his grandfathers and grandmothers for them, and so on up to Noah and ever so far beyond, and God for us all!" Two poems I really liked-“Then the mortal coldness of the Soul like death itself comes down;It cannot feel for others' woes, it dare not dream its own;That heavy chill has frozen o'er the fountain of our tears,And, though the eye may sparkle yet, 'tis where the ice appears."Though wit may flash from fluent lips, and mirth distract the breast,Through midnighthours that yield no more their former hope of rest:'Tis but as ivy leaves around a ruined turret wreathe,All green and wildly fresh without, but worn and gray beneath”
"The Ending poem-“That blessed harbor of refuge well within our reach, and having really cut our wisdom teeth at last, and learned the ropes, and left off hankering after the moon-we can do with so little down here....A little work, a little play To keep us going-and so, good-day!A little warmth, a little light Of love's bestowing-and so, good-night!A little fun, to match the sorrow Of each day's growing-and so, good-morrow!A little trust that when we die. We reap our sowing! And so-good-bye!"
Such a difference than my last book- Madame Bovary Daughter- Trilby is a true classic which many passages need for French translation & some Latin & German. Some passage are not discernible due to dialect unknown or author's humor but they are not vast. Reading electronic makes these translation possible & full enjoyment of this gem of a book
February 21, 2008
Trilby is highly sentimental, in the worst tradition of late-19th century British fiction, and were it not set in Paris and London, I might be tempted to think of it as kailyard. Svengali and Trilby and several other characters are memorable, but they’re not enough to rescue the novel from bathos. Another deterrent for the average reader is that a large portion of the novel’s dialogue is in French, which makes it slow going for anyone whose French is rudimentary, even though all the French passages are translated, of course, in the endnotes. The notes in the Oxford World’s Classics edition are generally helpful, but they were far too copious. Following the recent trend of explaining everything to everyone—no matter how lazy or culturally deprived—we are given footnotes, for example, explaining who Dickens and Thackeray are, telling us that “Benedictine sisters” are nuns of the Benedictine Order, and explaining that a “Broadwood piano” is one made by the English piano maker Broadwood. The novel is worth reading. Just don’t expect…well… Dickens or Thackeray.
August 26, 2012
In 2005 film critic Nathan Rabin coined the term Manic Pixie Dream Girl after watching Cameron Crowe's Elizabethtown. Pulled from Wikipedia, Rabin's definition of an MPDG is "that bubbly, shallow cinematic creature that exists solely in the fevered imaginations of sensitive writer-directors to teach broodingly soulful young men to embrace life and its infinite mysteries and adventures."
Can an MPDG exist in literature?
Sure, why not. I make the rules here.
Trilby is an MPDG in so many ways. She's beautiful and quirky, or beautiful in her quirkiness, or quirky in her beauty, or something like that. We first meet her in Paris as a model for bohemian painters, at which time three English friends (Little Billee, Sandy the Laird, and Taffy) encounter her. In a classic MPDG move, their lives are never the same. Little Billee in particular feels that if only he could be with her, his life would be complete and he would only know happiness. She certainly doesn't mind this attention, though it's not obvious whether or not she's aware of just how deep this interest lies in her admirers.
But then things get complicated, the way things always get complicated (both in life and good literature). Billee's meddling mother... well, she meddles, the dynamic changes, and Trilby is gone, crushing the heart of young Billee beneath her perfectly sculpted heel.
Then there's the sinister Svengali, who uses his hypnotic skills to manipulate Trilby. This is pretty whacky. Svengali is one of the most interesting characters in literature (that I've encountered thus far at least).
This isn't a perfect novel. There are flaws, some of which are pretty large. But I'm not going to lie: I loved this book. I loved the bohemian aspect of the characters, I toured the streets of Paris with them (you couldn't see me, but I was there, arm-in-arm with the boys), we totally checked out the paintings at the Louvre. I recognized some parts of Paris from this reading but all it really did was make me want to go back, right now, screw all of y'inz, I need to be in Paris STAT.
There are illustrations included in this book, all drawn by the author's hand. The introduction points out that at the time of this, du Maurier had lost vision in his left eye, and intimated that this is why the drawings aren't that great. I don't know what the hell that means. These sketches aren't fantastic, but they're hardly worth apologizing over. If I were to include illustrations in anything I wrote, you'd see a series of stick figures with either a smiley or a frown-y face. And I can even see out of both eyes. So I scoff at that. The illustrations were fun and added a nice element to the story.
I can't quite say that I loved this more than du Maurier's granddaughter's Rebecca, but I can say that both novels have touched in me in surprising ways, in spite of their flaws. Du Maurier seems to put his finger right on all the spots that affect me deeply - art, literature, music - all the things that make me feel truly alive. If 19th-century Paris could ever feel alive to a 21st-century American woman, this is a perfect example.
Can an MPDG exist in literature?
Sure, why not. I make the rules here.
Trilby is an MPDG in so many ways. She's beautiful and quirky, or beautiful in her quirkiness, or quirky in her beauty, or something like that. We first meet her in Paris as a model for bohemian painters, at which time three English friends (Little Billee, Sandy the Laird, and Taffy) encounter her. In a classic MPDG move, their lives are never the same. Little Billee in particular feels that if only he could be with her, his life would be complete and he would only know happiness. She certainly doesn't mind this attention, though it's not obvious whether or not she's aware of just how deep this interest lies in her admirers.
But then things get complicated, the way things always get complicated (both in life and good literature). Billee's meddling mother... well, she meddles, the dynamic changes, and Trilby is gone, crushing the heart of young Billee beneath her perfectly sculpted heel.
Then there's the sinister Svengali, who uses his hypnotic skills to manipulate Trilby. This is pretty whacky. Svengali is one of the most interesting characters in literature (that I've encountered thus far at least).
This isn't a perfect novel. There are flaws, some of which are pretty large. But I'm not going to lie: I loved this book. I loved the bohemian aspect of the characters, I toured the streets of Paris with them (you couldn't see me, but I was there, arm-in-arm with the boys), we totally checked out the paintings at the Louvre. I recognized some parts of Paris from this reading but all it really did was make me want to go back, right now, screw all of y'inz, I need to be in Paris STAT.
There are illustrations included in this book, all drawn by the author's hand. The introduction points out that at the time of this, du Maurier had lost vision in his left eye, and intimated that this is why the drawings aren't that great. I don't know what the hell that means. These sketches aren't fantastic, but they're hardly worth apologizing over. If I were to include illustrations in anything I wrote, you'd see a series of stick figures with either a smiley or a frown-y face. And I can even see out of both eyes. So I scoff at that. The illustrations were fun and added a nice element to the story.
I can't quite say that I loved this more than du Maurier's granddaughter's Rebecca, but I can say that both novels have touched in me in surprising ways, in spite of their flaws. Du Maurier seems to put his finger right on all the spots that affect me deeply - art, literature, music - all the things that make me feel truly alive. If 19th-century Paris could ever feel alive to a 21st-century American woman, this is a perfect example.
He had never heard such music as this, never dreamed such music was possible. He was conscious, while it lasted, that he saw deeper into the beauty, the sadness of things, the very heart of them, and their pathetic evanescence, as with a new inner eye - even into eternity itself, beyond the veil - a vague cosmic vision that faded when the music was over, but left an unfading reminiscence of its having been, and a passionate desire to express the like some day through the plastic medium of his own beautiful art.
(Page 25)
Read
October 15, 2017somewhere around a 3.5 -- it's neither great nor perfect, but it is great fun, and I'm very, very happy to have read it.
Set mainly in Paris, du Maurier gives us the story of Trilby O'Ferrall, the young artist's model who enchants not only the three artists of this story, but the musician Svengali as well. Trilby is offered both headache cures and singing lessons from Svengali, and at the same time, finds herself falling for one of the artists, Little Billee; he is also in love with her enough to propose marriage. The book is the story of these two people whose lives take very different turns after Billee's mother steps in to ensure that the marriage doesn't happen. While Billee goes on to England to become the up and coming artist William Bagot, Trilby stays in Paris with Svengali. Eventually, their paths will cross again, in a most unexpected way.
Reading this book for the story of Little Billee, Trilby and Svengali takes a bit of patience because rather than writing a straight narrative that sticks to that plotline, Du Maurier has placed us in the milieu of the Bohemian artists of the Latin Quarter of Paris, and he spends a lot of time giving us his own version of that life, a "mixing of reality and fantasy" (xii) based on his own experiences. Then, when the story moves to London, we are made privy to the world of the British upper classes, where Little Billee is now William Bagot, successful artist. While you may wonder what's going on with Trilby all this time, well, eventually we do get back there. So anyone considering reading this book should plan to be in it for the long haul. There is a LOT happening in this novel under its surface as well, so it's not a skimmer.
This edition from Oxford World's Classics has an interesting introduction by Elaine Showalter, and the publishers have included du Maurier's original illustrations for this book, which made Svengali a household word. As I said, I did have fun with it; it did sort of meander here and there, but it's what it is. Probably best for very patient readers who enjoy 19th-century fiction.
http://www.oddlyweirdfiction.com/2017...
Set mainly in Paris, du Maurier gives us the story of Trilby O'Ferrall, the young artist's model who enchants not only the three artists of this story, but the musician Svengali as well. Trilby is offered both headache cures and singing lessons from Svengali, and at the same time, finds herself falling for one of the artists, Little Billee; he is also in love with her enough to propose marriage. The book is the story of these two people whose lives take very different turns after Billee's mother steps in to ensure that the marriage doesn't happen. While Billee goes on to England to become the up and coming artist William Bagot, Trilby stays in Paris with Svengali. Eventually, their paths will cross again, in a most unexpected way.
Reading this book for the story of Little Billee, Trilby and Svengali takes a bit of patience because rather than writing a straight narrative that sticks to that plotline, Du Maurier has placed us in the milieu of the Bohemian artists of the Latin Quarter of Paris, and he spends a lot of time giving us his own version of that life, a "mixing of reality and fantasy" (xii) based on his own experiences. Then, when the story moves to London, we are made privy to the world of the British upper classes, where Little Billee is now William Bagot, successful artist. While you may wonder what's going on with Trilby all this time, well, eventually we do get back there. So anyone considering reading this book should plan to be in it for the long haul. There is a LOT happening in this novel under its surface as well, so it's not a skimmer.
This edition from Oxford World's Classics has an interesting introduction by Elaine Showalter, and the publishers have included du Maurier's original illustrations for this book, which made Svengali a household word. As I said, I did have fun with it; it did sort of meander here and there, but it's what it is. Probably best for very patient readers who enjoy 19th-century fiction.
http://www.oddlyweirdfiction.com/2017...
July 2, 2010
Such was the power of Svengali to mesmerise the world that his name became a word. In brief he takes a tone-deaf girl and turns her into a great diva, as long as she is hypnotised before she sings. Alas at one performance he is incapacitated and as Trilby tries to sing, but cannot - to the disgust of the audience – she is in a strange situation where she is aware of her life with Svengali but has no conception at all of her singing career. In fact this is not exactly how hypnotism works, but never mind that, the idea is fascinating.
If you’d asked me I would have thought the most likely reasons people want to be hypnotised is to give up smoking and to lose weight. Not so! The most asked for thing is this – can I be hypnotised to forget a person?
The uneasy reply is somewhere between a reluctant ‘yes’ and ‘this isn’t the right thing to do.’ What the experts want you to do, apparently, is trash the person you want to forget. There seems here to be a presumption that if you do want to forget them, they deserve to be trashed – ie it isn’t an artificial construct to get you over somebody who doesn’t deserve to be thus treated in your head. So, my first question is, but what if you don’t think that? I know the answer is supposed to be that you are a sucker who hasn’t gotten over a bad person in your life, but that can’t possibly always be true. Must there not also be some chance that this is a fabulously wonderful person and that trashing them as being undeserving in some way is a terrible thing to do? I find it hard to believe this is seen as the healthy option. If it comes down to it, maybe you are a scumbag and he isn’t.
My next question revolves around the idea that you have been hypnotised to forget a person and this has worked. How has it worked? If you forget a person successfully, what impact does this have on the rest of your memories? A person isn’t a discrete unit. He is time and space, sensation, touch, sound, he has a context, a background, he is part of a social setting. You went to dinner with this person and had the most divine meal. What impact does hypnosis to forget the person have on the memory of the meal? Instead of a picture in your head of some wonderful romantic occasion where you shared spaghetti together, you have what? The same picture, but your lover is erased? It is just you and a plate of spaghetti? Is there an empty chair next to you? Has the waiter filled two water glasses? Does the other fork move, but there is nobody attached to it???? Most importantly, do you get more spaghetti in this changed memory than you did on the real occasion? How much is erased with the memory of the person?
Maybe you can do that, I imagine. Maybe the mind’s eye picture of this whole occasion is erased. But add to this, a social setting, for example. Now there are three of you at dinner. How does the removal of one person from the memory of this work? You recall person ‘a’ asking a question but there is no answer because you have erased the memory of person ‘b’ to whom the question was addressed? I can’t see that in forgetting the required person, you would also forget the innnocent bystander, so to speak.
And there are the things that will be fundamentally imprinted on you, in a way spaghetti might not be. (MIGHT not, mark you…) How would you forget the way you made love, slept, woke up? And even if you forgot in a passive sense, surely you would be reminded of them by – well, it could be anything. Putting out the washing and noticing that a cardigan has been undone that isn’t usually and there is a whole memory attached to that. How it was taken off, what happened next. You are made love to exquisitely. It involves all of him, he is completely joined to you. What happens to that? Does it become an Immaculate Orgasm?
Note to self: discuss this with the VM next time in church, maybe she knows. Hey, though. That makes me think. Maybe this is exactly what happened. She shagged someone who was a bad ‘un, a couple of sessions with a hypnotherapist and voila, the Immaculate Conception.
If you’d asked me I would have thought the most likely reasons people want to be hypnotised is to give up smoking and to lose weight. Not so! The most asked for thing is this – can I be hypnotised to forget a person?
The uneasy reply is somewhere between a reluctant ‘yes’ and ‘this isn’t the right thing to do.’ What the experts want you to do, apparently, is trash the person you want to forget. There seems here to be a presumption that if you do want to forget them, they deserve to be trashed – ie it isn’t an artificial construct to get you over somebody who doesn’t deserve to be thus treated in your head. So, my first question is, but what if you don’t think that? I know the answer is supposed to be that you are a sucker who hasn’t gotten over a bad person in your life, but that can’t possibly always be true. Must there not also be some chance that this is a fabulously wonderful person and that trashing them as being undeserving in some way is a terrible thing to do? I find it hard to believe this is seen as the healthy option. If it comes down to it, maybe you are a scumbag and he isn’t.
My next question revolves around the idea that you have been hypnotised to forget a person and this has worked. How has it worked? If you forget a person successfully, what impact does this have on the rest of your memories? A person isn’t a discrete unit. He is time and space, sensation, touch, sound, he has a context, a background, he is part of a social setting. You went to dinner with this person and had the most divine meal. What impact does hypnosis to forget the person have on the memory of the meal? Instead of a picture in your head of some wonderful romantic occasion where you shared spaghetti together, you have what? The same picture, but your lover is erased? It is just you and a plate of spaghetti? Is there an empty chair next to you? Has the waiter filled two water glasses? Does the other fork move, but there is nobody attached to it???? Most importantly, do you get more spaghetti in this changed memory than you did on the real occasion? How much is erased with the memory of the person?
Maybe you can do that, I imagine. Maybe the mind’s eye picture of this whole occasion is erased. But add to this, a social setting, for example. Now there are three of you at dinner. How does the removal of one person from the memory of this work? You recall person ‘a’ asking a question but there is no answer because you have erased the memory of person ‘b’ to whom the question was addressed? I can’t see that in forgetting the required person, you would also forget the innnocent bystander, so to speak.
And there are the things that will be fundamentally imprinted on you, in a way spaghetti might not be. (MIGHT not, mark you…) How would you forget the way you made love, slept, woke up? And even if you forgot in a passive sense, surely you would be reminded of them by – well, it could be anything. Putting out the washing and noticing that a cardigan has been undone that isn’t usually and there is a whole memory attached to that. How it was taken off, what happened next. You are made love to exquisitely. It involves all of him, he is completely joined to you. What happens to that? Does it become an Immaculate Orgasm?
Note to self: discuss this with the VM next time in church, maybe she knows. Hey, though. That makes me think. Maybe this is exactly what happened. She shagged someone who was a bad ‘un, a couple of sessions with a hypnotherapist and voila, the Immaculate Conception.
March 4, 2012
Having finished reading Trilby, I am at a loss to explain why there ever was something like a Trilbymania around 1900. The hype about this book was as big as the one about Stoker's Dracula and Stevenson's The Strange Case of Mr. Jekyll and Mr. Hide, both of which still enjoy an immense popularity while Trilby's fame has dwindled over the years. Deservedly, I must say.
The narrator is one sickeningly condescending and self-loving windbag. The anti-semitism is hard to bear and coupled with a terrible jingoism. The narrative flow is awkward since the narrator is so fond of using French phrases that there's hardly a paragraph that can be read without consulting some translating notes. All this makes the book extremely wearisome to read and the fruit of this labour is rather small and rotten. Svengali is not much of a villain, in fact I found him rather piteous, while Little Billee is nothing more than a moping fop.
I can only recommend rereading Dracula or picking up some of the better urban gothic or sensation novels instead of wasting time on this annoying tale of bourgeois complacency. The only reason for the second star is the academic interest I had in the novel and the way it lends itself for an analysis of late nineteenth-century bourgeouis self-fashioning.
The narrator is one sickeningly condescending and self-loving windbag. The anti-semitism is hard to bear and coupled with a terrible jingoism. The narrative flow is awkward since the narrator is so fond of using French phrases that there's hardly a paragraph that can be read without consulting some translating notes. All this makes the book extremely wearisome to read and the fruit of this labour is rather small and rotten. Svengali is not much of a villain, in fact I found him rather piteous, while Little Billee is nothing more than a moping fop.
I can only recommend rereading Dracula or picking up some of the better urban gothic or sensation novels instead of wasting time on this annoying tale of bourgeois complacency. The only reason for the second star is the academic interest I had in the novel and the way it lends itself for an analysis of late nineteenth-century bourgeouis self-fashioning.
July 2, 2013
Beauty Without Talent
From school with strict cheerless nuns to university, where I came under the severe hand of my tutor, I identified with the eponymous Trilby the moment I opened the pages of George du Maurier's novel of domination and submission, a book with an undercurrent of eroticism that can only have slipped by the censors by its sly subtlety and incisive examination of the human condition.
Set in the Paris Bohemia of the 1850s, it is in Trilby that we meet Svengali, a name from fiction that has found its way into the language, like quixotic, Scrooge and Catch 22. Svengali is a music teacher and would be impresario with a perfect ear and an eye for the main chance. Trilby O'Ferrall works as a laundress and artists' model. She is young, pretty and vulnerable. All the men she meets fall in love with her, which forms the body of the book. But when she enters the orbit of Svengali, he becomes obsessed with making her his protégée and a singing star; a Diva.
Although Trilby is tone deaf, she is susceptible to hypnosis, another of Svengali's dark arts. Under his power, she performs in a trance. They travel across Europe, making their fortune until Svengali has a heart attack during a concert in London and Trilby, as she sings on, is shown to be talentless without the maestro's influence. Having been acclaimed in high society and lived among the élite, Trilby O'Ferrall returns to her former role in the laundry aware that her only gift is her fading prettiness, the fate of most women.
Written in the 1890s, the writing is sometimes overblown and prosaic; overlook this and the novel remains a delight.
From school with strict cheerless nuns to university, where I came under the severe hand of my tutor, I identified with the eponymous Trilby the moment I opened the pages of George du Maurier's novel of domination and submission, a book with an undercurrent of eroticism that can only have slipped by the censors by its sly subtlety and incisive examination of the human condition.
Set in the Paris Bohemia of the 1850s, it is in Trilby that we meet Svengali, a name from fiction that has found its way into the language, like quixotic, Scrooge and Catch 22. Svengali is a music teacher and would be impresario with a perfect ear and an eye for the main chance. Trilby O'Ferrall works as a laundress and artists' model. She is young, pretty and vulnerable. All the men she meets fall in love with her, which forms the body of the book. But when she enters the orbit of Svengali, he becomes obsessed with making her his protégée and a singing star; a Diva.
Although Trilby is tone deaf, she is susceptible to hypnosis, another of Svengali's dark arts. Under his power, she performs in a trance. They travel across Europe, making their fortune until Svengali has a heart attack during a concert in London and Trilby, as she sings on, is shown to be talentless without the maestro's influence. Having been acclaimed in high society and lived among the élite, Trilby O'Ferrall returns to her former role in the laundry aware that her only gift is her fading prettiness, the fate of most women.
Written in the 1890s, the writing is sometimes overblown and prosaic; overlook this and the novel remains a delight.
September 5, 2016
An unusual fairly anti-Semitic melodrama about the lives of several expatriates in bohemian Paris. The second half tells what becomes of them, including the beautiful young model, Trilby, who becomes a singing sensation under the tutelage of the mysterious Svengali. My favorite parts centered on the boys living in the Latin Quarter. Then, the story goes all Camille, and finally, full-on creepy tale of mesmerism. Fascinating that it was so wildly successful in its day. The anti-semitism is a poke in the eye, but otherwise it's a quirky, entertaining read.
July 13, 2018
I thought I knew what a Svengali was but I did NOT!
I thought it to mean a person of such amounts of charisma and charm that people (usually women) would find them absolutely irresistible. But the Svengali of George DuMaurier is none of those things. He reminds me of the descriptions of Rasputin. He is dirty, never bathes. He is an egomaniac in the extreme and when people do not act as he wishes, he resorts to cruelty, and he preys on the week. He is inconsiderate on the best of days and a manipulative monster on the best.
Trilby on the other hand is as sweet and innocent as you can imagine a person could ever be. There is even an innocence in her posing as a (nude) artist figure model.
This is one of the flaws of this book, the idealized look at humanity as if any one person could be all good or all bad. All the characters in the book are either wonderful, affable, if not downright angelic like the aforementioned Trilby.
The story is a tragedy and it slowly becomes more and more sad. It’s not a wonder many people put it down finding it depressing or boring. I found it interesting and it’s romanticized view of the artistic life was charming, even if a bit simplistic. I must clarify that the WRITING is not simplistic at all, and in fact with its liberal splatters of untranslated french throughout, I will say that it can be a bit to get through at times.
3.75 stars
I thought it to mean a person of such amounts of charisma and charm that people (usually women) would find them absolutely irresistible. But the Svengali of George DuMaurier is none of those things. He reminds me of the descriptions of Rasputin. He is dirty, never bathes. He is an egomaniac in the extreme and when people do not act as he wishes, he resorts to cruelty, and he preys on the week. He is inconsiderate on the best of days and a manipulative monster on the best.
Trilby on the other hand is as sweet and innocent as you can imagine a person could ever be. There is even an innocence in her posing as a (nude) artist figure model.
This is one of the flaws of this book, the idealized look at humanity as if any one person could be all good or all bad. All the characters in the book are either wonderful, affable, if not downright angelic like the aforementioned Trilby.
The story is a tragedy and it slowly becomes more and more sad. It’s not a wonder many people put it down finding it depressing or boring. I found it interesting and it’s romanticized view of the artistic life was charming, even if a bit simplistic. I must clarify that the WRITING is not simplistic at all, and in fact with its liberal splatters of untranslated french throughout, I will say that it can be a bit to get through at times.
3.75 stars
May 24, 2018
I enjoyed some aspects of this book - the examination of Bohemian art circles in Paris especially, but the plot did grate on me at points - and was ruined by the blurb of the book! Trilby is an interesting character, but I want always entirely comfortable with her presentation.
July 9, 2020
It happened the other day, while I was reading George du Maurier's Trilby, that a young man asked me whether I read mainly fiction or non-fiction - his preference clearly being for the latter. I answered the former, and had to supress within me a slight sense of shame. Does the fiction reader not, after all, sunbathe in supercillious fantasy while lazing on the beach, while the non-fiction reader applies his mind to the 'hard facts'?
Maybe it is engrained in us to think so. But the distinction is shallow and meaningless when you dig a little deeper. For one thing, if 2020 has anything to teach us, it is that the 'hard facts', even those that are as hard as rock, are so numerous and tiny that they give way to the cudgel of dogma and zealotry, like grains of sand on that very same beach. One eye-catching event, propelled by the right algorithms, can trump an entire discipline of rigorous empiricism.
Non-fiction can easily fall into the trap of pretending the 'castle of truth' which the author has built up is structurally sound. Fiction, as written from the perspective of the narrator, or better still, the third persons who inhabit the narration, harbours no such pretense of architectural stability. The reader knows that the truth on which a novel is based is a shifty one; changing with the tide and giving way to the footprints left by the author's own biases, those of his characters and those of the reader.
In this respect, a book like 'Trilby' helps us gain perspective on the 'truthiness' of our own age. It places fantastical events in a historical and subjective context, and in doing so removes us from the fantastical context of our own time, allowing us to regard these as no less subjective and ephemeral.
At the time of its publication, 'Trilby' was a sensation - the 'Da Vinci Code' of its day. Upon reading it, it's easy to see why. Borrowing with self-effacing openness from Thackery, Dickens and Dumas, this festival of vanity, a tale set in Two Cities, chronicles the adventures of three very British 'musketeers of the brush' (artists) and their acquaintance with the Anglo-Irish Parisian washerwoman of the title. The narrative is light and fun, rich in the tradition of turn-of-the-Century satirists like Wilde or Saki. The plot is compelling, though perhaps somewhat too linear for modern tastes.
Mostly though, I read it as an antidote to the irrationality and illiberalism of the dominant 'Liberal' world view. If we must inhabit sand castles in order to have a coherent frame of reference, let's at least decorate them with the colourful seashells of funny, well-written Victorian prose.
Maybe it is engrained in us to think so. But the distinction is shallow and meaningless when you dig a little deeper. For one thing, if 2020 has anything to teach us, it is that the 'hard facts', even those that are as hard as rock, are so numerous and tiny that they give way to the cudgel of dogma and zealotry, like grains of sand on that very same beach. One eye-catching event, propelled by the right algorithms, can trump an entire discipline of rigorous empiricism.
Non-fiction can easily fall into the trap of pretending the 'castle of truth' which the author has built up is structurally sound. Fiction, as written from the perspective of the narrator, or better still, the third persons who inhabit the narration, harbours no such pretense of architectural stability. The reader knows that the truth on which a novel is based is a shifty one; changing with the tide and giving way to the footprints left by the author's own biases, those of his characters and those of the reader.
In this respect, a book like 'Trilby' helps us gain perspective on the 'truthiness' of our own age. It places fantastical events in a historical and subjective context, and in doing so removes us from the fantastical context of our own time, allowing us to regard these as no less subjective and ephemeral.
At the time of its publication, 'Trilby' was a sensation - the 'Da Vinci Code' of its day. Upon reading it, it's easy to see why. Borrowing with self-effacing openness from Thackery, Dickens and Dumas, this festival of vanity, a tale set in Two Cities, chronicles the adventures of three very British 'musketeers of the brush' (artists) and their acquaintance with the Anglo-Irish Parisian washerwoman of the title. The narrative is light and fun, rich in the tradition of turn-of-the-Century satirists like Wilde or Saki. The plot is compelling, though perhaps somewhat too linear for modern tastes.
Mostly though, I read it as an antidote to the irrationality and illiberalism of the dominant 'Liberal' world view. If we must inhabit sand castles in order to have a coherent frame of reference, let's at least decorate them with the colourful seashells of funny, well-written Victorian prose.
May 25, 2014
Free download available at Project Gutenberg.
This book was published serially in Harper’s Monthly in 1894.
This is the story of Trilby O’Ferrall, an half-Irish girl working in Paris as an artist model and laundress. There she meets Svengali, a Jewish hypnotist who teaches her to sing since she is tone-deaf. In Paris, she meets Little Billee and fails in love with him but she cannot stay with him since he belongs to a higher social class. Later on, he will become a famous artist in London. After a love disillusion, Billee returns to Paris and meets both Trilby and Svengali.
Trilby, hypnotized by Svengali. Svengali exaggerated features were typical of anti-Semitic portrayals of Jews at the turn of the century. This engraving was done by Du Maurier himself for the first edition of the novel in 1894.
According to Wiki, this book has inspired Gaston Leroux’s novel .
The novel has been adapted to the stage several times. During one of these plays, an actress wearer a short-brimmed hat with a sharp snap to the back of the brim, thus giving the name of the well-known hat “trilby”:
George du Maurier was the father of the actor Gerald du Maurier and grandfather of the writers Angela and Dame Daphne du Maurier. He was also the father of Sylvia Llewelyn Davies and grandfather of 5 boys who inspired J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan. He wrote several cartoons in Punch.
This book was published serially in Harper’s Monthly in 1894.
This is the story of Trilby O’Ferrall, an half-Irish girl working in Paris as an artist model and laundress. There she meets Svengali, a Jewish hypnotist who teaches her to sing since she is tone-deaf. In Paris, she meets Little Billee and fails in love with him but she cannot stay with him since he belongs to a higher social class. Later on, he will become a famous artist in London. After a love disillusion, Billee returns to Paris and meets both Trilby and Svengali.
Trilby, hypnotized by Svengali. Svengali exaggerated features were typical of anti-Semitic portrayals of Jews at the turn of the century. This engraving was done by Du Maurier himself for the first edition of the novel in 1894.
According to Wiki, this book has inspired Gaston Leroux’s novel .
The novel has been adapted to the stage several times. During one of these plays, an actress wearer a short-brimmed hat with a sharp snap to the back of the brim, thus giving the name of the well-known hat “trilby”:
George du Maurier was the father of the actor Gerald du Maurier and grandfather of the writers Angela and Dame Daphne du Maurier. He was also the father of Sylvia Llewelyn Davies and grandfather of 5 boys who inspired J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan. He wrote several cartoons in Punch.
May 30, 2010
[These notes were made in 1983. I read this in an 1895 edition:]. Du Maurier is a minor novelist at best, and like Bram Stoker and Mary Shelley, what he has created is not so much a great work of art (although I would say that Frankenstein is a good one) but an impingement on popular consciousness, an addition to popular culture. Svengali is a byword these days, tho' few people know his origin, and fewer still, I think, would recognize him in his portrait here. I begin to realize how prevalent the stereotypical repulsive Jew is in English literature (Merchant of Venice and Twist come to mind immediately), and have a little more sympathy with those who are outraged by it. It seems entirely unnecessary to specify a race or country of origin for the greasy, demanding, amoral, gifted dominator. Trilby is an interesting, if not terribly consistent character. She is altogether too spiritualized in her last scenes to have anything to do with the charming, earthbound creature of the beginning. As for the main device of the plot, it's an intriguing idea that latent musical genius could be released under hypnosis, but I see no reason why the personality should be utterly suppressed at the same time! As for Little Billee, the ostensible hero, he's just too sickening for words, and the jingoism of the book (LB's English, and the secondary characters are Welsh and Scots) is nearly as sickening. Du Maurier's drawings are a very interesting addition indeed, for his ideal of female beauty, much clearer in the pictures than in the words, is scarcely everyone's. He seems to have a particular fondness for a ski-nose and a jutting chin in a woman! In short, I found this more interesting than compelling.
March 11, 2016
I’ve actually seen this book credited to Daphne in the newspapers; as if some journalist put the name ‘Trilby’ into a search engine, saw it was written by ‘du Maurier’ and researched no further than that. I know, it’s hard to believe that the British press could be so shoddy.
Of course the most famous thing about ‘Trilby’, the thing that gets it mentioned in the newspapers from time to time, is the fact that this is the novel that created the character ‘Svengali’ – that rare fictional presence whose name has entered the language. And it is definitely interesting to see this character, to see this phenomenon in its rawest form. It’s also quite disconcerting. Yes, this is a character who harnesses talent, who builds up a star – yet as presented here he lacks the sophistication and glamour of what we now know as a Svengali. Bluntly, he’s a smelly sex pest, and the way du Maurier portrays him is more than a tad anti-Semitic.
However, he is still by far the most compulsive character in ‘Trilby’. But that's no great boast as the book around him is a mess. An unfocused tale of struggling artists in Paris, which fails to realise which are the good sections of its narrative, and instead indulges in dozens of digressions and meanderings. If ever a book could have done with a better editor (if it ever had an editor at all) it’s this one. du Maurier clearly hopes that his charming prose will carry the whole along no matter where his pen wanders, but it really doesn’t. ‘Trilby’ is disengaging much more than it’s engaging, and annoying far more frequently than it’s endearing.
Apparently it was a big influence on ‘Phantom of the Opera’, which is far from the best book ever written, but a damn sight better than ‘Trilby’.
Of course the most famous thing about ‘Trilby’, the thing that gets it mentioned in the newspapers from time to time, is the fact that this is the novel that created the character ‘Svengali’ – that rare fictional presence whose name has entered the language. And it is definitely interesting to see this character, to see this phenomenon in its rawest form. It’s also quite disconcerting. Yes, this is a character who harnesses talent, who builds up a star – yet as presented here he lacks the sophistication and glamour of what we now know as a Svengali. Bluntly, he’s a smelly sex pest, and the way du Maurier portrays him is more than a tad anti-Semitic.
However, he is still by far the most compulsive character in ‘Trilby’. But that's no great boast as the book around him is a mess. An unfocused tale of struggling artists in Paris, which fails to realise which are the good sections of its narrative, and instead indulges in dozens of digressions and meanderings. If ever a book could have done with a better editor (if it ever had an editor at all) it’s this one. du Maurier clearly hopes that his charming prose will carry the whole along no matter where his pen wanders, but it really doesn’t. ‘Trilby’ is disengaging much more than it’s engaging, and annoying far more frequently than it’s endearing.
Apparently it was a big influence on ‘Phantom of the Opera’, which is far from the best book ever written, but a damn sight better than ‘Trilby’.
November 22, 2009
This is a gothic, tragic, beautiful novel and I loved it. There are so many ways in which the narrative defies romantic expectation.
Trilby is a Parisian girl, model for various artists. She's a simple, well meaning, innocent soul who at the outset can take her clothes off for art without any real shame. One of the artists (a naive young lad called Billy) falls in love with her, but she also wins the attention of Svengali, a dark, twisted sort of person whose intetions towards her are less than good.
The author, du Maurier is part of the same family as Daphne Du Maurier, although an older generation.
Because of the age of the book, there are places it does not go - only hinting at things, and never following any of the protagonists into the bedroom. There are things we do not know about their relatonships, and we don't get inside heads much.
There is a fascinating strand involving Trilby's loss of innocence - far less about her own actions than her coming to realise how the world might see her.
The desctiptions are engaging, the plot full of surprises. I loved it. it's not for people who like comfortable romance formulae, but if gothic and full of uncertainty is your thing, I highly recomend this novel.
Trilby is a Parisian girl, model for various artists. She's a simple, well meaning, innocent soul who at the outset can take her clothes off for art without any real shame. One of the artists (a naive young lad called Billy) falls in love with her, but she also wins the attention of Svengali, a dark, twisted sort of person whose intetions towards her are less than good.
The author, du Maurier is part of the same family as Daphne Du Maurier, although an older generation.
Because of the age of the book, there are places it does not go - only hinting at things, and never following any of the protagonists into the bedroom. There are things we do not know about their relatonships, and we don't get inside heads much.
There is a fascinating strand involving Trilby's loss of innocence - far less about her own actions than her coming to realise how the world might see her.
The desctiptions are engaging, the plot full of surprises. I loved it. it's not for people who like comfortable romance formulae, but if gothic and full of uncertainty is your thing, I highly recomend this novel.
February 17, 2023
boooooo so unengaging and only moderately interesting as a literary history artifact
May 14, 2025
Trilby is the most popular novel by George du Maurier, renowned illustrator and sometime novelist and grandfather of Daphne du Maurier, a novelist with a better and more lasting literary reputation.
The story is a sensational story of three young art students trying to succeed as artists in an idyllic 1850s bohemian Paris. The three are large, muscular and loyal Yorkshireman Taffy, Scottish Sandy the “Laird” of Cockpen, and young, slender talented Englishman “Little Billie.” The book often equates them to the Three Musketeers and there is a “one for all and all for one” quality of their relationship. The three live in a large art studio which they use as a ‘salon’ with friends and guests dropping in. Musicians Svengali and violinist Gecko are frequent drop-ins. The often-offensive and aggressive Svengali is tolerated only due to his incredible musical talent. Also dropping into the studio is the beautiful and kind, half-Irish Trilby O’Ferrell, an artist’s model and laundress.
The plot is about the interrelationship of the above parties concentrating especially on Trilby’s romance with Little Billie and Svengali’s pursuit of her. I won’t tell more as everyone has enough idea of some of the plot as Svengali’s possessive controlling attitude toward Trilby was so notorious that Svengali’s character became a prototype for a certain type of person. A ‘Svengali' is defined in the Oxford Dictionary as "a person who exercises a controlling or mesmeric influence on another, especially for a sinister purpose." Despite his characters’ renown, Svengali is not the main character, just the most impactful one. Little Billie is the main protagonist, with Trilby and Taffy in secondary lead roles.
This has been called the second most popular novel of the last part of the Victorian period, after Dracula. However I can see why it is not that widely read these days. First of all, it is a sensational novel. Yes, sensation novels like those of Wilkie Collins and Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s have become popular and respected again, but the sensation elements here are more mawkish and more contrived, even having me guffawing during the overly drawn-out and overwrought last chapter. Overall, this novel was more similar in tone though superior to another non-literary popular sensation novel of that period that I have read, Marie Correlli’s The Sorrows of Satan.
Second, the characters are fairly one-dimensional portrayals and almost caricatures. The main protagonist “Little Billie” was never a fully fleshed out character and he was the main character the reader is expected to identify with. But perhaps du Maurier recognized the limitations of his ‘Little Billie’ creation as he endowed ‘Taffy” with traits to make him a character a reader could more easily identify with. Third, there are some fairly derogatory antisemitic descriptions of the Jewish Svengali. As I've read enough classics to accept the reality that we are an evolving society, it doesn't bother me, but the level of it did surprise me some as it indicates a total lack of progress in the 56 years between Dickens' Fagin in 1838 and the Svengali portrayal in 1894. It does remind me though of just how long the Victorian Age actually was.
These defects explain why the book no longer carries hardly any literary cache. I imagine that some of these defects would be more literarily acceptable in a sensation novel back in its early heyday of the 1860s than in one written in the 1890s when realism reigned and 20th century modernism was approaching. However, these defects didn’t prevent the book from being an easy and engaging read that I enjoyed reading. Even some of the last chapter’s overly maudlin aspects were enjoyable as I had fun guffawing at them. I enjoyed it enough that I may even read du Maurier’s second most popular novel Peter Ibbetson someday, as it was well-regarded enough to be made into a movie with Gary Cooper, a play and an opera. The opera is where I first heard of the title before ever becoming aware that it was based on a George du Maurier novel.
I rate this as 3 stars.
The story is a sensational story of three young art students trying to succeed as artists in an idyllic 1850s bohemian Paris. The three are large, muscular and loyal Yorkshireman Taffy, Scottish Sandy the “Laird” of Cockpen, and young, slender talented Englishman “Little Billie.” The book often equates them to the Three Musketeers and there is a “one for all and all for one” quality of their relationship. The three live in a large art studio which they use as a ‘salon’ with friends and guests dropping in. Musicians Svengali and violinist Gecko are frequent drop-ins. The often-offensive and aggressive Svengali is tolerated only due to his incredible musical talent. Also dropping into the studio is the beautiful and kind, half-Irish Trilby O’Ferrell, an artist’s model and laundress.
The plot is about the interrelationship of the above parties concentrating especially on Trilby’s romance with Little Billie and Svengali’s pursuit of her. I won’t tell more as everyone has enough idea of some of the plot as Svengali’s possessive controlling attitude toward Trilby was so notorious that Svengali’s character became a prototype for a certain type of person. A ‘Svengali' is defined in the Oxford Dictionary as "a person who exercises a controlling or mesmeric influence on another, especially for a sinister purpose." Despite his characters’ renown, Svengali is not the main character, just the most impactful one. Little Billie is the main protagonist, with Trilby and Taffy in secondary lead roles.
This has been called the second most popular novel of the last part of the Victorian period, after Dracula. However I can see why it is not that widely read these days. First of all, it is a sensational novel. Yes, sensation novels like those of Wilkie Collins and Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s have become popular and respected again, but the sensation elements here are more mawkish and more contrived, even having me guffawing during the overly drawn-out and overwrought last chapter. Overall, this novel was more similar in tone though superior to another non-literary popular sensation novel of that period that I have read, Marie Correlli’s The Sorrows of Satan.
Second, the characters are fairly one-dimensional portrayals and almost caricatures. The main protagonist “Little Billie” was never a fully fleshed out character and he was the main character the reader is expected to identify with. But perhaps du Maurier recognized the limitations of his ‘Little Billie’ creation as he endowed ‘Taffy” with traits to make him a character a reader could more easily identify with. Third, there are some fairly derogatory antisemitic descriptions of the Jewish Svengali. As I've read enough classics to accept the reality that we are an evolving society, it doesn't bother me, but the level of it did surprise me some as it indicates a total lack of progress in the 56 years between Dickens' Fagin in 1838 and the Svengali portrayal in 1894. It does remind me though of just how long the Victorian Age actually was.
These defects explain why the book no longer carries hardly any literary cache. I imagine that some of these defects would be more literarily acceptable in a sensation novel back in its early heyday of the 1860s than in one written in the 1890s when realism reigned and 20th century modernism was approaching. However, these defects didn’t prevent the book from being an easy and engaging read that I enjoyed reading. Even some of the last chapter’s overly maudlin aspects were enjoyable as I had fun guffawing at them. I enjoyed it enough that I may even read du Maurier’s second most popular novel Peter Ibbetson someday, as it was well-regarded enough to be made into a movie with Gary Cooper, a play and an opera. The opera is where I first heard of the title before ever becoming aware that it was based on a George du Maurier novel.
I rate this as 3 stars.
April 29, 2022
It is a wondrous thing, the human foot—like the human hand; even more so, perhaps; but, unlike the hand, with which we are so familiar, it is seldom a thing of beauty in civilized adults who go about in leather boots or shoes.
So that it is hidden away in disgrace, a thing to be thrust out of sight and forgotten. It can sometimes be very ugly, indeed—the ugliest thing there is, even in the fairest and highest and most gifted of her sex; and then it is of an ugliness to chill and kill romance, and scatter young love's dream, and almost break the heart.
And all for the sake of a high heel and a ridiculously pointed toe—mean things, at the best!
Conversely, when Mother Nature has taken extra pains in the building of it, and proper care or happy chance has kept it free of lamentable deformations, indurations, and discolorations—all those grewsome boot-begotten abominations which have made it so generally unpopular—the sudden sight of it, uncovered, comes as a very rare and singularly pleasing surprise to the eye that has learned how to see!
Nothing else that Mother Nature has to show, not even the human face divine, has more subtle power to suggest high physical distinction, happy evolution, and supreme development; the lordship of man over beast, the lordship of man over man, the lordship of woman over all!
Much humor here in Trilby by George Du Maurier written 1n 1894. Also much sadness so be prepared. Also waaay too much French language. I'm sure I would have enjoyed it 100% more if it was completely translated. Even so, it was a story well told and it will make you laugh, then it will make you cry.
I read it on Project Gutenberg, link:
https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/...
Complete with awesome illustrations by the author!
So that it is hidden away in disgrace, a thing to be thrust out of sight and forgotten. It can sometimes be very ugly, indeed—the ugliest thing there is, even in the fairest and highest and most gifted of her sex; and then it is of an ugliness to chill and kill romance, and scatter young love's dream, and almost break the heart.
And all for the sake of a high heel and a ridiculously pointed toe—mean things, at the best!
Conversely, when Mother Nature has taken extra pains in the building of it, and proper care or happy chance has kept it free of lamentable deformations, indurations, and discolorations—all those grewsome boot-begotten abominations which have made it so generally unpopular—the sudden sight of it, uncovered, comes as a very rare and singularly pleasing surprise to the eye that has learned how to see!
Nothing else that Mother Nature has to show, not even the human face divine, has more subtle power to suggest high physical distinction, happy evolution, and supreme development; the lordship of man over beast, the lordship of man over man, the lordship of woman over all!
Much humor here in Trilby by George Du Maurier written 1n 1894. Also much sadness so be prepared. Also waaay too much French language. I'm sure I would have enjoyed it 100% more if it was completely translated. Even so, it was a story well told and it will make you laugh, then it will make you cry.
I read it on Project Gutenberg, link:
https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/...
Complete with awesome illustrations by the author!
March 31, 2021
Esta lectura ha sido un poco como una montaña rusa, en el sentido de que se han intercalado partes que me han aburrido soberanamente y se me han hecho muy largas (y me he tenido que obligar a seguir leyendo al llegar a ellas, para que mentir), con otras que he disfrutado una barbaridad y que me han gustado mucho. Por suerte, la parte que más me ha gustado ha sido la que corresponde al último cuarto del libro, de ahí que, a grandes rasgos, la novela me haya dejado una excelente impresión y muy buen sabor de boca. En todo esto creo que ha tenido mucho que ver, también, el hecho de que esta novela me haya sorprendido tanto, porque no ha sido lo que me esperaba. Y es que, si tuviera que usar una imagen para describir “Trilby” sería la de la matrioska rusa, la muñeca hueca que alberga en su interior otra muñeca que, a su vez, guarda otra muñeca, y así, sucesivamente, hasta llegar a la más pequeña.
Digo todo esto porque “Trilby” es mucho más de lo que parece a primera vista, su argumento simple y romántico salpicado con pinceladas de misterio e intriga esconde muchas cosas, toda una serie de criticas satíricas, arte en el que Du Maurier, su autor, era muy ducho al haberse curtido con las ilustraciones de la revista satírica “ Punch”. No será en este aspecto donde dejemos de ver referencias biográficas del autor a lo largo y ancho de su obra. Y es que Du Maurier conocía al dedillo el mundo bohemio que nos presenta al principio de la novela bajo una capa de alegría, bon vivant, ligereza y liberalidad que lo sazona todo, presentándolo como una realidad paralela dentro de la encorsetada hipócrita sociedad londinense de la época. Tengo que reconocer que dicha introducción y presentación de este mundillo idealizado y fiestero (que el autor, por otro lado, hace de forma impecable e incisiva) se me hizo un poco pesada y lenta, me sobraban páginas y descripciones de como era la vida de los tres Angeluchos con los que iniciamos la novela, tres amigos ingleses que se dedican a pintar en el Paris de mediados del siglo XIX, por más interesante y bien hecho que estuviera todo.
Pero no pasa nada. Precisamente es después de esta introducción donde empiezan las sorpresas con esta novela: con este ambiente tan alegre y romántico, uno no puede anticipar lo que viene, La tragedia que va a ir desarrollándose ante los ojos del lector a partir del primer cuarto de este libro. Y no solo eso: no se trata meramente de una novela que trata sobre una relación entre dos personas de países y ámbitos sociales muy diferentes. También trata temas tan espinosos y eternos como el sexo, la religión, la búsqueda de los sentimientos, la amistad o la desigualdad entre sexos. Y eso es algo que no me esperaba encontrar en esta obra que nos ocupa, creía que iba a ser todo más centrado en lo sentimental. Y por supuesto, también sorprende la complejidad que Du Maurier acaba por ofrecer en sus personajes. Con la excepción de Laird (que es, sin duda alguna, el que queda más desdibujado de toda la historia y del trio inglés inicial, tanto por su personalidad como por su actuación dentro de la trama) ninguno de los principales tiene desperdicio. Hasta el protagonista romántico de la historia por antonomasia, Little Billee, tiene una personalidad y una evolución mucho más compleja de lo que puede anticipar su papel inicial de joven soñador y bondadoso, virtuoso del pincel, e inglesito burgués muy hijo de su época y educación, que queda devastadoramente enamorado de la coqueta y casquivana planchadora Trilby.
Como para no estarlo.
Si hay algo que me ha encantado en esta novela ha sido el personaje que le da nombre, sin duda alguna (y esto lo he tenido claro desde que he cerrado la novela) se va a convertir en uno de mis personajes femeninos favoritos de toda la historia de la literatura. Desde ya. Tal y como nos es presentada y descrita es imposible que ningún personaje no caiga rendido ante su bondad, picardía y alegría, se nota que hasta el propio autor está un tanto enamorado de ella, tan fascinante es. Podría haberse quedado en un personaje ñoño o plano, la típica protagonista insípida de novela romántica, si no fuera por la manera que Du Maurier nos la presenta, tan tierna como fulminantemente humana, un personaje lleno de vida y capaz de respirar a través de la tinta y el papel, tan llena de matices, pero no de sombras, lo que hace que la luz que ya de por si desprende el personaje sea aún más bella y especial. Ese dialogo final que tiene con la Señora Bagot... sin palabras... me ha parecido precioso, bello y conmovedor. Me considero una tipa dura, de esas que no lloran con facilidad leyendo un libro o viendo una película. Pero en este caso tengo que reconocer que leyendo estas páginas se me han saltado las lágrimas, tan bonito y tan triste que me ha parecido todo lo que tenía ante mis ojos.
Y por supuesto todo melodrama romántico que se precie tiene su malo malísimo, encarnado en este caso en la oscura figura de Svengali. Ciertamente este personaje tiene bien merecida la fama que se ha ganado en el ideario anglosajón y la historia de la literatura. Solo hay que pensar en la última escena en la que aparece a modo de retrato ante nuestra Tribly para justificar su fama y su impacto en la cultura popular, al ver las devastadoras consecuencias que tiene para la protagonista y para el resto de la historia. Para ponerte los pelos de punta. Y lo peor del caso es que aunque es imposible que te caiga bien, tampoco puedes odiarle del todo, tal es la caracterización tan depurada y llena de matices que el autor hace con él. Sin duda alguna es un personaje fascinante por lo tenebroso que es, de hecho a veces pienso que no se le ha sacado todo el jugo que podría haber dado más juego (y bastante da a lo largo de la historia), tan bien construido que está. Y por supuesto, otro personaje que también se merece una mención es el de Taffy, otro de tantos caracteres que parecen que tienen un rol fijo tanto de personalidad como de rol dentro de la historia, para luego salirse de la tangente y demostrar ser más rico e interesante de lo que parecía a simple vista, demostrando que más que ser meramente el Hercules de la historia, estamos ante un excelente amigo y un personaje de lo más complejo y maduro.
En definitiva “Trilby” ha sido una lectura llena de contrastes. Como dije antes, se han mezclado partes que se me han hecho innecesariamente largas (muy interesante todo el monologo de Little Billee al perro, no niego que aporta profundidad al personaje, pero me ha parecido desmesurado en su longitud) con otras que he disfrutado y sufrido enormemente, como solo los buenos libros consiguen hacer. Me ha parecido una novela muy rompedora y original para la época en la que se publico. Ciertamente, se nota que cuando se sale un poco de la tangente, Du Maurier no duda en volver al redil de lo políticamente correcto para el momento en que vivió, pero se aprecian sus esfuerzos por tratar de ser poco convencional y romper tabúes. También reconozco que me he divertido mucho investigando sobre el impacto cultural que en su momento tuvo esta obra, considerada como el primer Best-Seller de la historia moderna. Me han parecido muy interesantes todos los datos que he descubierto sobre una obra que, actualmente, es tan poco (y creo que injustamente) conocida por el gran público, desde que diera nombre a un sombrero, hasta el hecho de que salieran al mercado helados con la forma del piececito de Trilby. Como señala el excelente epílogo de la edición que he manejado, preparada por la editorial Funambulista, ríete tu de la campaña de publicidad de Harry Potter.
Digo todo esto porque “Trilby” es mucho más de lo que parece a primera vista, su argumento simple y romántico salpicado con pinceladas de misterio e intriga esconde muchas cosas, toda una serie de criticas satíricas, arte en el que Du Maurier, su autor, era muy ducho al haberse curtido con las ilustraciones de la revista satírica “ Punch”. No será en este aspecto donde dejemos de ver referencias biográficas del autor a lo largo y ancho de su obra. Y es que Du Maurier conocía al dedillo el mundo bohemio que nos presenta al principio de la novela bajo una capa de alegría, bon vivant, ligereza y liberalidad que lo sazona todo, presentándolo como una realidad paralela dentro de la encorsetada hipócrita sociedad londinense de la época. Tengo que reconocer que dicha introducción y presentación de este mundillo idealizado y fiestero (que el autor, por otro lado, hace de forma impecable e incisiva) se me hizo un poco pesada y lenta, me sobraban páginas y descripciones de como era la vida de los tres Angeluchos con los que iniciamos la novela, tres amigos ingleses que se dedican a pintar en el Paris de mediados del siglo XIX, por más interesante y bien hecho que estuviera todo.
Pero no pasa nada. Precisamente es después de esta introducción donde empiezan las sorpresas con esta novela: con este ambiente tan alegre y romántico, uno no puede anticipar lo que viene, La tragedia que va a ir desarrollándose ante los ojos del lector a partir del primer cuarto de este libro. Y no solo eso: no se trata meramente de una novela que trata sobre una relación entre dos personas de países y ámbitos sociales muy diferentes. También trata temas tan espinosos y eternos como el sexo, la religión, la búsqueda de los sentimientos, la amistad o la desigualdad entre sexos. Y eso es algo que no me esperaba encontrar en esta obra que nos ocupa, creía que iba a ser todo más centrado en lo sentimental. Y por supuesto, también sorprende la complejidad que Du Maurier acaba por ofrecer en sus personajes. Con la excepción de Laird (que es, sin duda alguna, el que queda más desdibujado de toda la historia y del trio inglés inicial, tanto por su personalidad como por su actuación dentro de la trama) ninguno de los principales tiene desperdicio. Hasta el protagonista romántico de la historia por antonomasia, Little Billee, tiene una personalidad y una evolución mucho más compleja de lo que puede anticipar su papel inicial de joven soñador y bondadoso, virtuoso del pincel, e inglesito burgués muy hijo de su época y educación, que queda devastadoramente enamorado de la coqueta y casquivana planchadora Trilby.
Como para no estarlo.
Si hay algo que me ha encantado en esta novela ha sido el personaje que le da nombre, sin duda alguna (y esto lo he tenido claro desde que he cerrado la novela) se va a convertir en uno de mis personajes femeninos favoritos de toda la historia de la literatura. Desde ya. Tal y como nos es presentada y descrita es imposible que ningún personaje no caiga rendido ante su bondad, picardía y alegría, se nota que hasta el propio autor está un tanto enamorado de ella, tan fascinante es. Podría haberse quedado en un personaje ñoño o plano, la típica protagonista insípida de novela romántica, si no fuera por la manera que Du Maurier nos la presenta, tan tierna como fulminantemente humana, un personaje lleno de vida y capaz de respirar a través de la tinta y el papel, tan llena de matices, pero no de sombras, lo que hace que la luz que ya de por si desprende el personaje sea aún más bella y especial. Ese dialogo final que tiene con la Señora Bagot... sin palabras... me ha parecido precioso, bello y conmovedor. Me considero una tipa dura, de esas que no lloran con facilidad leyendo un libro o viendo una película. Pero en este caso tengo que reconocer que leyendo estas páginas se me han saltado las lágrimas, tan bonito y tan triste que me ha parecido todo lo que tenía ante mis ojos.
Y por supuesto todo melodrama romántico que se precie tiene su malo malísimo, encarnado en este caso en la oscura figura de Svengali. Ciertamente este personaje tiene bien merecida la fama que se ha ganado en el ideario anglosajón y la historia de la literatura. Solo hay que pensar en la última escena en la que aparece a modo de retrato ante nuestra Tribly para justificar su fama y su impacto en la cultura popular, al ver las devastadoras consecuencias que tiene para la protagonista y para el resto de la historia. Para ponerte los pelos de punta. Y lo peor del caso es que aunque es imposible que te caiga bien, tampoco puedes odiarle del todo, tal es la caracterización tan depurada y llena de matices que el autor hace con él. Sin duda alguna es un personaje fascinante por lo tenebroso que es, de hecho a veces pienso que no se le ha sacado todo el jugo que podría haber dado más juego (y bastante da a lo largo de la historia), tan bien construido que está. Y por supuesto, otro personaje que también se merece una mención es el de Taffy, otro de tantos caracteres que parecen que tienen un rol fijo tanto de personalidad como de rol dentro de la historia, para luego salirse de la tangente y demostrar ser más rico e interesante de lo que parecía a simple vista, demostrando que más que ser meramente el Hercules de la historia, estamos ante un excelente amigo y un personaje de lo más complejo y maduro.
En definitiva “Trilby” ha sido una lectura llena de contrastes. Como dije antes, se han mezclado partes que se me han hecho innecesariamente largas (muy interesante todo el monologo de Little Billee al perro, no niego que aporta profundidad al personaje, pero me ha parecido desmesurado en su longitud) con otras que he disfrutado y sufrido enormemente, como solo los buenos libros consiguen hacer. Me ha parecido una novela muy rompedora y original para la época en la que se publico. Ciertamente, se nota que cuando se sale un poco de la tangente, Du Maurier no duda en volver al redil de lo políticamente correcto para el momento en que vivió, pero se aprecian sus esfuerzos por tratar de ser poco convencional y romper tabúes. También reconozco que me he divertido mucho investigando sobre el impacto cultural que en su momento tuvo esta obra, considerada como el primer Best-Seller de la historia moderna. Me han parecido muy interesantes todos los datos que he descubierto sobre una obra que, actualmente, es tan poco (y creo que injustamente) conocida por el gran público, desde que diera nombre a un sombrero, hasta el hecho de que salieran al mercado helados con la forma del piececito de Trilby. Como señala el excelente epílogo de la edición que he manejado, preparada por la editorial Funambulista, ríete tu de la campaña de publicidad de Harry Potter.
March 18, 2020
Para que vean que en todas épocas han existido novelas deficientes que han sido adoradas por el público.
Trillby es un nombre que hoy en día no se escucha mucho, pero cuando fue publicada por entregasen 1894 generó una manía tal como la de Harry Potter cien años después, de acuerdo al postfacio de mi edición. Tanto que se hacían "pasteles de Trillby" y hasta el día de hoy el nombre de un sombrero se llama así.
Quizá lo más interesante sería ver cómo esta novela agradó tanto a las sensibilidades del "fin de siecle". Eso es su ruina. Porque es sentimentalista y exagerada hasta decir basta. Primero, se simplifica y romantiza el mundo de los bohemios parisinos, obviando que Dumas Hijo y Murger lo hicieron mucho mejor. En este país los bohemios son felices y hasta medio sanos y no hay ni sífilis ni tuberculosis ni delirium tremens por el ajenjo. Los personajes, si bien diferentes entre sí, son descritos como un cúmulo y un dechado de virtudes para echar luego un par de defectillos que poco hacen por quitarme la idea de que los cuatro principales son todos unos mary sues. Y por supuesto el villano principal, que es una desafortunada caricatura antisemita. Todo se junta en un coctel lleno de melcocha que parece una caricatura de la novela gótica de muchos años antes y de las pasiones del romanticismo. Creo que uso mucho este símil, pero este sentimentalismo de finales del S XIX es una versión adulterada y rebajada de las manifestaciones más ásperas de tiempos anteriores (tipo el grunge vs. el post-grunge). Así, Trillby me remite a ese mundillo de valsecitos mediocres y de poesías vulgares tipo "el brindis del bohemio". Lo peor de la bella época.
Trillby es un nombre que hoy en día no se escucha mucho, pero cuando fue publicada por entregasen 1894 generó una manía tal como la de Harry Potter cien años después, de acuerdo al postfacio de mi edición. Tanto que se hacían "pasteles de Trillby" y hasta el día de hoy el nombre de un sombrero se llama así.
Quizá lo más interesante sería ver cómo esta novela agradó tanto a las sensibilidades del "fin de siecle". Eso es su ruina. Porque es sentimentalista y exagerada hasta decir basta. Primero, se simplifica y romantiza el mundo de los bohemios parisinos, obviando que Dumas Hijo y Murger lo hicieron mucho mejor. En este país los bohemios son felices y hasta medio sanos y no hay ni sífilis ni tuberculosis ni delirium tremens por el ajenjo. Los personajes, si bien diferentes entre sí, son descritos como un cúmulo y un dechado de virtudes para echar luego un par de defectillos que poco hacen por quitarme la idea de que los cuatro principales son todos unos mary sues. Y por supuesto el villano principal, que es una desafortunada caricatura antisemita. Todo se junta en un coctel lleno de melcocha que parece una caricatura de la novela gótica de muchos años antes y de las pasiones del romanticismo. Creo que uso mucho este símil, pero este sentimentalismo de finales del S XIX es una versión adulterada y rebajada de las manifestaciones más ásperas de tiempos anteriores (tipo el grunge vs. el post-grunge). Así, Trillby me remite a ese mundillo de valsecitos mediocres y de poesías vulgares tipo "el brindis del bohemio". Lo peor de la bella época.
April 13, 2020
Ultimately this was worth reading for (a) the origin of the reference “Svengali” (but does anyone even use that term anymore?) and (b) its nostalgic look at la vie Bohème in 1850s Paris which du Maurier (grandfather to Daphne) experienced firsthand in his youth. Certainly the books popularity when it was published in 1894 must have been in part due to its scandalous depiction of bohemian life with its more casual mores about sex and nudity compared to that of Victorian England.
Three young men share a Left Bank studio in Paris where they meet Trilby, the beautiful, jejune orphan who models for painters and sculptors. All three are in love with Trilby, but especially Little Billee, whose love she returns. Unfortunately, she has also caught the eye of the manipulative musician Svengali. Events conspire to tear the young lovers apart and to bring Trilby under the sway of Svengali.
I am glad to have read it but it was a bit meandering; there was lots of description that slowed me down, not to mention the untranslated French, not to mention the untranslated French written phonetically in a German accent. Whew! Also, it is very anti-Semitic. Svengali, like Fagin in Oliver Twist is not bad and a Jew, he is bad because he is a Jew.
Three young men share a Left Bank studio in Paris where they meet Trilby, the beautiful, jejune orphan who models for painters and sculptors. All three are in love with Trilby, but especially Little Billee, whose love she returns. Unfortunately, she has also caught the eye of the manipulative musician Svengali. Events conspire to tear the young lovers apart and to bring Trilby under the sway of Svengali.
I am glad to have read it but it was a bit meandering; there was lots of description that slowed me down, not to mention the untranslated French, not to mention the untranslated French written phonetically in a German accent. Whew! Also, it is very anti-Semitic. Svengali, like Fagin in Oliver Twist is not bad and a Jew, he is bad because he is a Jew.
September 20, 2025
What a find! I picked this up at a second hand bookshop because of the name du Maurier. I'm a huge Rebecca du Maurier fan and assumed George must be related. It turns out her was her Grandfather and was the illustrator for Punch magazine in the mid 1860's and wrote Trilby 1894.
Trilby is such an original work, that it inspired many other masterpieces such as Phantom of the Opera, not to mention the Trilby hat.
Set in Paris, there are two Englishmen and a Scotsman who have let a studio to paint in and enjoy the bohemian lifestyle. They meet Trilby who is also English, and become fast friends. Trilby is an artists model for sculptors and painters. While she has the perfect foot for sculpting, she also sits in the 'altogether' on occasion and has no qualms about doing so.
The protagonist of the novel is Svengali. He is a talented musician and often visits the studio to fawn over Trilby and play music for the others. He is portrayed as menacing, dirty and unkempt, always on the take.
I don't want to leave any spoilers so you will have to read to see what happens. There is a love story, a rags to riches component, several heartbreaks and a baffling criminal act..Will there be justice?
Highly recommend, this is one of my new favourite classics. Warning, my version of the book had a lot of French dialogue in it, but also lots of wonderful illustrations by the author. A real treasure.
Trilby is such an original work, that it inspired many other masterpieces such as Phantom of the Opera, not to mention the Trilby hat.
Set in Paris, there are two Englishmen and a Scotsman who have let a studio to paint in and enjoy the bohemian lifestyle. They meet Trilby who is also English, and become fast friends. Trilby is an artists model for sculptors and painters. While she has the perfect foot for sculpting, she also sits in the 'altogether' on occasion and has no qualms about doing so.
The protagonist of the novel is Svengali. He is a talented musician and often visits the studio to fawn over Trilby and play music for the others. He is portrayed as menacing, dirty and unkempt, always on the take.
I don't want to leave any spoilers so you will have to read to see what happens. There is a love story, a rags to riches component, several heartbreaks and a baffling criminal act..Will there be justice?
Highly recommend, this is one of my new favourite classics. Warning, my version of the book had a lot of French dialogue in it, but also lots of wonderful illustrations by the author. A real treasure.
May 20, 2025
I found parts of Trilbys story to be quite slow but in the end I enjoyed this classic, tragic as it was. It was interesting tale of love, heartbreak, art and challenges of the time. Was great to step back into the past.
August 8, 2021
Its an odd one. I fell into it because of reading around Svengali (and one of the more recent films), and it has an awful lot of the tropes of Victorian semi-Gothic. Its nominally about Trilby, but not really - much more about the men who loved her and its semi-angst over her poor station in life. Which is a pity because the book is never as good as when she is on the page. She is, it strikes me, potentially a Victorian example of a Manic Pixie Dream Girl, all adorable tropes and irrestistable to the three British art toffs who pine away like fools. Of course Trilby has no agency, and once into the claws of a surprisingly underplayed (though obviously hideously anti-Semitic) Svengali its all over for her. In the end the main thing the book has going for it is du Maurier's conversational style, which can get infuriating when he is defending Trilby's honour, but at least manages to paint a portrait of relatively carefree Parisian days even whilst doing the titular character wrong.
January 23, 2018
Reading just about half of the first part of the book was enough to convince me this was a waste of my time. Didn't care for the casual antisemitism, didn't care for the fussy and sometimes downright amateurish style (those weird interjections by the narrator saying he'll translate the French/German dialogue from now on). A historic curiosity that may deserve study, but no longer seems able to elicit any pleasure.
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