Castle Richmond

Anthony Trollope, an Englishman, settled in Ireland in 1841 after volunteering to serve as a postal surveyor's clerk in Connacht. Trollope soon began to thrive in his new locale, marrying Rose Heseltine in 1844 and completing his first novel, The Macdermots of Ballycloran, the following year. Along with this first literary venture, Trollope went on to write an additional four novels set in Ireland. Though many of these works were not enthusiastically received upon publication (publisher Henry Colburn even noted to Trollope that it was clear "readers do not like novels on Irish subjects as well as on others"), they demonstrate the development of Trollope's early style and also capture Ireland during a tumultuous time in its history (the Great Famine and its aftermath). Considered one of the novelist's forgotten masterpieces, Castle Richmond was the third Trollope novel to feature an Irish background, portraying a stirring tale of a County Cork castle owner set during the earliest days of the famine.