Women, Love and Marriage

Marriage is a central theme in much of Trollope’s writing.

  • Had she not been so much the lady, she might have been more the woman.

    Miss Mackenzie

  • A woman is always angry with the woman, who has probably been quite passive, and rarely with the man, who is ever the real transgressor.

    He Knew He Was Right

  • Had she not been so much the lady, she might have been more the woman.

    Miss Mackenzie

  • The tact of women excels the skill of men.

    The Claverings

  • Girls are understood by their mothers better than they are by their fathers.

    He Knew He Was Right

  • Remember this, there is no tyranny to a woman like telling her of her duty.

    Phineas Finn

  • Women are accustomed to look deeper into men at the first sight than other men will trouble themselves to do.

    Phineas Finn

  • All the virtues in the calendar, though they exist on each side, will not make a man and woman happy, unless there be sympathy.

    Phineas Finn

  • It is very hard sometimes to know how intensely we are loved, and of what value our presence is to those who love us.

    The Last Chronicle of Barset

  • Love desires an equal.

    The Duke's Children

  • Long engagements are bad, no doubt. Everybody has always said so. But a long engagement may be better than none at all.

    Dr Wortle's School

  • He was one of those men of whom it may be said that they have no possible claim to remain unmarried.

    He Knew He Was Right

  • Lovers with all the glories and all the graces are supposed to be plentiful as blackberries by girls of nineteen, but have been proved to be rare hothouse fruits by girls of twenty-nine.

    The Way We Live Now

  • A woman's weapon is her tongue.

    The Way We Live Now

  • I hate a stupid man who can't talk to me, and I hate a clever man who talks me down. I don’t like a man who is too lazy to make any effort to shine; but I particularly dislike the man who is always striving for effect.

    Phineas Finn

  • Feemy was a fine girl in the eyes of a man not too much accustomed to refinement.

    The Macdermots of Ballycloran

  • It was admitted by all her friends, and also by her enemies - who were in truth the more numerous and active body of the two - that Lizzie Greystock had done very well with herself.

    The Eustace Diamonds

  • With him, yea will stand for yea, and nay for nay. Though his heart should break for it, the woman who shall reject him once, will have rejected him once and for all.

    Barchester Towers, Chapter 45

  • It was admitted by all her friends, and also by her enemies--who were in truth the more numerous and active body of the two--that Lizzie Greystock had done very well with herself.

    The Eustace Diamonds

  • Miss Trefoil must have thought that kissing and proposing were the same thing. Other young ladies have, perhaps, before now made such a mistake. But this young lady had had much experience, and should have known better.

    The American Senator

  • Why-oh! why had she told such a falsehood? Could anything justify her in a lie? was it not a lie-knowing as she did that she loved him with all her loving heart?

    Framley Parsonage

  • Now, now that she was older and perhaps wiser, love meant a partnership, in which each partner would be honest to the other, in which each would wish and strive for the other's welfare, so that thus their joint welfare might be insured. Then, in those early girlish days, it had meant a total abnegation of self. The one was of earth, and therefore possible. The other had been a ray from heaven, - and impossible, except in a dream.

    Can You Forgive Her?