Nina Balatka

by Anthony Trollope

Book Overview

Anthony Trollope was an established novelist of great renown when Nina Balatka was published in 1866, twenty years after his first novel. Nina Balatka is, on the surface, a love story--not an unusual... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0140438203
• ISBN13: 9780140438208
• Release Date: January 1994
• Publisher: Penguin Group
• Length: 208 Pages
• Weight: 0.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 4.3" x 7.0"

Customer Reviews

Trollope and Social Politics

Trollope's first novel in his Barsetshire series was The Warden. It was based on the corruption at St. Cross Hospital during the early nineteenth century by its Master, Francis North, in Winchester, England. At the time of the Second Reform Act of 1867, Trollope had written the first of his Paliser series, which was a political novel. At this time, he also wrote Nina Balatka, a novel which reflects the beginning of the end of social restrictions inflicted on Jews in Prague. It concerns the love between a Catholic woman, Nina, and a Jewish man, Anton Trendellsohn who was a merchant. It is the story of the couple's triumph over family manipulation and lies to find a life for themselves. With so many stereotypical Jewish characters in Trollope's prolific literature, Nina Balatka serves as an effective way to demonstrate that his antisemitism is satirical and stops with his characters while his sympathy for the Jew is without reservation. Trollope was able to proceed with his political life by running for parliament representing the borough of Beverley. He was unsuccessful but was able to continue his series of Paliser novels. Part of his goal was to chronicle anti-semitism in Victorian England which he did successfully. Due to his evenhandedness in writing Nina Balatka, the prejudice was never one of which he could be accused. George Eliot followed his lead by writing Daniel Deronda,a story about a Jew who is also betrayed by his family but eventually finds love among one of his own. Although she is generally considered of higher intellect than Trollope, she was not able to rid her novel of her personal conviction that married women are dull, dependent creatures who are unable to think for themselves. In this respect, Nina Balatka is refreshing as a fearless heroine, willing to face the duplicity of her family in the name of love.

Loved it!

I really enjoyed the characters in this book. Even though you could sort of predict what was going to happen it was still an enjoyable book to read. When it got to the part that you knew was coming it was so well written that you could really visualize what was happening.