Ralph The Heir

Anthony Trollope

*Ralph the Heir* by Anthony Trollope (published 1871) is a novel built around questions of inheritance, legitimacy, and social position in Victorian England. The central plot concerns Ralph Newton, the heir to a country estate held by his uncle, Squire Gregory Newton. Complicating matters, there are two men named Ralph Newton in the story: the legitimate heir (often called "the heir") and his illegitimate cousin, also named Ralph, whom the squire actually prefers and wishes to make his successor. The squire schemes to break the entail and pass the property to his beloved illegitimate son, but the legal and emotional obstacles to doing so drive much of the narrative. The legitimate Ralph Newton is an amiable but feckless young man who falls into debt and drifts somewhat aimlessly through his romantic and financial affairs. His indecisiveness, particularly regarding marriage, forms a major thread. He wavers between several women, including Polly Neefit, the daughter of a wealthy breeches-maker who would gladly fund Ralph's debts in exchange for the social elevation a marriage would bring his daughter. Polly, notably, has the good sense and self-respect to resist the arrangement. A significant subplot follows Sir Thomas Underwood, a lawyer and reluctant politician, and his daughters. This section contains Trollope's satirical treatment of a parliamentary election at the borough of Percycross, widely understood to draw on Trollope's own unsuccessful run for Parliament at Beverley in 1868. The depiction of electoral corruption and the dispiriting realities of campaigning is one of the book's most pointed elements. The novel weaves these strands together to examine how money, birth, and respectability interact, and how characters navigate obligations of love and duty. It's generally considered one of Trollope's lesser-known and more uneven works, though the election material is often singled out for its sharp, autobiographically informed realism.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Ralph The Heir