Paris and the Parisians in 1835 was published by Richard Bentley in 1836, based on a year’s residence in Paris during 1835. Having made her reputation with a travel book about America, Trollope applied the same method — close observation of daily life, social customs, and national character — to France under the July Monarchy of Louis-Philippe.
The book is structured as a series of letters (a common travel-book format of the period) and covers the full range of Parisian life: the salons, the theaters, the churches, the political debates, the daily commerce of the streets, the fashions, the food, the intellectual currents. Trollope’s tone is notably warmer than in Domestic Manners — she genuinely liked French civilization and found Parisian society infinitely more agreeable than American — though she retains her sharp eye for absurdity and pretension.
Her accounts of French political life during the turbulent July Monarchy period have documentary value: she attended the Chamber of Deputies, observed the street politics of republican opposition, and recorded the atmosphere of a society poised between revolution and reaction. Her portraits of French literary and social figures — carefully anonymized but clearly identifiable to contemporary readers — provide valuable evidence of Parisian social life in the 1830s.
Collecting Paris and the Parisians in 1835
First edition (Richard Bentley, London, 1836): Two volumes, cloth boards, with illustrations by Auguste Hervieu.
Market values:
- First edition (2 vols): $150–$400
- Later reprints: $30–$75