Trilby – George du Maurier

It was a du Maurier cartoon that begat the term “curate’s egg”, which I suppose would be a reasonable description of this odd novel. It was a runaway best-seller in it’s day (the 1890s) thanks to a couple of vivid characters, a fun Parisian setting and a jocular narrative voice.

To the modern reader, though, it feels horribly dated. The depiction of arch-villain Svengali is hopelessly anti-Semitic, the pacing is way off and the references to popular songs and literature of the day have no meaning at all any more.

In historical terms, interesting. In literary terms, close to worthless.