Trollope and Hervieu left and headed north up the Mississippi. Inspired by Wright’s idealism, the staunchly abolitionist Trollope was looking forward to seeing the stereotypical America: a land of opportunity, where “noble-minded, progressive, and kind-hearted liberals lived in a veritable Elysium.” But once there, both Trollope and Hervieu were deeply disappointed by the Commune’s primitive conditions – neither expected that it would be basically a peasant farming community located in the marshy, mosquito-saturated swamp. Hervieu was originally going to be a drawing instructor there. Their intended destination was Nashoba Commune, a utopian settlement for ex-slaves set up by the reformer Frances Wright in Tennessee. Also accompanying her was the young French illustrator Auguste Hervieu. Trollope sailed for America in 1827 with three of her children. Published in 1832 in two volumes, Domestic Manners of the Americans was a runaway bestseller and a wildly controversial takedown of what Trollope saw as a backward, uncouth, and hypocritical new nation. Her literary career began out of financial desperation when she wrote a travelogue describing her impressions of America, gathered on a three-year excursion there. Frances Trollope, today best known as the mother of the prolific and hugely popular Victorian author Anthony Trollope, was herself an extraordinarily productive writer in many genres.
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