I've had a copy of Phineas Finn gathering dust on my dresser-drawer for a couple years, but I hadn't read a single line of Anthony Trollope's until last week. A few words of admiration moved me to start, beginning with this pugilistic essay by David Mamet, titled Charles Dickens Makes Me Want to Throw Up:

"I’ve read Anthony Trollope’s entire work several times, not because I am schooled, educated or right-thinking—I don’t believe I am more afflicted in these than most—but because I like to read. Trollope’s 47 novels, nonfiction and incidental work are a delight. His prose is clear, perfectly rhythmic, concise and, at turns, trenchant and profoundly funny."

Mamet's right, whatever one thinks of Dickens. On page 83 of Phineas Finn is a passage that squares with each descriptor of Mamet's phrase; a lucid take on American politics, that doesn't ring false in December 2017:

"[In the United States]...political enmity exists, but the political enmity produces private hatred. The leader of parties there really mean what they way when they abuse each other, and are in earnest when they talk as though they were about to tear each other limb from limb."

Mamet reports that Trollope, a true monster of prolificity, awoke at 5:30 each morning to churn out 2,500 words. He wrote his novels while working a regular shift at the post office and raising two children.