The Way We Live Now (1875), Anthony Trollope's towering masterpiece of Victorian satire, exposes greed and moral corruption beneath London's glittering society. At its center stands Augustus Melmotte, a mysterious foreign financier of dubious origins whose enormous wealth opens every aristocratic door. As Melmotte inflates a fraudulent railway scheme and buys his way into Parliament, characters like the dissolute Sir Felix Carbury, his scheming mother, and the principled Roger Carbury navigate a world where money eclipses honor. When Melmotte's empire collapses, Trollope delivers a searing indictment of speculation, hypocrisy, and a society willing to worship wealth at any price.
