
Behemoth
A History of the Factory and the Making of the Modern World
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Narrated by:
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Stephen Bowlby
About this listen
A sweeping, global history of the rise of the factory and its effects on society
We live in a factory-made world: modern life is built on three centuries of advances in factory production, efficiency, and technology. But giant factories have also fueled our fears about the future since their beginnings, when William Blake called them "dark Satanic mills". Many factories that operated over the last two centuries - such as Homestead, River Rouge, and Foxconn - were known for the labor exploitation and class warfare they engendered, not to mention the environmental devastation caused by factory production from the beginning of the Industrial Revolution up to today.
In a major work of scholarship that is also wonderfully accessible, celebrated historian Joshua B. Freeman tells the story of the factory and examines how it has reflected both our dreams and our nightmares of industrialization and social change. He whisks listeners from the textile mills in England that powered the Industrial Revolution and the factory towns of New England to the colossal steel and car plants of 20th-century America, Eastern Europe, and the Soviet Union and on to today's behemoths making sneakers, toys, and cellphones in China and Vietnam.
The giant factory, Freeman shows, led a revolution that transformed human life and the environment. He traces arguments about factories and social progress through such critics and champions as Marx and Engels, Charles Dickens, Alexander Hamilton, Henry Ford, and Joseph Stalin. He chronicles protests against standard industry practices from unions and workers' rights groups that led to shortened workdays, child labor laws, protection for organized labor, and much more.
In Behemoth, Freeman also explores how factories became objects of great wonder that both inspired and horrified artists and writers in their time. He examines representations of factories in the work of Charles Sheeler, Margaret Bourke-White, Charlie Chaplin, Diego Rivera, and Edward Burtynsky.
Behemoth tells the grand story of global industry from the Industrial Revolution to the present. It is a magisterial work on factories and the people whose labor made them run. And it offers a piercing perspective on how factories have shaped our societies and the challenges we face now.
©2018 Joshua B. Freeman (P)2018 Blackstone Audio, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
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Long but good
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My only criticism is the reader’s use of accents in dialogue within the prose. Not really necessary, and not very good. But everything else about his reading is fantastic!
I’ll be thinking about the ramifications of this book for some time to come, and will never look at my I-phone in quite the same way.
Excellent Read
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I will close with a note about the narrator and his accents. I am typically distracted by purposeful accents and so i selected this audiobook with trepidation based upon the many reviews castigating the narrator for his interpretation of Marx's accent (for example). In my opinion, the value of this book's content was worth the mild distraction. Yet, i actually want to commend the narrator because the author uses many actual quotes of historical actors to support his hypothesis. The accents serve to delineate the firsthand "testimony" from the author's thoughts. They are akin to audio footnotes. I value that practice because it gives me the opportunity to think critically and develop my own conclusions. I learned much and thank the author AND narrator.
Very informative and interesting history
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Fantastic Book!
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What a gem for history fans
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love it
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Somewhat Misleading Title
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The single STUPIDEST and WORST audio book in the HISTORY of audio books. Aside from execrable accent like a Canadian three-year-old trying to imitate the queen (self-consciously dropping the letter R, rather than using an English R) no matter what the class or background of the English person being quoted - he just did Karl Marx in....drum roll, please....a RUSSIAN accent. hahahahahahahahahaha
I cannot conceive how the publisher allowed this narration to be used. The book is great. The audio version is so excruciatingly horrific that it's almost comical. It would be, if I didn't really want to hear the content. But...Karl Marx with a Russian accent? My God!
Addendum
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This could easily have been ten times longer.
I didn’t enjoy the reader trying to mimic accents in parts of dialogue- it was simply distracting.
Very happy I heard this. Thank you.
Eye opener to how complex an issue this is.
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A Good book badly performed
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