Decline and Fall
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
$0.99/mo for the first 3 months
Prime members: New to Audible? Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Decline and Fall
Buy for $16.07
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Stefan Rudnicki
-
By:
-
Evelyn Waugh
About this listen
“What an immature, self-destructive, antiquated mischief is man! How obscure and gross his prancing and chattering on his little stage of evolution! How loathsome and beyond words boring all the thoughts and self-approval of his biological by-product! this half-formed, ill-conditioned body! this erratic, maladjusted mechanism of his soul: on one side the harmonious instincts and balanced responses of the animal, on the other the inflexible purpose of the engine, and between them man, equally alien from the being of Nature and the doing of the machine, the vile becoming!”
Evelyn Waugh’s first novel, Decline and Fall, is the daring and hilarious tale of Paul Pennyfeather, a theology student expelled from Oxford and sent to teach at a private boys’ school in Wales. Previously a modest young man, Paul finds himself a bit out of place amongst the teachers of Llanabba, who are all misfits, fools, and derelicts themselves: Prendy (the anxious) and Captain Grimes (the drunk), just to name two. There are not only failed men and rowdy boys in this Welsh town to occupy his time, however; Margot Beste-Chetwynde, the mother of one of his students, quickly becomes the object of Paul’s affections. But Margot may not be all she appears to, and Paul’s world is turned upside down all over again.
With a title inspired both by Edward Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire and Oswald Spengler’s The Decline of the West, Waugh’s Decline and Fall is a brilliant farce and a biting satire of English morals and school life of the 1920s and, by extension, of the experience of generations of so many students and educators since.
Public Domain (P)2024 Blackstone PublishingPeople who viewed this also viewed...
-
A Handful of Dust
- By: Evelyn Waugh
- Narrated by: Andrew Sachs
- Length: 6 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 300
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 263
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 264
Evelyn Waugh's 1934 novel is a bitingly funny vision of aristocratic decadence in England between the wars. It tells the story of Tony Last, who, to the irritation of his wife, is inordinately obsessed with his Victorian Gothic country house and life. When Lady Brenda Last embarks on an affair with the worthless John Beaver out of boredom with her husband, she sets in motion a sequence of tragicomic disasters that reveal Waugh at his most scathing.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Slow Start then Subtle
- By Michael on 05-16-15
By: Evelyn Waugh
-
The Complete Stories of Evelyn Waugh
- By: Evelyn Waugh
- Narrated by: Simon Prebble
- Length: 19 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 43
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 39
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 36
A book of brilliant entertainments: 39 stories spanning the entire career of a great modern writer and an undisputed comic genius, "a satirist whose skill at sticking pens in people rates him a roomy cell in the murderers' row (Swift, Poe, Wilde, Shaw) of English letters" ( Time).
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
MORE than actual print book!
- By Anonymous User on 02-01-19
By: Evelyn Waugh
-
Decline and Fall
- By: Evelyn Waugh
- Narrated by: Michael Maloney
- Length: 5 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 261
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 227
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 224
Sent down from Oxford after a wild, drunken party, Paul Pennyfeather is oddly surprised to find himself qualifying for the position of schoolmaster at a boys' private school in Wales. His colleagues are an assortment of misfits, rascals and fools, including Prendy (plagued by doubts) and Captain Grimes, who is always in the soup (or just plain drunk). Then Sports Day arrives, and with it the delectable Margot Beste-Chetwynde, floating on a scented breeze.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Black Humor, Satire, and the Absurd
- By Gypsi on 06-09-18
By: Evelyn Waugh
-
Decline and Fall
- By: Evelyn Waugh
- Narrated by: Jonathan Keeble
- Length: 6 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall5 out of 5 stars 1
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 1
-
Story5 out of 5 stars 1
Sent down from Oxford for indecent behaviour, Paul Pennyfeather is oddly unsurprised to find himself qualifying for the position of schoolmaster at Llanabba Castle. His colleagues are an assortment of misfits, rascals, and fools, including Prendy and Captain Grimes, who is always in the soup (or just plain drunk). Then Sports Day arrives, and with it the delectable Margot Beste-Chetwynde, floating on a scented breeze. As the farce unfolds and the young run riot, no one is safe, least of all Paul.
By: Evelyn Waugh
-
The Heart of the Matter
- By: Graham Greene
- Narrated by: Joseph Porter
- Length: 10 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 98
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 75
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 77
A police commissioner in a British-governed, war-torn West African state, Scobie is bound by the strictest integrity and sense of duty both for his colonial responsibilities and for his wife, whom he deeply pities but no longer loves. Passed over for a promotion, he is forced to borrow money in order to send his despairing wife away on a holiday.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Characters come to life with Greene as the author
- By John on 06-08-11
By: Graham Greene
-
Brideshead Revisited
- By: Evelyn Waugh
- Narrated by: Jeremy Irons
- Length: 11 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 3,373
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 3,061
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 3,041
Evelyn Waugh's most celebrated work is a memory drama about the intense entanglement of the narrator, Charles Ryder, with a great Anglo-Catholic family. Written during World War II, the story mourns the passing of the aristocratic world Waugh knew in his youth and vividly recalls the sensuous pleasures denied him by wartime austerities; in so doing it also provides a profound study of the conflict between the demands of religion and the desires of the flesh.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Extraordinary
- By Vieux Carré Blonde on 12-12-12
By: Evelyn Waugh
-
A Handful of Dust
- By: Evelyn Waugh
- Narrated by: Andrew Sachs
- Length: 6 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 300
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 263
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 264
Evelyn Waugh's 1934 novel is a bitingly funny vision of aristocratic decadence in England between the wars. It tells the story of Tony Last, who, to the irritation of his wife, is inordinately obsessed with his Victorian Gothic country house and life. When Lady Brenda Last embarks on an affair with the worthless John Beaver out of boredom with her husband, she sets in motion a sequence of tragicomic disasters that reveal Waugh at his most scathing.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Slow Start then Subtle
- By Michael on 05-16-15
By: Evelyn Waugh
-
The Complete Stories of Evelyn Waugh
- By: Evelyn Waugh
- Narrated by: Simon Prebble
- Length: 19 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 43
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 39
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 36
A book of brilliant entertainments: 39 stories spanning the entire career of a great modern writer and an undisputed comic genius, "a satirist whose skill at sticking pens in people rates him a roomy cell in the murderers' row (Swift, Poe, Wilde, Shaw) of English letters" ( Time).
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
MORE than actual print book!
- By Anonymous User on 02-01-19
By: Evelyn Waugh
-
Decline and Fall
- By: Evelyn Waugh
- Narrated by: Michael Maloney
- Length: 5 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 261
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 227
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 224
Sent down from Oxford after a wild, drunken party, Paul Pennyfeather is oddly surprised to find himself qualifying for the position of schoolmaster at a boys' private school in Wales. His colleagues are an assortment of misfits, rascals and fools, including Prendy (plagued by doubts) and Captain Grimes, who is always in the soup (or just plain drunk). Then Sports Day arrives, and with it the delectable Margot Beste-Chetwynde, floating on a scented breeze.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Black Humor, Satire, and the Absurd
- By Gypsi on 06-09-18
By: Evelyn Waugh
-
Decline and Fall
- By: Evelyn Waugh
- Narrated by: Jonathan Keeble
- Length: 6 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall5 out of 5 stars 1
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 1
-
Story5 out of 5 stars 1
Sent down from Oxford for indecent behaviour, Paul Pennyfeather is oddly unsurprised to find himself qualifying for the position of schoolmaster at Llanabba Castle. His colleagues are an assortment of misfits, rascals, and fools, including Prendy and Captain Grimes, who is always in the soup (or just plain drunk). Then Sports Day arrives, and with it the delectable Margot Beste-Chetwynde, floating on a scented breeze. As the farce unfolds and the young run riot, no one is safe, least of all Paul.
By: Evelyn Waugh
-
The Heart of the Matter
- By: Graham Greene
- Narrated by: Joseph Porter
- Length: 10 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 98
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 75
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 77
A police commissioner in a British-governed, war-torn West African state, Scobie is bound by the strictest integrity and sense of duty both for his colonial responsibilities and for his wife, whom he deeply pities but no longer loves. Passed over for a promotion, he is forced to borrow money in order to send his despairing wife away on a holiday.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Characters come to life with Greene as the author
- By John on 06-08-11
By: Graham Greene
-
Brideshead Revisited
- By: Evelyn Waugh
- Narrated by: Jeremy Irons
- Length: 11 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 3,373
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 3,061
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 3,041
Evelyn Waugh's most celebrated work is a memory drama about the intense entanglement of the narrator, Charles Ryder, with a great Anglo-Catholic family. Written during World War II, the story mourns the passing of the aristocratic world Waugh knew in his youth and vividly recalls the sensuous pleasures denied him by wartime austerities; in so doing it also provides a profound study of the conflict between the demands of religion and the desires of the flesh.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Extraordinary
- By Vieux Carré Blonde on 12-12-12
By: Evelyn Waugh