On Chesil Beach
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Narrated by:
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Ian McEwan
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By:
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Ian McEwan
About this listen
At dinner in their rooms they struggle to suppress their worries about the wedding night to come. Edward, eager for rapture, frets over Florence's response to his advances and nurses a private fear of failure, while Florence's anxieties run deeper: she is overcome by sheer disgust at the idea of physical contact, but dreads disappointing her husband when they finally lie down together in the honeymoon suite.
Ian McEwan has caught with understanding and compassion the innocence of Edward and Florence at a time when marriage was presumed to be the outward sign of maturity and independence. On Chesil Beach is another masterwork from McEwan: a story of lives transformed by a gesture not made or a word not spoken.
©2007 Ian McEwan (P)2007 Random House, Inc. Random House Audio, a division of Random House, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
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- Length: 26 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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John Fowles’s The Magus was a literary landmark of the 1960s. Nicholas Urfe goes to a Greek island to teach at a private school and becomes enmeshed in curious happenings at the home of a mysterious Greek recluse, Maurice Conchis. Are these events, involving attractive young English sisters, just psychological games, or an elaborate joke, or more? Reality shifts as the story unfolds. The Magus reflected the issues of the 1960s perfectly, and it continues to create tension and concern today.
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One of the best novels that I really think I hate.
- By Darwin8u on 01-29-14
By: John Fowles
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The Luckiest Lady in London
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- Narrated by: Corrie James
- Length: 8 hrs and 42 mins
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Felix Rivendale, the Marquess of Wrenworth, is The Ideal Gentleman, a man all men want to be and all women want to possess. Even Felix himself almost believes this golden image. But underneath is a damaged soul soothed only by public adulation.Louisa Cantwell needs to marry well to support her sisters. She does not, however, want Lord Wrenworth-though he seems inexplicably interested in her. She mistrusts his outward perfection, and the praise he garners everywhere he goes.
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Lovely story, extremely well-written
- By Jonna on 04-14-14
By: Sherry Thomas
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The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
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In the classic work that launched a play, a movie, and a song, Muriel Spark tells the darkly intriguing story of an eccentric Edinburgh teacher and the intense relationship she develops with six of her students. The scandalously outspoken Miss Brodie makes big waves in the conservative Scottish school, preaching the value of art, passion, and daring.
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creme de la creme
- By Kathleen on 01-04-08
By: Muriel Spark
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Sophie's Choice
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- Narrated by: Norman Snow
- Length: 2 hrs and 53 mins
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In this brilliant, multi-layered novel, a young Southerner, Stingo, wants to become a writer. In Brooklyn, he meets Nathan, a brilliant Jewish intellectual involved in a turbulent love-hate affair with Sophie, a beautiful Polish woman. She has a terrible wound in her past, one that impels both Sophie and Nathan toward destruction.
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THIS IS ABRIDGED
- By J. Flynn on 07-25-16
By: William Styron
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Amsterdam
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The best-selling author of Atonement and Enduring Love, Ian McEwan is known as one of contemporary fiction’s most acclaimed writers. This Booker Prize-winning novel by McEwan finds two men connecting at the funeral of their ex-lover. Distressed by how she was slowly destroyed by an illness, the two make a pact to save each other from enduring such a fate.
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Make something, and die.
- By Darwin8u on 02-07-17
By: Ian McEwan
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Wildest Dreams
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Joletta Caresse's beloved grandmother dies, taking with her the secret to the formula of a legendary perfume that is now the most sought-after perfume on the market. Joletta tries to track down the formula through journals written by her ancestress, Violet Fossier, who in 1854 made a grand tour of Europe. As Joletta follows Violet's itinerary across the continent, the story goes back in time, to 19th-century Europe and a scandalous love affair that is intimately bound up in the mystery of the perfume.
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Made me cry
- By Amazon Customer on 02-14-23
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The Sea, the Sea
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Charles Arrowby, leading light of England's theatrical set, retires from glittering London to an isolated home by the sea. He plans to write a memoir about his great love affair with Clement Makin, his mentor, both professionally and personally, and amuse himself with Lizzie, an actress he has strung along for many years.
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Murdoch Amazes
- By Sara on 08-30-17
By: Iris Murdoch, and others
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The Museum of Innocence
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Kemal, scion of one of the city's wealthiest families, is about to become engaged to Sibel, daughter of another prominent family, when he encounters Füsun, a beautiful shopgirl and a distant relation. Once the long-lost cousins violate the code of virginity, a rift begins to open between Kemal and the world of the Westernized Istanbul bourgeosie - a world, as he lovingly describes it, with opulent parties and clubs, society gossip, picnics, and mansions on the Bosphorus, infused with the melancholy of decay.
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one of the very best I've ever heard
- By Rebecca Lindroos on 03-06-10
By: Orhan Pamuk, and others
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Up a Road Slowly
- By: Irene Hunt
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Julie would remember her happy days at Aunt Cordelia’s forever. Running through the spacious rooms, singing on rainy nights in front of the blazing fireplace. There were rides in the woods on Peter the Great, the races with Danny Trevort. Maybe best of all were the precious moments alone in her room at night, gazing at the sea of stars. But there was sadness too - the painful jealousy Julie felt after her sister got married, the tragic death of a schoolmate, and the bitter disappointment of her first love. Sometimes it all seemed like too much to handle.
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Coming of age in mid century
- By Mary A. Kozy on 01-17-21
By: Irene Hunt
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Charming and Sweet!!!
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What listeners say about On Chesil Beach
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- chris
- 05-09-18
A book for everyone!
About the naivite' of intimacy of a young couple and how it ruled the rest of their lives.
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- Lisa
- 02-06-16
I wish their courtship was not summarized so much
Any additional comments?
Mr. McEwan's writing is very beautiful, and he will always be one of my favorite writers; the main reason I read or listen to his work is to help improve my own writing. With that said, I have to complain: he loves to summarize huge swaths of his story, not just for this novel, but others as well, and I find that frustrating. I get it though, because the way he summarizes is so very elegantly and beautifully written that I can only imagine that it would be difficult to achieve the same level of beauty in his prose had he chosen to write detailed scenes. But for those of you who finished the book, wouldn't the ending have been so much more potent, a blow to the stomach, if McEwan had illustrated the two falling in love with each other by showing us actual scenes? Close the psychic distance between the reader and the characters in the story? Let us see and feel these characters falling in love with each other rather than summarizing their courtship? Experience it for ourselves rather than being told with lovingly wrought sentences? (If you disagree, saying, "no, there were a few scenes showing their courtship," I would argue that these scenes were so short that I hardly remember them. The scene in which Edward first meets Florence is described in Edward's POV with one paragraph and four sentences, followed by nine Kindle pages summarizing Florence's life until we get something resembling another scene (I got the e-book too)). Summarizing is too distant, pulls us away; scenes give us a close-up view. The wedding night is not summarized; it's very well described in painful, awkward detail, scene by scene, moment by moment. It's the rest of their lives that's summarized, before and after (especially before), and I think it's a mistake (and frustrating as a listener) that their courtship was not illustrated in specific, concrete, detailed language so that we could experience it too. That would have made the ending so much more... well, you should read the novel to find out what happens.
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- Darwin8u
- 02-08-16
A tight little novella
"...being in love was not a steady state, but a matter of fresh surges or waves, and he was experiencing one now."
-- Ian McEwan, On Chesil Beach
Almost no one can write about sex well in my opinion. You've got your erotic writers, fine, if your need for arousal and release comes from text rather than pictures or actual lovers. There are certainly millions of toss-n-tug novels that can certainly get things done. But these books, obviously, aren't literature.
There are writers, like Ken Follett, who seem to need to insert sex writing into a novel every 160 - 200 pages just to help drive the novel's narrative forward. Sex in these adventure, mystery, genre novels, etc., acts as almost a sign post or quick reward. "Congrats, fair reader, you made it to page 320, here is your second sex scene on a road with a monk." But as delivered, it all just seems a bit flat and not a little absurd.
Now, I'm not saying there isn't good sex writing out there, I have actually come across some. Joyce, Miller, Chopin, and Lawrence all seem to be able to walk that narrow beach of rolling bodies without twisting their ankles on the rocks. The capture the human frailty and power and awkwardness and sensuality of sex without dipping into cliché or caricature. I'm not sure why some, few, writers I can handle and most others I just despise. I'm not a prude. I get that sex is a part of life. It isn't icky. I'm not ashamed by it. I realize like food, it is a part of life and thus needs to be represented and shadowed in art and literature.
So, with all that baggage and preamble, it was still with quite a bit of trepidation that I slid into Ian McEwan's tight little novella. One reason I think this novel didn't bend me over too much with its very direct narrative about sex was Ian McEwan's mastery of language. He knew exactly what he was doing. He was aiming for an exact mood, a tension, a flick of a finger on a solo hair, an almost anti-climax, to convey the message of this novella. It required a tease, a premature crescendo, and in the end -- the cold, wet, and sticky dialogue of pain and regret.
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15 people found this helpful
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- Patricia Villarreal
- 07-24-24
Great novel
Loved the book and also the author's comments at the end. These were great to understand the context even more.
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- GiaJulianA
- 06-12-18
Haunting and complex
Short book, under 5 hrs total. Decided to read after seeing new film. Many details are different from cinematic version, and I ended the story with more questions than I had after the movie. McEwan is a brilliant writer and narrator of Audible version. Thoroughly enjoyable.
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- Anonymous User
- 04-17-12
Inthrolling story many of us have faced in life.
Would you listen to On Chesil Beach again? Why?
Yes, not to miss anything.
What did you like best about this story?
How we are all victims of our ingnorance.
Have you listened to any of Ian McEwan’s other performances before? How does this one compare?
No. But I plan to.
Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?
No
Any additional comments?
I was facinated with the iterview with the author that came after the story end.
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Overall
- J
- 08-23-07
Short One, But Decent
This does not approach "Atonement" (one of my all-time favorite books) in quality, but is quite worth reading. The situation is infuriating, and the ending a bit bland compared to the heart of the story, but it certainly is a compelling portrait of the clashing mores of its time (early sixties). The author interview after the book is a significant value-added feature that makes the audio version preferable to the print.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall
- E. Stern
- 11-02-07
Another phenomenal book
Ian McEwan is a master; this short book was riveting and revelatory. If you've read him before you know that his depiction of the inner experience of women is astute and often astonishing. In the interview at the end (we're so lucky to have Audible!) he talks about limiting actual depicted conversation between the two main characters until the ultimate confrontation at the end. This is a fascinating narrative tool in the hands of an artist like McEwan. Next download: everything else by McEwan.
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Overall
- George
- 06-13-07
One of the best new novels in recent years
NcEwan has crafted a compelling and tightly woven novel of two lives that are changed by one night and the things not said. To say much more about the story could spoil it for the next reader. I found it difficult to stop listening to it. A perfect audio book for a long car trip when you can listen nonstop. As a literary work this will remain a significant work of this century. The author reads this shot novel with a level of feeling and drama that would be difficult for anyone else to match. Thoroughly enjoyable.
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19 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Cariola
- 07-27-07
More than I Expected
The description of this book didn't sound too promising, even though I'm a big McEwan fan . . . how can one write an entire book about a few hours on a wedding night? But McEwan deftly creates two engaging characters who generate the reader's empathy. I found the interview with the author particularly insightful, especially on the question of why he summed up Edward's life in the end but not Florence's. Not all authors are good readers, but McEwan does a fine job. Don't be put off by reviews which make it sound as if the book is about nothing but sex. It's so much more.
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5 people found this helpful