Our Mutual Friend
The Audible Dickens Collection
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Narrated by:
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Meera Syal
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Lucinda Hawksley - introduction
About this listen
This definitive performance of Our Mutual Friend - Dickens' final completed novel - features expert narration by Meera Syal and an exclusive introduction written and read by Lucinda Hawksley, great-great-great-granddaughter of Charles Dickens. Hawksley is a biographer, author and lecturer, whose wealth of knowledge on Dickens is both research led and personal. She introduces us to the themes in Our Mutual Friend and tells us how they connect to the life of Dickens' himself.
Full of both satire and social analysis, Our Mutual Friend looks at what could happen in Victorian England when a fortune passes to a working-class couple. The audiobook will enchant the listener with its larger-than-life characters, its poignant depiction of social injustice and the singular seed of hope with which Dickens hints at the possibility of a better tomorrow.
About the author
Having experienced the incarceration of his father, Charles Dickens had to abandon his studies at a young age and set to work in a factory so as to support himself. Despite his short-lived education, Dickens went on to write 15 novels, various articles, novellas and short stories. He lectured and led campaigns for children's rights and education and arguably became the ultimate self-made man.
About the narrator
Comedian, writer and actor Meera Syal rose to prominence as one of the creators of comedy sketch show Goodness Gracious Me, and cemented herself as a household name in the UK portraying Sanjeev's grandmother, Ummi, in The Kumars at No. 42.
Multitalented Syal has penned novels, scripts and screenplays, as well as lending her vocals to various songs and albums. Here she uses her voice to tell our Dickensian story with all the mastery you would expect from this talented performer.
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The three novels that make up The Forsyte Saga chronicle the ebbing social power of the commercial upper-middle class Forsyte family through three generations, beginning in Victorian London during the 1880s and ending in the early 1920s. Galsworthy's masterly narrative examines not only their fortunes but also the wider developments within society, particularly the changing position of women.
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A delight
- By Kay in DC on 03-02-06
By: John Galsworthy
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Cranford
- By: Elizabeth Gaskell
- Narrated by: Prunella Scales
- Length: 6 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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A vivid and affectionate portrait of the residents of an English country town in the mid-19th century, Cranford describes a community dominated by its independent and refined women, relating the adventures of Miss Matty and Miss Deborah, two middle-aged spinster sisters striving to live with dignity in reduced circumstances. Through a series of satirical vignettes, Gaskell sympathetically portrays changing small town customs and values in mid-Victorian England....
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Quietly, subtly sweet and heartwarming
- By T. on 03-26-12
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The Warden
- By: Anthony Trollope
- Narrated by: Nigel Hawthorne
- Length: 7 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Set in the world of the Victorian professional and landed classes, the story centres on Mr Harding, a clergyman of great personal integrity who is nevertheless in possession of an income from a charity far in excess of the sum devoted to it.
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a delight
- By Janet on 12-22-08
By: Anthony Trollope
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Jude The Obscure
- By: Thomas Hardy
- Narrated by: Stephen Thorne
- Length: 15 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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This is the story of a young country workman obsessed by his ambition to become an Oxford student, interwoven with his fraught relationships with two women.
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Staggering
- By Tad Davis on 02-16-10
By: Thomas Hardy
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North and South
- By: Elizabeth Gaskell
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 18 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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Written at the request of Charles Dickens, North and South is a book about rebellion that poses fundamental questions about the nature of social authority and obedience. Gaskell expertly blends individual feeling with social concern and her heroine, Margaret Hale, is one of the most original creations of Victorian literature. When Margaret Hale's father leaves the Church in a crisis of conscience she is forced to leave her comfortable home in the tranquil countryside of Hampshire....
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Delightful
- By Sally on 01-04-10
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An Old-Fashioned Girl
- By: Louisa May Alcott
- Narrated by: Anne Hancock
- Length: 9 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Immediately following the success of Little Women, Louisa May Alcott sat down to write An-Old Fashioned Girl, expanding on the subject of rich versus poor that she explored in her first novel. It’s a story of a country mouse and a city mouse: 14-year-old Polly Milton travels to Boston for a stay with her friend Fanny Shaw. The wealthy Shaws’ way of life is foreign to Polly who tries to adapt but is quickly labeled “old-fashioned”. Fanny and her friends dress and behave as their elders do, flirting with boys and gossiping.
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Okay
- By selene on 07-15-18
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Dead Souls
- By: Nikolai Gogol, C. J. Hogarth - translator
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 15 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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Chichikov, a mysterious stranger, arrives in a provincial town and visits a succession of landowners to make each a strange offer. He proposes to buy the names of dead serfs still registered on the census, saving their owners from paying tax on them, and to use these "souls" as collateral to reinvent himself as a gentleman. In this ebullient masterpiece, Nikolai Gogol created a grotesque gallery of human types.
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Captures absurdity of mid 19th century Russia
- By Darwin8u on 10-26-12
By: Nikolai Gogol, and others
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Shirley
- By: Charlotte Brontë
- Narrated by: Anna Bentinck
- Length: 25 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Set in the industrialising England of the Napoleonic wars, a period of bad harvests, Luddite riots, and economic unrest, Shirley is the story of two contrasting heroines and the men they love. One is the shy Caroline Helstone, trapped in the oppressive atmosphere of a Yorkshire rectory, whose life represents the plight of single women in the 19th century. The other is the vivacious Shirley Keeldar, who inherits a local estate and whose wealth liberates her from convention.
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"As Romantic As Monday Morning"
- By Joseph R on 09-15-09
By: Charlotte Brontë
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Interesting but Frustrating
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When Samuel Pickwick decides to establish and preside over a travelling society, he unknowingly brings together three of the oddest men in all of London: Tracy Tupman, the loveless self-professed ladies’ man, Augustus Snodgrass, the poet who’s never put pen to paper, and Nathaniel Winkle, the endlessly clumsy sportsman. The ‘Pickwickians’ set off in search of new adventures outside of the confines of the city. Along with a host of other colourful Dickensian characters such as Mr Pickwick’s love-struck landlady, Mrs Bardell, and his trusty sidekick, Sam Weller.
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What listeners say about Our Mutual Friend
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Richard
- 02-23-23
The story is not Dickens' best, but pretty good
This wasn't my favorite Dickens novel (that would be David Copperfield). It didn't have any of the comic characters that are so much fun in some of his other novels, and the story wasn't wonderful. Nonetheless, for Dickens fans, it is a must read (listen). The narrator - Meera Syal - was awesome! All in all, an enjoyable way to spend 34 hours.
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- Kindle Customer
- 12-07-22
My favorite Dickens novel
Although I am probably in the minority this was my favorite Dickens novel. The iconic opening scene on the Thames was the essence of Dickensian London. Very interesting plot twists and way ahead of its time. As with all Dickens' novels there were a few instances of superfluous characters and stretched out plot lines. The villains in this novel were the best part.
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- Kindle Customer
- 04-21-18
Fantastic
Charles Dickens has always been one of my favourite authors. This production is wonderfully done and reminded me why l love this story. Thank you Ms Syal.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Sandra
- 07-02-22
superb narration
The story lost me frequently but the narration re-engaged me. This narrator's voice acting, consistent patois / accents, and character individuation are award worthy.
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- Amazon Customer
- 12-31-21
Meera Syal has done The Inimitable proud
This sustained, authentic performance has been a complete pleasure to listen to. Ms Syal has been able to find an individual voice for each of the myriad characters. She has performed this enormous masterpiece beautifully and most faithfully. I hope she will take on Nicholas Nickleby and Great Expectations. She understands Charles Dickens. I cannot pay her a greater compliment. Her reading of the Afterword in place of a Preface was incredibly moving.
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2 people found this helpful
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- 96Lily
- 12-06-20
Top notch narration
One of the best narrators I’ve heard. She fully portrayed every character with a unique voice, personality, and timbre, and brought the story vividly to life!
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1 person found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 08-30-19
Intricate and captivating story and reading!
I love Dickens’ complex character development in this story, which, simultaneously has the effect of making you love his noblest characters and even develop a fond affection and amusement for the most detestable, laughing aloud at times at the eccentricities and traits of them all. The characterization is well-captured in both voice and intonation of this reader, who has clearly well-acquainted herself with the passages to portray the intricate scenes and interactions as closely as possible to those conceptualized by the author. A must-read/listen!
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4 people found this helpful
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- David Hinden
- 01-01-21
The Best of Dickens and the Best of Audible!
Meera Syal’s narration of this work, complete with a unique voice for each character, is the best performance I’ve heard on Audible and what a story!
As Dickens writes in an afterword, there are two major plot twists in this novel (John Rockville is the heir John Hanford and the Boffins were in on the secret all along), one of which is deliberately telegraphed to the reader very early on and the other of which is completely disguised until the very end of the novel. The final plot twist is worthy of the finale of Dallas.
And along the way, we see Dickens at his most masterful in creating unforgettable characters and dialogue, skewering society, advocating for the poor and writing some of the finest landscape/riverscape descriptions I have ever had the pleasure to read. This is one of those books the reader savors. I found myself worrying that some particularly wonderful passages were not bound to be bound to my memory.
If pressed for what I liked best, I would have to say the characters and the dialogue: Ms. Jenny Wren, the dressmaker of children’s dolls, the Veneerings, Podsnaps and Miss Tiffen, dinner hosts and guests from hell, Betty Hidgins, a poor woman destined to die on the road, Mrs.Wilfer, who wants nothing more than to rise above her station, Mr. Venus the taxidermist and the unparalleled band of villains—Bradley Headstone, the stalking, murderous schoolmaster, the Lammles, the fortune hunters mutually deceived into marriage, Rodger Ridinghood a river rogue, and Fascinating Fledgby, the indolent “gentleman” looking for a scam and hiding his money-lending business behind the Jew, Mr. Riah, and Charley Hexam, a poor boy with brains and ambition.
These characters are all much more interesting with richer lives, stories, dialogue, than the main characters driving the plot. With Dickens, the plot is just the structure around which the best parts of the novel are strung.
This could be the best Dickens I’ve ever read although Great Expectations will always hold a special place for me. I see that it often ranks among Dickens’ most beloved works, the other one that is frequently mentioned being Bleak House. It’s been at least thirty years since I last visited Bleak House and this experience tells me it’s time for a revisit.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 06-12-23
Totally committed performance
It took me a while to “tune in” to Meera’s voice. But as each new character was introduced and the range of emotions evoked by Dickens increased, the more I marvelled at the effort it must have taken on Ms Syal’s part to understand the text at such a deep level. And then convey that to us.
As for the story, I thought it was brilliant. I suspect the not-so-crypto-antisemitism has been responsible for the lack of screen adaptations. Or perhaps Dickens’ take on wealth doesn’t chime so well with some.
Anyway, thank you Meera Syal for your stunning reading of a truly great novel.
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- David P
- 06-30-20
Spectacular Performance
I read the majority of this book on the page but listened to the audio on a couple of drives. Maybe four or five hours total? Meera Syal's reading was spectacular. She brought the characters to life in ways that stayed with me when I was reading on my own and had an uncanny instinct for timing and pacing when reading the narration. It's so easy to make cartoons of some of Dickens's characters (minor especially) but she gave every one of them depth and humanity. I would rank her at Juliet Stevenson level, the highest praise I can think to give.
As for the novel itself, it is Dickens's last completed novel. The plot gets a little pointlessly complicated, but it didn't detract at all from the power, the humor, the expansiveness of his view of people. This feels like a mature work of art by an author at peak control of his astonishing talents. No other writer I've read creates such a completely absorbing, immersive, vivid experience for their readers. It's like taking a long voyage to another time and place. (A blessing since our own time place aren't so great right now.)
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7 people found this helpful