The Ballad of Peckham Rye Audiobook By Muriel Spark cover art

The Ballad of Peckham Rye

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The Ballad of Peckham Rye

By: Muriel Spark
Narrated by: Nadia May
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The Ballad of Peckham Rye is the wickedly farcical fable of a blue-collar town turned upside down.

When the firm of Meadows, Meade & Grindley hires Dougal Douglas (a.k.a. Douglas Dougal) to do "human research" into the private lives of its workforce, they are in no way prepared for the mayhem, mutiny, and murder he will stir up. In fact, this Music Man of the thoroughly modern corporation changes the lives of all the eccentric characters he meets, from Miss Merle Coverdale, head of the typing pool, to V.R. Druce, unsuspecting Managing Director.

This is Dame Muriel Spark at her most devilishly piquant.

©1960 Muriel Spark (P)1996 Blackstone Audio, Inc. Classics

Critic reviews

"We are never out of touch, in a Spark novel, with the happiness of creation; the sudden willful largesse of magic and wit, the cunning tautness of suspense." (John Updike, The New Yorker)
"Not only funny but startlingly original, the legendary character of Dougal Douglas....may not have been boasting when he referred so blithely to his association with the devil." ( Washington Post)
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My least favorite of Muriel Spark's books... billed as her most humorous, the deceitful antics of Dougal Douglas are in fact harmful and abusive to those whose sphere he invades.

Narcissism unchecked

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This is Spark at her wicked best! A strange, unexpected delight. CHARMINGLY read. A great pleasure!

Delicious & sinister!

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When a minor demon, in the guise of an eccentric Scot called Dougal, enters the South London work force in the 1950s many lives are disrupted. His odd behavior calls many settled citizens to see that there might be other choices in life. But being undecided can be a torment. A sort of fable for adults this is not Spark's best work. Unusual, especially for its time (1960), but not exciting. A good reading helps it along but, due to the nature of the material, there is little emotional engagement on offer.

An open door may be dangerous

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I've really liked some other books by Muriel Spark (Prime of Miss Jean Brodie; Loitering With Intent; Memento Mori) but this one is quite different and I stopped listening after about the first hour. Very unpleasant characters that I didn't want to spend time on. Maybe the book was going somewhere but I couldn't really tell and couldn't be bothered to find out. The narration was good but perhaps a bit heavy on the accents, almost sounded like caricatures.

Disappointing

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