The Bridge of San Luis Rey
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
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $15.02
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Sam Waterston
-
By:
-
Thornton Wilder
About this listen
Pulitzer Prize Winner, The Novel, 1928
The Bridge of San Luis Rey, first published in 1927, was Thornton Wilder's first major work and won him instant international recognition. The story concerns the lives of five people who fall to their deaths on July 20, 1714, when a rope bridge breaks on a road near Lima, Peru. A humble Franciscan, Brother Juniper, witnesses the accident and determines to learn about the lives of the victims in order to find out whether this accident happened by chance or by plan.
Again and again, the novelist and playwright Thornton Wilder explores in his works the connections between the commonplace and cosmic dimensions of human experience, always returning to fundamental questions about the meaning of life.
The Bridge of San Luis Rey, one of the true great American classics, has been translated into more than 30 languages. The book won Wilder the first of his three Pulitzer Prizes.
©1927 Albert and Charles Boni Inc., 1955 renewed by Thornton Wilder (P)1997 HighBridge CompanyListeners also enjoyed...
-
The Ides of March
- A Novel
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins, Piper Goodeve, Jane Copland, and others
- Length: 8 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
First published in 1948, The Ides of March is a brilliant epistolary novel of the Rome of Julius Caesar. Through imaginary letters and documents, Wilder brings to life a dramatic period of world history and one of its magnetic personalities. In this novel, the Caesar of history becomes Caesar the human being as he appeared to his family, his legions, his Rome, and his empire in the months just before his death.
-
-
Strong Recommend
- By Anonymous User on 11-16-23
By: Thornton Wilder
-
The Cabala
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Tristan Morris
- Length: 5 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A young American student spends a year in the exotic world of post-World War I Rome. While there, he experiences firsthand the waning days of a secret community (a "cabala") of decaying royalty, a great cardinal of the Roman Church, and an assortment of memorable American ex-pats.
-
-
Good Narration
- By anon on 06-19-20
By: Thornton Wilder
-
The Eighth Day
- A Novel
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Adam Lazarre-White
- Length: 18 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1962 and 1963, Thornton Wilder spent 20 months in hibernation, away from family and friends, in the town of Douglas, Arizona. While there, he launched The Eighth Day, a tale set in a mining town in Southern Illinois about two families blasted apart by the apparent murder of one father by the other. The miraculous escape of the accused killer, John Ashley, on the eve of his execution and his flight to freedom triggers a powerful story tracing the fate of his and the victim’s wife and children.
-
-
Uneven
- By Albert Kendrick on 01-15-21
By: Thornton Wilder
-
Theophilus North
- A Novel
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Richard Poe
- Length: 14 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The last of Thornton Wilder’s works published during his lifetime, Theophilus North is part autobiographical and part the imagined adventures of Wilder’s twin brother who died at birth. Setting out to see the world in the summer of 1926, Theophilus North gets as far as Newport, Rhode Island, before his car breaks down. To support himself, Theophilus takes jobs in the elegant mansions along Ocean Drive, just as Wilder himself did in the same decade.
-
-
I Absolutely Loved It!
- By SandyK on 06-10-24
By: Thornton Wilder
-
The Ballad of the White Horse
- By: G. K. Chesterton
- Narrated by: Stewart Crank
- Length: 2 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Published in 1911, The Ballad of the White Horse by G. K. Chesterton is a poem about the deeds of King Alfred the Great. The epic ballad tells the story of how the King defeated the invading Danes at the Battle of Ethandun in the Valley of the White Horse, beneath an ancient equine image on the Berkshire hills. Chesterton employs this mysterious figure as a symbol of the traditions that guard and protect humanity.
-
-
Very Helpful
- By niki vavra on 01-19-21
By: G. K. Chesterton
-
Death Comes for the Archbishop
- By: Willa Cather
- Narrated by: David Ackroyd
- Length: 7 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1851, Father Jean Marie Latour comes to serve as the Apostolic Vicar to New Mexico. What he finds is a vast territory of red hills and tortuous arroyos, American by law but Mexican and Indian in custom and belief. In the almost forty years that follow, Latour spreads his faith in the only way he knows—gently, all the while contending with an unforgiving landscape, derelict and sometimes openly rebellious priests, and his own loneliness. Out of these events, Cather gives us an indelible vision of life unfolding in a place where time itself seems suspended.
-
-
A beautiful story, perfectly read
- By Eugene on 01-25-17
By: Willa Cather
-
The Ides of March
- A Novel
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins, Piper Goodeve, Jane Copland, and others
- Length: 8 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
First published in 1948, The Ides of March is a brilliant epistolary novel of the Rome of Julius Caesar. Through imaginary letters and documents, Wilder brings to life a dramatic period of world history and one of its magnetic personalities. In this novel, the Caesar of history becomes Caesar the human being as he appeared to his family, his legions, his Rome, and his empire in the months just before his death.
-
-
Strong Recommend
- By Anonymous User on 11-16-23
By: Thornton Wilder
-
The Cabala
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Tristan Morris
- Length: 5 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A young American student spends a year in the exotic world of post-World War I Rome. While there, he experiences firsthand the waning days of a secret community (a "cabala") of decaying royalty, a great cardinal of the Roman Church, and an assortment of memorable American ex-pats.
-
-
Good Narration
- By anon on 06-19-20
By: Thornton Wilder
-
The Eighth Day
- A Novel
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Adam Lazarre-White
- Length: 18 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1962 and 1963, Thornton Wilder spent 20 months in hibernation, away from family and friends, in the town of Douglas, Arizona. While there, he launched The Eighth Day, a tale set in a mining town in Southern Illinois about two families blasted apart by the apparent murder of one father by the other. The miraculous escape of the accused killer, John Ashley, on the eve of his execution and his flight to freedom triggers a powerful story tracing the fate of his and the victim’s wife and children.
-
-
Uneven
- By Albert Kendrick on 01-15-21
By: Thornton Wilder
-
Theophilus North
- A Novel
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Richard Poe
- Length: 14 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The last of Thornton Wilder’s works published during his lifetime, Theophilus North is part autobiographical and part the imagined adventures of Wilder’s twin brother who died at birth. Setting out to see the world in the summer of 1926, Theophilus North gets as far as Newport, Rhode Island, before his car breaks down. To support himself, Theophilus takes jobs in the elegant mansions along Ocean Drive, just as Wilder himself did in the same decade.
-
-
I Absolutely Loved It!
- By SandyK on 06-10-24
By: Thornton Wilder
-
The Ballad of the White Horse
- By: G. K. Chesterton
- Narrated by: Stewart Crank
- Length: 2 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Published in 1911, The Ballad of the White Horse by G. K. Chesterton is a poem about the deeds of King Alfred the Great. The epic ballad tells the story of how the King defeated the invading Danes at the Battle of Ethandun in the Valley of the White Horse, beneath an ancient equine image on the Berkshire hills. Chesterton employs this mysterious figure as a symbol of the traditions that guard and protect humanity.
-
-
Very Helpful
- By niki vavra on 01-19-21
By: G. K. Chesterton
-
Death Comes for the Archbishop
- By: Willa Cather
- Narrated by: David Ackroyd
- Length: 7 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1851, Father Jean Marie Latour comes to serve as the Apostolic Vicar to New Mexico. What he finds is a vast territory of red hills and tortuous arroyos, American by law but Mexican and Indian in custom and belief. In the almost forty years that follow, Latour spreads his faith in the only way he knows—gently, all the while contending with an unforgiving landscape, derelict and sometimes openly rebellious priests, and his own loneliness. Out of these events, Cather gives us an indelible vision of life unfolding in a place where time itself seems suspended.
-
-
A beautiful story, perfectly read
- By Eugene on 01-25-17
By: Willa Cather
-
The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter
- By: Carson McCullers
- Narrated by: Cherry Jones
- Length: 12 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Carson McCullers was all of 23 when she published her first novel, The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter. She became an overnight literary sensation, and soon such authors as Tennessee Williams were calling her "the greatest prose writer that the South [has] produced." The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter tells an unforgettable tale of moral isolation in a small southern mill town in the 1930s.
-
-
Do yourself a favor
- By Barbara on 06-08-05
By: Carson McCullers
-
Appointment in Samarra
- Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition
- By: John O'Hara, Charles McGrath - introduction
- Narrated by: Christian Camargo
- Length: 6 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In December 1930, just before Christmas, the Gibbsville, Pennsylvania, social circuit is electrified with parties and dances. At the center of the social elite stand Julian and Caroline English. But in one rash moment born inside a highball glass, Julian breaks with polite society and begins a rapid descent toward self-destruction.
-
-
Quite good, but not a classic
- By Michael on 04-25-15
By: John O'Hara, and others
-
All the King's Men
- By: Robert Penn Warren
- Narrated by: Michael Emerson
- Length: 20 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The fictionalized account of Louisiana's colorful and notorious governor, Huey Pierce Long, All the King's Men follows the startling rise and fall of Willie Stark, a country lawyer in the Deep South of the 1930s. Beset by political enemies, Stark seeks aid from his right-hand man Jack Burden, who will bear witness to the cataclysmic unfolding of this very American tragedy.
-
-
Beautifully presented
- By Cheimon on 10-12-08
-
The Yearling
- By: Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
- Narrated by: Tom Stechschulte
- Length: 13 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Young Jody lives with his ma and pa on a farm in backwoods Florida. Life is hard there: cutting wood, planting fields, hauling water from a distant sinkhole. It is dangerous: wolves and bears roam the night. It’s also lonely for a young boy. One spring day, Jody’s pa kills a deer for meat. When Jody sees her spotted fawn in the brush, he convinces his father they should bring the fawn home. Thus begins a year when deer and boy are never far from each other. But the day will come when Jody must make a terrible choice between his beloved pet and his family’s survival.
-
-
Gorgeous
- By P. Giorgio on 10-22-13
-
Lucky Jim
- By: Kingsley Amis
- Narrated by: James Lailey
- Length: 9 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This is the story of Jim Dixon, a hapless lecturer in medieval history at a provincial university who knows better than most that “there was no end to the ways in which nice things are nicer than nasty ones.” Kingsley Amis’s scabrous debut leads the audience through a gallery of emphatically English bores, cranks, frauds, and neurotics with whom Dixon must contend in one way or another in order to hold on to his cushy academic perch and win the girl of his fancy.
-
-
An old favorite!
- By Helen53 on 05-29-23
By: Kingsley Amis
-
The Heart of the Matter
- By: Graham Greene
- Narrated by: Michael Kitchen
- Length: 10 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Scobie, a police officer in a West African colony, is a good and honest man. But when he falls in love, he is forced into a betrayal of everything that he has ever believed in, and his struggle to maintain the happiness of two women destroys him.
-
-
Starts Very Slowly then Boom!
- By Michael on 05-21-17
By: Graham Greene
-
The Old Man and the Sea
- By: Ernest Hemingway
- Narrated by: Donald Sutherland
- Length: 2 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Old Man and the Sea is one of Hemingway's most enduring works. Told in language of great simplicity and power, it is the story of an old Cuban fisherman, down on his luck, and his supreme ordeal, a relentless, agonizing battle with a giant marlin far out in the Gulf Stream. Here Hemingway recasts, in strikingly contemporary style, the classic theme of courage in the face of defeat, of personal triumph won from loss.
-
-
Truly a Classic
- By Dave on 07-01-08
By: Ernest Hemingway
-
Giant
- A Novel
- By: Edna Ferber
- Narrated by: Courtney Patterson
- Length: 15 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When larger-than-life cattle rancher Jordan "Bick" Benedict arrives at the family home of sharp-witted but genteel Virginia socialite Leslie Lynnton to purchase a racehorse, the two are instantly drawn to each other. But for Leslie, falling in love with a Texan was a lot simpler than falling in love with Texas. Upon their arrival at Bick's ranch, Leslie is confronted not only with the oppressive heat and vastness of Texas but also by the disturbing inequity between runaway riches and the poverty and racism suffered by the Mexican workers on the ranch.
-
-
Giant
- By Kathy Johannes on 02-17-21
By: Edna Ferber
-
The Optimist's Daughter
- By: Eudora Welty
- Narrated by: Eudora Welty
- Length: 3 hrs and 59 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This story of a young woman's confrontation with death and her past is a poetic study of human relations.
-
-
Beautiful writing
- By Teresa on 07-15-13
By: Eudora Welty
-
Lincoln in the Bardo
- A Novel
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: Nick Offerman, David Sedaris, George Saunders, and others
- Length: 7 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
February 1862. The Civil War is less than one year old. The fighting has begun in earnest, and the nation has begun to realize it is in for a long, bloody struggle. Meanwhile, President Lincoln’s beloved eleven-year-old son, Willie, lies upstairs in the White House, gravely ill. In a matter of days, despite predictions of a recovery, Willie dies and is laid to rest in a Georgetown cemetery. “My poor boy, he was too good for this earth,” the president says at the time. “God has called him home.”
-
-
"Where might God stand?"
- By Mel on 02-17-17
By: George Saunders
-
Bel Canto
- By: Ann Patchett
- Narrated by: Anna Fields
- Length: 11 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ann Patchett’s award winning, New York Times best-selling Bel Canto balances themes of love and crisis as disparate characters learn that music is their only common language. As in Pratchett’s other novels, including Truth & Beauty and The Magician’s Assistant, the author’s lyrical prose and lucid imagination make Bel Canto a captivating story of strength and frailty, love and imprisonment, and an inspiring tale of transcendent romance.
-
-
Opera Has Charms to Soothe the Savage Guerillas
- By Mel on 03-01-13
By: Ann Patchett
-
Sons and Lovers
- By: D. H. Lawrence
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 16 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Sons and Lovers, D. H. Lawrence's first major novel, was also the first in the English language to explore ordinary working-class life from the inside. No writer before or since has written so well about the intimacies enforced by a tightly knit mining community and by a family where feelings are never hidden for long. When the marriage between Walter Morel and his sensitive, high-minded wife begins to break down, the bitterness of their frustration seeps into their children's lives.
-
-
Momma's Boy (The Dangers of Overbearing Parenting)
- By W Perry Hall on 02-01-14
By: D. H. Lawrence
Critic reviews
- Pulitzer Prize winner
"A masterpiece." (New York Herald Tribune)
"A melancholy narrative of great power, simplicity and beauty." (AudioFile)
Related to this topic
-
Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas
- A Novel
- By: Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis, Jull Costa Margaret - translator, Robin Patterson - translator
- Narrated by: Ramon De Ocampo
- Length: 8 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Machado de Assis’ classic novel, the precursor of Latin American fiction, is finally rendered as a stunningly relevant work for 21st-century audiences. In eloquent, contemporary prose, Costa and Patterson breathe new life into the dynamic character of Brás Cubas and reveal the vivid, tempestuous Rio de Janeiro of his time. The recently deceased Cubas narrates his life story, admitting glibly: “I am not so much a writer who has died, as a dead man who has decided to write.”
-
-
Incredible story from an incredible author
- By Anonymous User on 01-01-21
By: Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis, and others
-
Villette
- By: Charlotte Brontë
- Narrated by: Davina Porter
- Length: 22 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Hailed as Charlotte Brontë’s “finest novel” by Virginia Woolf, Villette is the timeless semi-autobiographical tale of Lucy Snowe. Left with no family and no money, Lucy goes against her own timid nature and travels to the small city of Villette, France, where she becomes a school teacher in Madame Beck’s school for girls. During her stay, she falls in love—twice—and discovers an independent, inner strength rarely seen in women of her time.
-
-
The Divine Ms. Porter delivers as always
- By peachnmario on 03-17-15
By: Charlotte Brontë
-
Poor People
- By: Fyodor Dostoevsky
- Narrated by: Patrick Cullen, Julia Emlen
- Length: 5 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Written as a series of letters, Poor People tells the tragic tale of a petty clerk and his impossible love for a young girl. Longing to help her and her family, he sells everything he can, but his kindness leads him only into more desperate poverty, and ultimately into debauchery. As a typical "man of the underground", he serves as the embodiment of the belief that happiness can only be achieved with riches.
-
-
Background before listening recommended!
- By Rebecarol on 10-02-08
-
Le Pere Goriot
- By: Honoré de Balzac
- Narrated by: Paul Hecht
- Length: 10 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At the shabby boarding house in the rue Neuve-Sainte-Geneviève, petty Madame Vauquer and her tenants wonder at the plight of the aging resident Goriot. Once a well-heeled merchant, Goriot was, at first, afforded special treatment from the Madame. But now something is clearly amiss in his financial affairs, and his increasingly tawdry appearance makes him a subject of ridicule in the household.
-
-
balzac rocks
- By beatrice on 03-12-10
By: Honoré de Balzac
-
Shirley
- By: Charlotte Brontë
- Narrated by: Anna Bentinck
- Length: 25 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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.
-
-
"As Romantic As Monday Morning"
- By Joseph R on 09-15-09
By: Charlotte Brontë
-
A Woman of No Importance
- By: Oscar Wilde
- Narrated by: Miriam Margolyes, Samantha Mathis, Rosalind Ayres, and others
- Length: 1 hr and 34 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Devilishly attractive Lord Illingworth is notorious for his skill as a seducer. But he is still invited to all the "best" houses, while his female conquests must hide their shame in seclusion. In this devastating drawing-room comedy, Oscar Wilde uses his celebrated wit to expose English society's narrow view of everything from sexual mores to Americans.
-
-
Pitch Perfect Performance
- By Cheryl on 08-26-12
By: Oscar Wilde
-
Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas
- A Novel
- By: Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis, Jull Costa Margaret - translator, Robin Patterson - translator
- Narrated by: Ramon De Ocampo
- Length: 8 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Machado de Assis’ classic novel, the precursor of Latin American fiction, is finally rendered as a stunningly relevant work for 21st-century audiences. In eloquent, contemporary prose, Costa and Patterson breathe new life into the dynamic character of Brás Cubas and reveal the vivid, tempestuous Rio de Janeiro of his time. The recently deceased Cubas narrates his life story, admitting glibly: “I am not so much a writer who has died, as a dead man who has decided to write.”
-
-
Incredible story from an incredible author
- By Anonymous User on 01-01-21
By: Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis, and others
-
Villette
- By: Charlotte Brontë
- Narrated by: Davina Porter
- Length: 22 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Hailed as Charlotte Brontë’s “finest novel” by Virginia Woolf, Villette is the timeless semi-autobiographical tale of Lucy Snowe. Left with no family and no money, Lucy goes against her own timid nature and travels to the small city of Villette, France, where she becomes a school teacher in Madame Beck’s school for girls. During her stay, she falls in love—twice—and discovers an independent, inner strength rarely seen in women of her time.
-
-
The Divine Ms. Porter delivers as always
- By peachnmario on 03-17-15
By: Charlotte Brontë
-
Poor People
- By: Fyodor Dostoevsky
- Narrated by: Patrick Cullen, Julia Emlen
- Length: 5 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Written as a series of letters, Poor People tells the tragic tale of a petty clerk and his impossible love for a young girl. Longing to help her and her family, he sells everything he can, but his kindness leads him only into more desperate poverty, and ultimately into debauchery. As a typical "man of the underground", he serves as the embodiment of the belief that happiness can only be achieved with riches.
-
-
Background before listening recommended!
- By Rebecarol on 10-02-08
-
Le Pere Goriot
- By: Honoré de Balzac
- Narrated by: Paul Hecht
- Length: 10 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At the shabby boarding house in the rue Neuve-Sainte-Geneviève, petty Madame Vauquer and her tenants wonder at the plight of the aging resident Goriot. Once a well-heeled merchant, Goriot was, at first, afforded special treatment from the Madame. But now something is clearly amiss in his financial affairs, and his increasingly tawdry appearance makes him a subject of ridicule in the household.
-
-
balzac rocks
- By beatrice on 03-12-10
By: Honoré de Balzac
-
Shirley
- By: Charlotte Brontë
- Narrated by: Anna Bentinck
- Length: 25 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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.
-
-
"As Romantic As Monday Morning"
- By Joseph R on 09-15-09
By: Charlotte Brontë
-
A Woman of No Importance
- By: Oscar Wilde
- Narrated by: Miriam Margolyes, Samantha Mathis, Rosalind Ayres, and others
- Length: 1 hr and 34 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Devilishly attractive Lord Illingworth is notorious for his skill as a seducer. But he is still invited to all the "best" houses, while his female conquests must hide their shame in seclusion. In this devastating drawing-room comedy, Oscar Wilde uses his celebrated wit to expose English society's narrow view of everything from sexual mores to Americans.
-
-
Pitch Perfect Performance
- By Cheryl on 08-26-12
By: Oscar Wilde
-
White Nights
- By: Fyodor Dostoyevsky
- Narrated by: Simon Hester
- Length: 2 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
"White Nights" is one of Dostoyevsky's shorter works told from the standpoint of an ultimate introvert, brought briefly out of his shell by love. It might have been written 170 years ago, but certain aspects of it are very relatable to the modern listener, especially to those of us who gravitate toward solitude and introversion.
-
-
Incredible Romance Novel
- By Matthew Marks on 10-13-24
-
Death in Venice
- By: Thomas Mann
- Narrated by: Peter Batchelor
- Length: 3 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A stunningly beautiful youth and the city of Venice set the stage for Thomas Mann’s introspective examination of erotic love and philosophical wisdom.
-
-
A problem with the narration
- By Erez on 03-19-12
By: Thomas Mann
-
Siddhartha
- By: Hermann Hesse
- Narrated by: Harish Bhimani
- Length: 4 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Hermann Hesse’s classic novel Siddhartha, takes place in ancient India around the time of the Buddha (6th century BC). Siddhartha and his companion Govinda set out in search of enlightenment. Siddhartha goes through a series of changes and realizations as he attempts to achieve this goal. Siddhartha joins the ascetics, visits Gotama, embraces his earthly desires, and finally communes with nature, all in an attempt to attain Nirvana.
-
-
Sounds rushed
- By Viviane on 10-17-11
By: Hermann Hesse
-
The House of the Seven Gables
- By: Nathaniel Hawthorne
- Narrated by: Anthony Heald
- Length: 11 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a sleepy little New England village stands a dark, weather-beaten, many-gabled house. This brooding mansion is haunted by a centuries-old curse that casts the shadow of ancestral sin upon the last four members of the distinctive Pyncheon family of Salem.
-
-
A Classic Thriller
- By E. Pearson on 12-03-10
-
Swann's Way
- By: Marcel Proust
- Narrated by: Neville Jason
- Length: 21 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Swann’s Way is the first of seven volumes in Remembrance of Things Past. It sets the scene with the narrator’s memories being famously provoked by the taste of that little cake, the madeleine, accompanied by a cup of lime-flowered tea. It is an unmatched portrait of fin-de-siècle France.
-
-
Not a book one reads but inhabits & floats through
- By Darwin8u on 02-24-13
By: Marcel Proust
-
The Insulted and the Injured
- By: Fyodor Dostoyevsky
- Narrated by: Alastair Cameron
- Length: 13 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At its heart, The Insulted and the Injured is a story of human tragedy and suffering, but it is also a love story. Narrated by a fictitious young author, Vanya, this book tells the story of Natasha and her lover, Alyosha, who also happens to be the son of the cruel Prince Valkovsky.
-
-
Excellent
- By Joel A. Griska on 07-26-17
-
The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas
- By: Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis
- Narrated by: Edoardo Camponeschi
- Length: 7 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis (1839-1908) was the greatest writer ever to come from Brazil and one of the masters of nineteenth-century fiction. Susan Sontag calls him "the greatest writer ever produced in Latin America", surpassing even Borges. Harold Bloom says that Machado is "the supreme black literary artist to date". And Allen Ginsburg calls him "another Kafka". And The Posthumous Memoirs of Bras Cubas is his masterpiece, a dazzling, tragic, and profound novel that belongs next to the greatest works of his contemporaries Melville and Dostoevsky.
-
-
A hidden masterpiece
- By C. Park on 08-09-18
-
A Hero of Our Time
- By: Mikhail Lermontov
- Narrated by: Nicholas Boulton
- Length: 6 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Grigori Aleksandrovich Pechorin is an enigma: arrogant, cocky, melancholic, brave, cynic, romantic, loner, socialite, soldier, free soul, and yet, victim of the world, he eludes definition and remains a mystery to those who know him. Just who is he? And what does he hope to achieve? Evolving from first person to third person, and then into a diary, A Hero of Our Time takes on a variety of forms to interrogate Pechorin's cryptic character and his unusual philosophy, providing breathtaking descriptions of the Caucasus along the way.
-
-
Sarcastic Title
- By SmartShopper on 04-23-24
-
Ruth
- By: Elizabeth Gaskell
- Narrated by: Eve Matheson
- Length: 16 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The orphaned heroine Ruth, apprenticed to a dressmaker, is seduced by wealthy Henry Bellingham who is captivated by her simplicity and beauty. Their affair causes her to lose her home and job to which he offers her shelter, only to cruelly abandon her soon after. She is offered a chance of a new life though shamed in the eyes of society by her illegitimate son. When Henry reappears offering marriage she must choose between social acceptance and her own pride.
-
-
Fallen Woman Finds Redemption
- By Susan on 12-06-12
-
The Mill on the Floss
- By: George Eliot
- Narrated by: Laura Paton
- Length: 20 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Maggie Tulliver has two lovers: Philip Wakem, son of her father’s enemy, and Stephen Guest, already promised to her cousin. But the love she wants most in the world is that of her brother Tom. Maggie’s struggle against her passionate and sensual nature leads her to a deeper understanding and to eventual tragedy
-
-
Great compassion
- By nina lalumia on 12-26-16
By: George Eliot
-
Dombey and Son
- By: Charles Dickens
- Narrated by: David Timson
- Length: 39 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Dombey and Son is vintage Dickens and explores the classic themes of betrayal, cruelty and deceit. Dombey's dysfunctional relationships are painted against a backdrop of social unrest in industrialized London, which is populated by a host of fascinating and memorable secondary characters. The complete and unabridged novel is brought spectacularly to life by veteran reader David Timson.
-
-
Utterly incredible!
- By Amazon Customer on 03-12-12
By: Charles Dickens
-
Where Angels Fear to Tread
- Penguin English Library
- By: E. M. Forster
- Narrated by: Stephen Fry
- Length: 2 hrs and 51 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
E. M. Forster's first novel is a witty comedy of manners that is tinged with tragedy. It tells the story of Lilia Herriton, who proves to be an embarrassment to her late husband's family as, in the small Tuscan town of Monteriano, she begins a relationship with a much younger Italian man - classless, uncouth, and highly unsuitable. A subtle attack on Edwardian values and a humanely sympathetic portrayal of the clash of two cultures, Where Angels Fear to Tread is also a profound exploration of character and virtue.
-
-
Stephen Fry + E.M. Forster = Audio Kismet
- By Megasaurus on 08-20-12
By: E. M. Forster
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
- A Novel
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Thom Rivera
- Length: 4 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On Friday noon, July the 20th, 1714, the finest bridge in all Peru broke and precipitated five travelers into the gulf below. With this celebrated sentence, one of the towering achievements in American fiction, and a novel read throughout the world, begins. By fate or chance, a monk has witnessed the collapse. Brother Juniper, moved by the tragedy, embarks on a quest to prove a higher order is at work in the deaths of those who perished. His search leads readers on a timeless investigation into the nature of love and the meaning of the human condition.
-
-
The Metaphysics of Learning To Fly
- By David C. on 09-06-20
By: Thornton Wilder
-
Thornton Wilder: Our Town, The Bridge of San Luis Rey & More
- A BBC Radio Full-Cast Drama Collection
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Full Cast, Robert Glenister, Annette Badland, and others
- Length: 4 hrs and 32 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Thornton Wilder is one of America's most important literary figures. He won the Pulitzer Prize three times - for his novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey and the plays Our Town and The Skin of Our Teeth - and is the only person to be awarded the Pulitzer for both fiction and drama. Included here are four of his key works, set in different times and places, but sharing the same fundamental motifs - the universality of human experience and our search for life's meaning.
By: Thornton Wilder
-
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini
- Length: 2 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set in Peru in the summer of 1714, this novel tells the tale of a group of interrelated people who perish following the collapse of an Inca rope bridge. A Franciscan friar, Brother Juniper, witnesses the accident and sets out to find out more about each victim, seeking answers—cosmic or otherwise—as to why they had to die. In his quest, Brother Juniper spends six years trying to interview as many people that knew the victims as he can, seeking to prove that both their beginning and their end was part of God's plan for each victim.
-
-
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
- By Steve Tone on 11-09-24
By: Thornton Wilder
-
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Timothy Andrés Pabon
- Length: 3 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In eighteenth-century Peru, a rope bridge collapses, dropping five people to tragic deaths in the gorge below. In the aftermath, Brother Juniper, a Franciscan friar and a witness to the disaster, strives to comprehend why these five people were fated to die in this way. Was it, he wonders, some form of divine Providence, or was it arbitrary and unrelated to the manner in which these people had led their lives?
By: Thornton Wilder
-
Main Street
- By: Sinclair Lewis
- Narrated by: Lloyd James
- Length: 18 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This famous satire of life on Main Street, Gopher Prairie, mirrors with devastating honesty life on Main Streets from Albany to San Diego.
-
-
Timely and timeless
- By Kindle Customer on 05-17-18
By: Sinclair Lewis
-
JR
- By: William Gaddis
- Narrated by: Nick Sullivan
- Length: 37 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Absurdly logical, mercilessly real, gathering it's own tumultuous momentum for the ultimate brush with commodity training, JR captures the listener in the cacophony of voices that revolves around this young captive of his own myths. The disturbing clarity with which this finished writer captures the ways in which we deal, dissemble, and stumble through our words - through our lives - while the real plans are being made elsewhere makes JR the extraordinary novel that it is.
-
-
Possibly superior as an audio book
- By Peregrine on 12-12-10
By: William Gaddis
-
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
- A Novel
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Thom Rivera
- Length: 4 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On Friday noon, July the 20th, 1714, the finest bridge in all Peru broke and precipitated five travelers into the gulf below. With this celebrated sentence, one of the towering achievements in American fiction, and a novel read throughout the world, begins. By fate or chance, a monk has witnessed the collapse. Brother Juniper, moved by the tragedy, embarks on a quest to prove a higher order is at work in the deaths of those who perished. His search leads readers on a timeless investigation into the nature of love and the meaning of the human condition.
-
-
The Metaphysics of Learning To Fly
- By David C. on 09-06-20
By: Thornton Wilder
-
Thornton Wilder: Our Town, The Bridge of San Luis Rey & More
- A BBC Radio Full-Cast Drama Collection
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Full Cast, Robert Glenister, Annette Badland, and others
- Length: 4 hrs and 32 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Thornton Wilder is one of America's most important literary figures. He won the Pulitzer Prize three times - for his novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey and the plays Our Town and The Skin of Our Teeth - and is the only person to be awarded the Pulitzer for both fiction and drama. Included here are four of his key works, set in different times and places, but sharing the same fundamental motifs - the universality of human experience and our search for life's meaning.
By: Thornton Wilder
-
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini
- Length: 2 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set in Peru in the summer of 1714, this novel tells the tale of a group of interrelated people who perish following the collapse of an Inca rope bridge. A Franciscan friar, Brother Juniper, witnesses the accident and sets out to find out more about each victim, seeking answers—cosmic or otherwise—as to why they had to die. In his quest, Brother Juniper spends six years trying to interview as many people that knew the victims as he can, seeking to prove that both their beginning and their end was part of God's plan for each victim.
-
-
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
- By Steve Tone on 11-09-24
By: Thornton Wilder
-
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
- By: Thornton Wilder
- Narrated by: Timothy Andrés Pabon
- Length: 3 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In eighteenth-century Peru, a rope bridge collapses, dropping five people to tragic deaths in the gorge below. In the aftermath, Brother Juniper, a Franciscan friar and a witness to the disaster, strives to comprehend why these five people were fated to die in this way. Was it, he wonders, some form of divine Providence, or was it arbitrary and unrelated to the manner in which these people had led their lives?
By: Thornton Wilder
-
Main Street
- By: Sinclair Lewis
- Narrated by: Lloyd James
- Length: 18 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This famous satire of life on Main Street, Gopher Prairie, mirrors with devastating honesty life on Main Streets from Albany to San Diego.
-
-
Timely and timeless
- By Kindle Customer on 05-17-18
By: Sinclair Lewis
-
JR
- By: William Gaddis
- Narrated by: Nick Sullivan
- Length: 37 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Absurdly logical, mercilessly real, gathering it's own tumultuous momentum for the ultimate brush with commodity training, JR captures the listener in the cacophony of voices that revolves around this young captive of his own myths. The disturbing clarity with which this finished writer captures the ways in which we deal, dissemble, and stumble through our words - through our lives - while the real plans are being made elsewhere makes JR the extraordinary novel that it is.
-
-
Possibly superior as an audio book
- By Peregrine on 12-12-10
By: William Gaddis
-
Breathing Lessons
- By: Anne Tyler
- Narrated by: Alyssa Bresnahan
- Length: 12 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Maggie and Ira Moran are on a road trip from Baltimore, Maryland, to Deer Lick, Pennsylvania, to attend the funeral of a friend. Along the way, they reflect on the state of their marriage, its trials, and its triumphs - through their quarrels, their routines, and their ability to tolerate each other's faults with patience and affection.
-
-
This novel has earned all the recognition ---
- By DLTBGYD on 11-20-22
By: Anne Tyler
-
A Handful of Dust
- By: Evelyn Waugh
- Narrated by: Andrew Sachs
- Length: 6 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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.
-
-
Slow Start then Subtle
- By Michael on 05-16-15
By: Evelyn Waugh
-
The Plague
- By: Albert Camus
- Narrated by: James Jenner
- Length: 10 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the small coastal city of Oran, Algeria, rats begin rising up from the filth, only to die as bloody heaps in the streets. Shortly after, an outbreak of the bubonic plague erupts and envelops the human population. Albert Camus' The Plague is a brilliant and haunting rendering of human perseverance and futility in the face of a relentless terror born of nature.
-
-
Translator Please!
- By Placeholder on 06-04-11
By: Albert Camus
-
The Age of Innocence
- By: Edith Wharton
- Narrated by: David Horovitch
- Length: 12 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Countess Ellen Olenska, separated from her European husband, returns to old New York society. She bears with her an independence and an awareness of life which stirs the educated sensitivity of the charming Newland Archer, engaged to be married to her cousin, May Welland. Though he accepts the society's standards and rules he is acutely aware of their limitations. He knows May will assure him a conventional future but Ellen, scandalously separated from her husband, forces Archer to question his values and beliefs.
-
-
Narrated to Perfection
- By Ilana on 09-18-12
By: Edith Wharton
-
Of Human Bondage
- By: W. Somerset Maugham
- Narrated by: Steven Crossley
- Length: 25 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Philip Carey, a sensitive orphan born with a clubfoot, finds himself in desperate need of passion and inspiration. He abandons his studies to travel, first to Heidelberg and then to Paris, where he nurses ambitions of becoming a great artist. Philip's youthful idealism erodes, however, as he comes face-to-face with his own mediocrity and lack of impact on the world. After returning to London to study medicine, he becomes wildly infatuated with Mildred, a vulgar, tawdry waitress, and begins a doomed love affair.
-
-
You won't want it to end!
- By Rbjurnee on 04-18-11
-
A Place Called Freedom
- By: Ken Follett
- Narrated by: Simon Prebble
- Length: 14 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This lush novel, set in 1766 England and America, evokes an era ripe with riot and revolution, from the teeming streets of London to the sprawling grounds of a Virginia plantation. Mack McAsh burns with the desire to escape his life of slavery in Scottish coal mines while Lizzie Hallim is desperate to shed a life of sheltered subjugation to her spineless husband. United in America, their only chance for freedom lies beyond the Western frontier - if they're brave enough to take it.
-
-
Expected better than a historical romance
- By Lynette Garet on 01-09-17
By: Ken Follett
What listeners say about The Bridge of San Luis Rey
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Elizabeth
- 10-13-13
Better read than listened to?
Maybe this book is better taken in via reading it, rather than listening, for it lacked a compelling reason to stay with it. While I did complete the novel, I was left wanting more, wishing it was better, wishing for the profound.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Barry
- 08-14-13
Short but profound
This is a short but profound meditation on the moments that can bring a sense of reconciliation and redemption to our lives, and how we misunderstand or misinterpret even those we are closest to. I remain somewhat mystified as to why he chose to base this, however loosely, on actual historical persons, or why he dislocated them in time from their actual historical dates. For that matter, I remain mystified as to why the book's internal timeline refuses to behave itself. None of this detracts from the beauty and concision of this gem of a book.
The recording has mysteries of its own. Sam Waterston is a fine actor and his reading is full of expressive nuances, but for some reason the sound is muddy. I can't tell if this is because it's an old transfer from tape, or if Mr. Waterston's voice is pitched oddly, or because he lacks that special clipped diction that makes other readers more listenable. Maybe my hearing is just suffering from old age.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
6 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Keith
- 11-08-17
Really fabulous read, brilliant narrator.
It was one of those rare reads where I didn't want the book to end.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Felicity Fabulous
- 03-28-18
Love is the only survivor
I read this in high school I think. I liked it then, but after listening to it today, I'm astonished how much stuck with me, and how much IS me.
A timeless story that changes with time. I #LoVE
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Katie
- 04-02-19
The narration is poor.
Enjoyed the story, but this audiobook has very poor narration quality. There is alot of background static and the narrator speaks so low and quietly that I had to turn my volume up significantly just to hear him.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Padma devi
- 05-08-12
narrator mumbled
I might have enjoyed this book more if I could have understood more of the words. The narrator mumbled and swallowed his words. Seemed like he was running out of breath at the end of a sentence so one could not hear what he was saying.
Difficult to enjoy the story the reading was so poor.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
12 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Kansas Mom
- 11-29-11
A very compelling story performed well.
A very thought provoking story. Incredibly enjoyable and well performed. Characters have depth and are realistic.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- R. Klein
- 10-27-12
The sound quality drags this one down
What did you like best about The Bridge of San Luis Rey? What did you like least?
I didn't like the sound quality at all. It's muffled, which, combined with the somewhat flat reading, makes the story just drone on and on. The story goes into significant depth about the characters, but I simply gave up on starting the second of five stories. While the stories might be interesting, I don't recommend this audiobook on the simple lack of audio quality. You can get a good idea of it in the audio sample.
What was the most interesting aspect of this story? The least interesting?
The concept of the story seems interesting, but ultimately, I was finding the details, coupled with the difficulty in hearing it just not worth the effort.
How could the performance have been better?
Certainly a clearer recording - that didn't sound like it was made on a cassette recorder 35 years ago. It must be a rather old recording, transferred from tape.
And as much as I've always liked Sam Waterson as an actor, I found his reading flat to the point of becoming a drone.
Did The Bridge of San Luis Rey inspire you to do anything?
Only to try to return the book.
Any additional comments?
The recording quality is probably a disservice to the writing. Sorry to write such a negative review. I think this might be a book better read off the printed page than this recording.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Lisa B. Hamilton
- 04-24-18
Lackluster reading
Narrator sounded bored. Ruined a wonderful book. It sounded as if he neither cared about nor understood what he was reading.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Anita Herrick
- 03-21-19
Great story, poor quality audio, mediocre reading
The story was excellent. However, the audio quality was very poor. It was too quiet, and there was a distracting hiss in the background. Two of the parts played out of order, which was very frustrating. And the reading was mediocre as well. The reader rushed and mumbled at times and sometimes spoke with very little inflection, especially when reading dialogue. I've listened to a lot of books on Audible, and they are uniformly well done. This was a pretty stunning departure from the quality I expect.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!