The Hunting of the Snark Audiobook By Lewis Carroll cover art

The Hunting of the Snark

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The Hunting of the Snark

By: Lewis Carroll
Narrated by: Boris Karloff
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But what is a Snark? "Humpty Dumpty's theory, of two meanings packed into one word like a portmanteau, seems to me the right explanation for all."
-Lewis Carroll©2008 Saland Publishing (P)2008 Saland Publishing Classics European Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Poetry World Literature
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What made the experience of listening to The Hunting of the Snark the most enjoyable?

Boris Karloff! I mean, seriously, it's Boris freakin' Karloff! He's absolutely perfect for this material; I love his voice.

Who was your favorite character and why?

I don't really have a favorite character; I just love the poem as a whole. It's my favorite work of Lewis Carroll, and it's always been a goal of mine (one I fear I will never achieve) to memorize the whole thing.

What does Boris Karloff bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

He's just the perfect voice, with emphasis in all the right places. There's no one else I could imagine to do a better job.

Boris Karloff reads Lewis Carroll - perfect!

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Was there ever a better pairing the Boris Karloff and Lewis Carroll? I say not ever! My memory, though, takes me back to Karloff reading Rudyard Kipling's JUST SO STORIES. That, too, was a masterwork of Spoken Word! If Audible has it, that will be my next purchase! These are the stories my father read us at bedtime. That, and other stories from his childhood: GILGAMESH, THE ILLIAD, THE ODYSSEY random Law Books, all in amusing voices. The REAL GRIMM'S FAIRY TALES! READ TO the children in your life!
Once they get the habit, they will never stop!m

Oh What Joy To Own It!

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A true classic, much like a Bach sonata, short but perfect in form. I truly enjoyed it.

A true classic

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I was very disappointed that some of my favorite lined were skipped in this reading.

Some parts were skipped

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Boris Karloff is the perfect reader of this amusing and mysterious poetic work.

Delightful, and beats several listens.

Wonderful wacky poem

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Boris Karloff has a grand time with Lewis Carroll's epic nonsense quest poem, reading the pointedly crazy lines with a cadaverously enthusiastic and engaging rhythm. It sounds at times as if he's not reading so much as inhabiting the poem, adventuring in an echoing and fantastic landscape of chasms and crags, always staying right between gravitas and camp.

My only complaint--and it's a big one--is that this version is NOT (I repeat, NOT) unabridged, because it's missing an entire Fit or chapter (the sixth one of eight, the one about the Barrister's Dream). I also caught Karloff skipping a stanza in an earlier fit... And the humorous preface in which Carroll "defends" himself from the charge of nonsense and explains how to pronounce "slithy toves" is missing.

In conclusion, if you get this expecting a fun romp with Karloff and Carroll rather than a 100% complete unabridged reading of The Hunting of the Snark, you will enjoy it.

You gotta love the Horror-B-Movie King declaiming from his sepulcher,

They sought it with thimbles, they sought it with care;
They pursued it with forks and hope;
They threatened its life with a railway-share;
They charmed it with smiles ands soap.

Savory & Strange--but Missing a Fit!!!

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I paid to hear this, I expect a refund. Who decided to leave parts out?

Not the complete poem

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Carroll's poem is wonderful, Karloff's performance unsurpassable (even though abridged to fit on one side of an LP). But, here on Audible, the end of the poem's final sentence has been completely lopped off! Look for Karloff's "complete" (albeit abridged) recording elsewhere.

Missing the final words of the recording!

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