The Monk
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Narrated by:
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Nigel Carrington
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By:
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Matthew Lewis
About this listen
The Monk is a violent tale of ambition, murder, and incest. The great struggle between maintaining monastic vows and fulfilling personal ambitions leads the monk Ambrosio, into temptation and the breaking of his vows, then to sexual obsession and rape, and finally to murder in order to conceal his guilt.
Written when Matthew Lewis was only 19, The Monk was criticised when first published in 1796 for its lewdness and impiety, but this criticism only added to its popularity.
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The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
- By: Anne Brontë
- Narrated by: Alex Jennings, Jenny Agutter
- Length: 16 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Fleeing a disastrous marriage, Helen Huntingdon retreats to the desolate mansion, Wildfell Hall, with her son, Arthur. There, she makes her living as a painter. Finding it difficult to avoid her neighbors, she is soon an object of speculation and gossip. Brontë portrays Helen's eloquent struggle for independence at a time when society defined a married woman as her husband's property.
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Excellent performances of an abridged version
- By LSK on 04-21-19
By: Anne Brontë
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The Talisman
- By: Sir Walter Scott
- Narrated by: David McCallion
- Length: 12 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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The Talisman revolves around the Third Crusader's camp in the Holy Land whereby there exists a truce between the Christians and the Muslims. The camp, which is led by King Richard I of England (the Lion-heart) who is grievously ill, is being torn apart by tensions between rival leaders.
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a simple story but a joy to listen to
- By Adele Lemmon on 08-23-19
By: Sir Walter Scott
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The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia
- By: Samuel Johnson
- Narrated by: Steven Crossley
- Length: 4 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Rasselas and his companions escape the pleasures of the "happy valley" in order to make their "choice of life". By witnessing the misfortunes and miseries of others they come to understand the nature of happiness and value it more highly. Their travels and enquiries raise important practical and philosophical questions concerning many aspects of the human condition, including the business of a poet, the stability of reason, the immortality of the soul, and how to find contentment.
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1759 classic
- By Kindle Customer on 01-29-23
By: Samuel Johnson
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The Red and the Black
- By: Stendhal
- Narrated by: Davina Porter
- Length: 20 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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So what would Al Gore choose if he had a book club? Gore named Stendhal's The Red and the Black, a 19th century classic chock full of adultery, betrayal, and moral vacuity, as his favorite book on a recent broadcast of Oprah. It's a bit shocking of a choice, given his wife and running mate's position on clean, wholesome literature. Listen and decide for yourself the merit of this presidential pick.
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Almost perfect
- By Erez on 05-29-08
By: Stendhal
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Scaramouche
- Classic Tales Edition
- By: Raphael Sabatini
- Narrated by: B. J. Harrison
- Length: 14 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Once he was Andre-Louis, lawyer to the upper class, and destined for the upper echelons of French society. Now, he is Scaramouche. Speaking out against the injustices of the French government, he dons the garb of a clown with a band of wandering actors - a passionate jester with a vital message....
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A lot that I didn’t know
- By stl1111 on 02-27-23
By: Raphael Sabatini
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Waverley
- By: Sir Walter Scott
- Narrated by: David Rintoul
- Length: 17 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Waverley by Sir Walter Scott is an enthralling tale of love, war and divided loyalties. Taking place during the Jacobite Rebellion of 1745, the novel tells the story of proud English officer Edward Waverley. After being posted to Dundee, Edward eventually befriends chieftain of the Highland Clan Mac-Ivor and falls in love with his beautiful sister Flora. He then renounces his former loyalties in order actively to support Scotland in open rebellion against the Union with England. The book depicts stunning, romantic panoramas of the Highlands.
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Loved it
- By Tad Davis on 04-12-18
By: Sir Walter Scott
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The Story of My Life, Volume 1
- By: Giacomo Casanova
- Narrated by: Peter Wickham
- Length: 47 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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The Story of My Life is the explosive and exhilarating autobiography by the infamous libertine Giacomo Casanova. Intense and scandalous, Casanova's extraordinary adventures take the listener on an incredible voyage across 18th-century Europe - from France to Russia, Poland to Spain and Turkey to Germany, with Venice at their heart. He falls madly in love, has wild flings and delirious orgies, and encounters some of the most brilliant figures of his time, including Catherine the Great, Louis XV and Benjamin Franklin. He holds a verbal dual with Voltaire and finds himself hauled before the court multiple times.
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Extraordinarily interesting
- By Ed Pegg Jr on 10-19-19
By: Giacomo Casanova
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The Three Musketeers (AmazonClassics Edition)
- By: Alexandre Dumas, William Robson - translator
- Narrated by: Guy Mott
- Length: 27 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Young nobleman d’Artagnan has arrived in Paris intent on joining the guardians of King Louis XIII. He befriends the regiment’s most formidable musketeers, Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, and together they unite in their commitment to uphold justice. Soon, a royal indiscretion thrusts them into an audacious escapade of courtly intrigue, thwarted romance, and daring rescue. But it’s the Machiavellian schemes of a powerful enemy and the wicked seductions of an ingenious female spy that will be their greatest challenges.
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terrible narrator. every comma is a 3 second pause
- By Anonymous User on 09-21-21
By: Alexandre Dumas, and others
What listeners say about The Monk
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- John
- 07-31-18
Full of exciting and malicious twists and turns. Performed excellently.
This book is already revered as a classic work of literature and needs no extra praise. But the narration is in much need of praise.
Nigel Carrington’s performance is absolutely astounding. His ability to convey the emotion of each character is equal to that of great actors. And his delivery of the third person narrative shows a profound understanding of the book’s tone and theme.
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- Jessie
- 02-01-18
wow!!
this book was amazing!
great story and the reading was spot on. I will read this again!
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- kathologist
- 11-18-21
Supernatural Goth circa 1800
A Story with lots of color & sub plots, romance, travel guide gloss, vintage wordsmithing. The tropes that those who enjoy horror fiction will delight in recognition of their early beginnings.
Andalusia to Bavaria to Madrid
Monastic telenovela!
Bodice ripping! Fashion details!
Ghosts!
Bleeding Nun poltergeist!
Gypsies! ( pls remember to refer to Roma)
Cameo appearance of The Wandering Jew!
Cutthroats & cavaliers!
The sorry a** self righteous meet their ends
Uttered with the upper crust English accent of a man who truly delighted in the telling.
I latched onto this book for relief from today's current crop of perfidious people. Yep, stories of long gone evil doings are a balm to my exhaustion of staying abreast of current events & the grifters web of lies...
It came as a recommendation from @PulpLibrarian on Twitter.
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- Jefferson
- 01-01-17
An Overwritten, Oddly Compelling Gothic Father
Matthew Lewis' notorious and influential Gothic novel The Monk (1796) takes place during the heyday of the Spanish Inquisition. Ambrosio, the monk/friar/abbot/idol of Madrid, is nicknamed "the Man of Holiness" by the people of the sinful city, because he stands so piously above human failings, especially lust. When we read, "He looked round him with exultation, and Pride told him loudly that He was superior to the rest of his fellow-Creatures," however, we sense that he may be heading for a fall. Indeed, soon enough Matilda, a sexy groupie who uncannily resembles Ambrosio's beloved portrait of the Madonna, reveals herself to him, rocking his sense of self, religion, and life learned during his thirty years of warped Capuchin education and seclusion from the world. Meanwhile, the young aristocrat Don Lorenzo is trying to woo the teenage, ultra innocent Antonia, while his friend Don Raymond has gotten a little too close to Lorenzo's unsuitably convent-bound sister Agnes. Lewis intertwines his characters' destinies in a narrative that is by turns interesting, suspenseful, lurid, and comical. Some moments really shock, scare, or titillate.
There are, however, too many long monologues, uninterrupted personal narratives, and detailed descriptions. Late 18th century misogyny informs the novel: women bear the greater burden of protecting themselves from male lust, and female characters are generally wicked, vengeful, foolish, or weak. And some of the writing reads like a corny (if not creepy) romance:
"her lips were of the most rosy freshness; Her fair and undulating hair, confined by a simple ribband, poured itself below her waist in a profusion of ringlets; Her throat was full and beautiful in the extreme; Her hand and arm were formed with the most perfect symmetry; Her mild blue eyes seemed an heaven of sweetness, and the crystal in which they moved sparkled with all the brilliance of Diamonds: She appeared to be scarcely fifteen."
Nigel Carrington gives a stellar reading of the novel, doing fine voices for gloating Lucifer, lusting monk, persecuting prioress, and earnest protagonists, and making it possible to survive (and even enjoy) the long, overwrought and overwritten passages.
The Monk is an odd book. It features typical Gothic elements (or ones that it helped make typical): haunted castles, walled monasteries, labyrinthine caverns, secret dungeons, fetid sepulchers, trick statues, secret stairways, black magics, potent opiates, illicit loves, prophetic dreams, false identities, oracular gypsies, murderous bandits, decomposing babies, bleeding ghosts, demonic servants, damsels in distress, and compelling anti-heroes. Although superstition is criticized, reason cannot account for or protect from the supernatural. The novel is remarkable in that innocent victims are not always saved, The Bible is deemed unsuitable reading for children and virgins ("the annals of a Brothel would scarcely furnish a greater choice of indecent expressions"), and the psychology of the sexual predator in a position of power and prestige is convincingly depicted. The good characters are ineffectual and the bad ones potent, which may be Lewis' point.
Perhaps Lewis was trying to place his work in the context of classic literature via the epigraphs by the likes of Shakespeare, Tasso, and Cowper which begin his chapters and the poetry which his characters read or sing: poems like Love and Age, ballads like Alonzo the Brave and Fair Imogene, a Gypsy song, an Inscription in an Hermitage, a Midnight Hymn, and a "Spanish" street Serenade. Judging by the controversy the novel has provoked, its literary claims have not always justified its outre elements. Nonetheless, The Monk is a much more serious and sustained (if less focused) work than The Castle of Otranto.
Lewis does do plenty of compelling writing, as when Ambrosio sees a breast:
His eye dwelt with insatiable avidity upon the beauteous Orb. A sensation till then unknown filled his heart with a mixture of anxiety and delight: A raging fire shot through every limb; The blood boiled in his veins, and a thousand wild wishes bewildered his imagination.
Or when Don Raymond examines an illustration of the Bleeding Nun:
Here was One upon his knees with his eyes cast up to heaven, and praying most devoutly; There Another was creeping away upon all fours. Some hid their faces in their cloaks or the laps of their Companions; Some had concealed themselves beneath a Table, on which the remnants of a feast were visible; While Others with gaping mouths and eyes wide-stretched pointed to a Figure, supposed to have created this disturbance. It represented a Female of more than human stature, clothed in the habit of some religious order. Her face was veiled; On her arm hung a chaplet of beads; Her dress was in several places stained with the blood which trickled from a wound upon her bosom. In one hand She held a Lamp, in the other a large Knife, and She seemed advancing towards the iron gates of the Hall.
Or when Ambrosio meets Lucifer:
Enchanted at a vision so contrary to his expectations, Ambrosio gazed upon the Spirit with delight and wonder: Yet however beautiful the Figure, He could not but remark a wildness in the Daemon's eyes, and a mysterious melancholy impressed upon his features, betraying the Fallen Angel, and inspiring the Spectators with secret awe.
Or when Antonia does some inappropriate bedtime reading:
The perusal of this story [a ballad in which worms creep in and out of the empty eye sockets of a vengeful lover's ghost] was ill-calculated to dispel Antonia's melancholy.
Or when a silly woman tries to get Ambrosio to exorcise her house:
''Oh! That Chicken's wing! My poor soul suffers for it!''
Readers interested in the Gothic genre should try The Monk, but I'd recommend listening to an audiobook version read by a fine narrator (like Nigel C.) rather than the physical book.
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