The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas
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Narrated by:
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Edoardo Camponeschi
About this listen
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. Lexicos is proud to present Machado's supreme achievement in this gorgeous new translation by Neil McArthur.
©2018 Neil McArthur (P)2018 Neil McArthurListeners also enjoyed...
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Story
Znamenityj roman vvodit nas v bogatyj, raznoobraznyj, udivitel'no uyutnyj i privlekatel'nyj mir russkoj dvoryanskoj zhizni Moskvy i Peterburga. Tolstoj vystupaet zdes' pevcom povsednevnoj zhizni, kotoruyu on poehtiziruet i v kotoroj vidit filosofskuyu glubinu, primiryayushchuyu stol' razitel'nye protivopolozhnosti, kak tragicheskaya nezakonnaya svyaz' Anny Kareninoj s Vronskim i schastlivaya semejnaya zhizn' Kiti s Cherbackoj i Levina.
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Fantastic narration!
- By Anastasia Lattanand on 03-10-16
By: Leo Tolstoy
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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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Notes from Underground
- By: Natasha Randall - translator, Fyodor Dostoevsky
- Narrated by: D. B. C. Pierre
- Length: 5 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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A groundbreaking new translation of Dostoyevsky's most radical work of fiction. In the depths of a cellar in St. Petersburg, a civil servant spews forth a passionate and furious note on the ills of society. The underground man's manifesto reveals his erratic, self-contradictory, and even sadistic nature. Yet in Dostoyevsky's most extreme and disturbing character, there is the uncomfortable flicker of recognition of the human condition. When the narrator ventures above ground, he attends a dinner with a group of old school friends.
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The first modern anti-hero?
- By John L. Murphy on 07-14-17
By: Natasha Randall - translator, and others
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The Good Soldier
- By: Ford Madox Ford
- Narrated by: Frank Muller
- Length: 6 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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On the face of it Captain Edward Ashburnham's life was unimpeachable. But behind the mask where passion seethes, the captain's "good" life was rotting away.
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Treachery in the Troops
- By Mel on 01-08-15
By: Ford Madox Ford
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Middlemarch
- By: George Eliot
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 35 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Dorothea Brooke is an ardent idealist who represses her vivacity and intelligence for the cold, theological pedant Casaubon. One man understands her true nature: the artist Will Ladislaw. But how can love triumph against her sense of duty and Casaubon’s mean spirit? Meanwhile, in the little world of Middlemarch, the broader world is mirrored: the world of politics, social change, and reforms, as well as betrayal, greed, blackmail, ambition, and disappointment.
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Best Audible book ever
- By Molly-o on 12-25-11
By: George Eliot
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Dombey and Son
- By: Charles Dickens
- Narrated by: Frederick Davidson
- Length: 36 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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In this carefully crafted novel, Dickens reveals the complexity of London society in the enterprising 1840s as he takes the listener into the business firm and home of one of its most representative patriarchs, Paul Dombey.
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Perfect pair
- By Philip on 03-25-08
By: Charles Dickens
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Oblomov
- By: Ivan Goncharov
- Narrated by: Leighton Pugh
- Length: 20 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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A member of the landed gentry, with a seemingly guaranteed income from his estate in the country, Oblomov lives in Petersburg, uninterested in the business that provides his living and barely aware that the revenue is diminishing. Not that he leads a dissolute life of extravagance, balls and entertainment. Instead he is a dreamer, a sybarite, content above all to spend most of the day supine, in bed. The novel opens with Oblomov thus ensconced, attended only by his dirty, grumbling, indolent servant Zahar, who has looked after him since childhood, catering to his every need.
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funny and smart
- By Bennett Weiss on 07-29-20
By: Ivan Goncharov
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Anna of the Five Towns
- By: Arnold Bennett
- Narrated by: Peter Joyce
- Length: 9 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Set in stifled, industrial Staffordshire in the late 19th century, against a strong evangelical background, Anna of the Five Towns tells of the courting of hard businessman Ephraim Tellright's daughter by prosperous and accomplished Henry Mynors. As her father's fortune grows, so does Anna understanding. She realises her legacy and responsibility for the possible ruination of her father's tenants, Titus Price and his son, Willie, who also loves her.
By: Arnold Bennett
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Swann's Way
- By: Marcel Proust
- Narrated by: Neville Jason
- Length: 21 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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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.
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Not a book one reads but inhabits & floats through
- By Darwin8u on 02-24-13
By: Marcel Proust
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The Leopard
- A Novel
- By: Giuseppe di Lampedusa, Archibald Colquhuon - translator
- Narrated by: Paul Woodson
- Length: 9 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Set in the 1860s, The Leopard tells the spellbinding story of a decadent, dying Sicilian aristocracy threatened by the approaching forces of democracy and revolution. The dramatic sweep and richness of observation, the seamless intertwining of public and private worlds, and the grasp of human frailty imbue The Leopard with its particular melancholy beauty and power, and place it among the greatest historical novels of our time.
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Timeless
- By Robert Massarella on 12-05-23
By: Giuseppe di Lampedusa, and others
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The Shuttle
- By: Frances Hodgson Burnett
- Narrated by: Tabi That
- Length: 19 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Rosalie Vanderpoel, the daughter of an American multimillionaire marries an impoverished English baronet and goes to live in England. She all but loses contact with her family in America. Years later her younger sister Bettina, beautiful, intelligent and extremely rich, goes to England to find what has happened to her sister. She finds Rosalie shabby and dispirited, cowed by her husband's ill-treatment. Bettina sets about to rectify matters.
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More than Lovely
- By jTacy67 on 01-17-18
What listeners say about The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Diana Salles
- 10-06-19
An inspired interpretation of a singular novel.
I enjoyed it very much. Takes me back to my past life the performance is dreamy.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Andre
- 09-25-20
xx
Quite interesting to realize that's XIX century book. Not by chance Machado de Assis is the Father of National Letters Academy (Bra).
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- C. Park
- 08-09-18
A hidden masterpiece
I’d never heard of Machado de Assis till I read a profile in the New Yorker. The praise in that article was no exaggeration. Brazilian, mixed race, he really is as good as Melville or Dostoevsky. This is a short, elegant, moving novel. I also like that the narrator handles the Portuguese names and places fluently. Well done.
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6 people found this helpful
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- R
- 06-21-20
Salty chocolate chip cookie
I would not know about this book if it had not been featured in a recent The New Yorker article titled ‘Rediscovering one of the wittiest book ever written.’ A title like this is a perfect teaser for any reader. What’s better than something interesting and obscure - interesting for the sake of reading it and obscure to later boast about it, to portray oneself as a connoisseur? Is that what the The New Yorker review was doing?
There is no doubt that this book is witty. If it were not for the wit, the book would be in its grave (like the narrator!) rather than still standing on one leg - yes just one leg, barely able to hold its own weight. Kudos to the author for trying to build a three legged stool made of wit, love and philosophy, except that other than wit, the other two legs didn’t find their footing.
The book is a love story - an extramarital affair for nobody. It’s neither happy, nor sad. It’s neither romantic nor obsessive. The more you think about it, the more you realize that it’s just a narration auxiliary to the wit. The narration can be filled with any other story, perhaps that of a person running a marathon encountering wit at every mile - no one would know the difference. And like every unsuccessful love story, this one tries to venture into philosophy to express its regret - both with love and with life. The dabble attempts to describe a school of thought that the author himself didn’t understand. Was it witty that the author tried to wrap it as if someone else was explaining it to him in the book or just plain foolish?
So, after philosophy and love are lost for the reader, what’s left is just wit, like delicious chips in a salty chocolate chip cookie. Who doesn’t like salty chocolate chip cookies or rather who does?
The merit of this book lies in an obscure realm from where the literature can both extol or debase it, for instance for its one or three line chapters. Whether it deserves a rediscovery, remains an open question.
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- Caveat Emptor
- 06-10-20
The wittiest novel ever written? Uh, no.
Occasionally witty, yes. A great novel? I don’t think so. Not that entertaining, edifying, memorable, or inspirational (at least the latter not being author’s point). I think the reviews for the new translation oversold the original.
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- Tyler Stout
- 06-27-21
Simply marvelous from the king of Brazilian literature!
Machado de Assis is one of the most underrated writers outside of his native country of Brazil. This is a shame because his name should be mentioned in the same breath of the pantheon of the greatest classic writers like Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Dickens, Twain, Dumas, Verne, and Hugo. Unfortunately, this is not the case and outside of Brazil, he has been largely forgotten.
His story about Bras Cubas is witty, poignant, hilarious, a little sad, but ultimately a page turner from the first until the last.
The guy doing the reading is really good, but it took me a minute because I speak Portuguese and I’ve read the in the original Portuguese so it took me a little while to get over hearing Brazilian culture and the story in English.
The translation is really well done as well, and keeps the humor and the spirit of Assis. Very well done, so don’t cheat yourself by skipping out on this one!
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- Chris Lewis
- 06-29-20
Totally unimpressed!
After seeing so many reviews it was
disappointing to read this book. It is meandering tale of nothing happening to a lazy, arrogant, narcissistic, self-obsessed man.
It was this month’s choice for our book club and was universally disliked, to the point where we are considering cancelling the meeting at which it would have been discussed.
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- Todd Albert
- 02-27-24
Pointless picaresque drivel.
",,, a dazzling, tragic, and profound novel that belongs next to the greatest works of his contemporaries Melville and Dostoevsky" promises the audible description. This does not hold a candle to the writing of Melville. A classic? (of Brazilian literature) Perhaps. Profound? Not in the least. Good? No. The reader will not come away energized and with mind afire after reading this. If you are panning for gold, look elsewhere, you won't find it here.
High production quality, good translation.
If you decide to listen to the novel anyway, I suggest starting with Chapter 9, marked by the author with the word TRANSITION, when the narrative shifts gears to faux-autobiographical with the narrator's birth. The preceding eight chapters are as revealed by the narrator himself in chapter nine, a deathbed or post-death "delirium". Those chapters are easier to parse, if you read them after reading at least three-quarters of the novel, once the names the narrator refers to have become familiar to the reader.
Favorite turn of phrase from the novel: "While this idea worked on the trapeze in my brain..."
Favorite simile from the novel: "...as pallid as the magpies painted upon a ceiling in Sintra."
Suggested better alternative: Leopoldo Alas "La Regenta" (1884, Spain) translated by John Rutherford
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