
The Violent Bear It Away
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Narrated by:
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Mark Bramhall
About this listen
First published in 1960, The Violent Bear It Away is now a landmark in American literature. It is a dark and absorbing example of the gothic sensibility and bracing satirical voice that are united in Flannery O'Conner's work. In it, the orphaned Francis Marion Tarwater and his cousin, Rayber, defy the prophecy of their dead uncle - that Tarwater will become a prophet and will baptize Rayber's young son, Bishop. A series of struggles ensue, as Tarwater fights an internal battle against his innate faith and the voices calling him to be a prophet, while Rayber tries to draw Tarwater into a more “reasonable” modern world. Both wrestle with the legacy of their dead relatives and lay claim to Bishop's soul.
O'Connor observes all this with an astonishing combination of irony and compassion, humor and pathos. The result is a novel whose range and depth reveal a brilliant and innovative writer acutely alert to where the sacred lives and where it does not.
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deeply moving rollercoaster ride
- By h and l on 05-26-10
By: Wallace Stegner
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As I Lay Dying
- By: William Faulkner, Jesmyn Ward - introduction
- Narrated by: Marc Cashman, Robertson Dean, Lina Patel, and others
- Length: 7 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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One of William Faulkner’s finest novels, As I Lay Dying, originally published in 1930, remains a captivating and stylistically innovative work. The story revolves around a grim yet darkly humorous pilgrimage, as Addie Bundren’s family sets out to fulfill her last wish: to be buried in her native Jefferson, Mississippi, far from the miserable backwater surroundings of her married life.
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Faulkner's As I Lay Dying review
- By Kristina on 11-12-08
By: William Faulkner, and others
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Outer Dark
- By: Cormac McCarthy
- Narrated by: Ed Sala
- Length: 7 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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Outer Dark is a novel at once fabular and starkly evocative, set is an unspecified place in Appalachia, sometime around the turn of the century. A woman bears her brother's child, a boy; he leaves the baby in the woods and tells her he died of natural causes. Discovering her brother's lie, she sets forth alone to find her son. Both brother and sister wander separately through a countryside being scourged by three terrifying and elusive strangers, headlong toward an eerie, apocalyptic resolution.
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Throwing chert boulders at the dark center
- By Darwin8u on 04-22-13
By: Cormac McCarthy
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The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter
- By: Carson McCullers
- Narrated by: Cherry Jones
- Length: 12 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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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.
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Do yourself a favor
- By Barbara on 06-08-05
By: Carson McCullers
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Suttree
- By: Cormac McCarthy
- Narrated by: Richard Poe
- Length: 20 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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No discussion of great modern authors is complete without mention of Cormac McCarthy, whose rare and blazing talent makes his every work a true literary event. A grand addition to the American literary canon, Suttree introduces readers to Cornelius Suttree, a man who abandons his affluent family to live among a dissolute array of vagabonds along the Tennessee river.
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The River of Sewers, Stars, Life, and Death
- By Jefferson on 08-08-13
By: Cormac McCarthy
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Gravity's Rainbow
- By: Thomas Pynchon, Frank Miller - cover design
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 37 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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Winner of the 1973 National Book Award, Gravity's Rainbow is a postmodern epic, a work as exhaustively significant to the second half of the 20th century as Joyce's Ulysses was to the first. Its sprawling, encyclopedic narrative and penetrating analysis of the impact of technology on society make it an intellectual tour de force.
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"Time to touch the person next to you"
- By Jefferson on 07-04-16
By: Thomas Pynchon, and others
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The End of the Affair
- By: Graham Greene
- Narrated by: Colin Firth
- Length: 6 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Graham Greene’s evocative analysis of the love of self, the love of another, and the love of God is an English classic that has been translated for the stage, the screen, and even the opera house. Academy Award-winning actor Colin Firth (The King’s Speech, A Single Man) turns in an authentic and stirring performance for this distinguished audio release.
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Colin Firth Kills It
- By Em on 05-09-12
By: Graham Greene
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Blood Meridian
- Or the Evening Redness in the West
- By: Cormac McCarthy
- Narrated by: Richard Poe
- Length: 13 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Author of the National Book Award-winning All the Pretty Horses, Cormac McCarthy is one of the most provocative American stylists to emerge in the last century. The striking novel Blood Meridian offers an unflinching narrative of the brutality that accompanied the push west on the 1850s Texas frontier.
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A beautiful nightmare
- By Ryan on 07-11-11
By: Cormac McCarthy
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East of Eden
- By: John Steinbeck
- Narrated by: Richard Poe
- Length: 25 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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This sprawling and often brutal novel, set in the rich farmlands of California's Salinas Valley, follows the intertwined destinies of two families - the Trasks and the Hamiltons - whose generations helplessly reenact the fall of Adam and Eve and the poisonous rivalry of Cain and Abel.
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Why have I avoided this Beautiful Book???
- By Kelly on 03-25-17
By: John Steinbeck
What listeners say about The Violent Bear It Away
Highly rated for:
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- W Perry Hall
- 07-24-15
Violence to Youth of Good Ol' Fundamentalism
If you were raised in the rural South or spent the summertime there with someone in your WASP family, you may still suffer the occasional nightmare, as I do, from the trauma left by hellfire and brimstone sermons or a fundamentalist Sunday "school" or two, having been left at an impressionable age (8 to 14) with the constant fear that you and all who have not yet been saved will be eternally damned if you do not save them from this blasphemous world, and spooked by the bountiful ignorance that surrounded you.
Flannery O'Connor, a devout Catholic, was super-critical of fundamentalist Protestants. Her short stories and two novels either explored dark religious themes or were tinged with often morbid religious undertones.
THE VIOLENT BEAR IT AWAY's title is taken from a verse in the Douay-Rhiens Catholic Bible at Matthew 11:12: "From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away."
I'll forego delving into possible meanings of the title, and any discussion of the novel gives away what happens at and near the end of the book. I'll just say that it's a BRUTAL book, dealing with a 14-year-old boy, fanatical, Southern fundamentalists and the related themes of destruction and redemption.
If you are looking for an enjoyable summer read, perhaps you should look elsewhere. If you'd like to get a sampling of the deeply dark, morbid and haunting world of Southern fundamentalist ol' time religion, purchase now.
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23 people found this helpful
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- Seth H. Wilson
- 02-07-15
The Title Says It All
A bleak book with sustained religious imagery, that's what you're in for. O'Connor is such a powerful writer, though, that you occasionally get lost in the poetic beauty of her phrasing and forget how depressing the story is. But the story always jerks you back to reality.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Carolyn H.
- 02-27-21
Disturbing yet oddly mesmerizing & highly original
The vernacular of the star rating system is woefully inadequate in this case: 'I love it' (as five stars is meant to convey) seems the wrong sentiment for a story as dark and disturbing as this one, which showcases a place and time that is unpleasant to imagine existing, but unforgettable once introduced. Yet I can't imagine giving it anything other than five stars. I found it to be very beautifully written and perhaps uncomfortably evocative in its depiction of the inner motivations and thoughts of characters brutally shaped by their experiences and helpless in their power to overcome them. I almost didn't want to know about these people, but once started on the narrative I couldn't help wanting to continue the journey. I listened to it primarily as I tried to fall asleep, which I'm sure added to the haunting quality of the story, as the despair and darkness infused my dreams and always lingered when I awoke. This was my first Flannery O'Connor, and my reaction was similar to reading William Faulkner and Carson McCullers: the story is darkly alluring, the writing style leaves a singular impression (O'Connor being my favorite of the three), and the characters stir powerful and often disquieting emotions. The story crawls into your bones, and once there, it lingers until it's almost hard to know if you're glad you allowed it in or not. The effect is made all the more dramatic by the narrator, who was so masterful it's hard to imagine that anyone else could have brought this to life so vividly as to make the events almost painful to bear witness to. I encourage you to press 'play,' in the end I'm glad I did.
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- Maria C. Gutierrez
- 12-16-20
Timeless and Amazing
I write and I listen to learn how the masters wrote. Flannery’s writing is precise and deliberate. Perfect and timeless.
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- Doris
- 02-27-15
Coarse, gritty world I never want to know
Flannery Conner uncovers some of the ugly culture as a consequence of the unrooted, superstitious people of the American post-war era. The vulnerable bear the brunt of each man 's interpretation what he believes is being freed from perceived evils.
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- Heather
- 01-19-22
Trigger warnings - but also well read
Woooooof I was not expecting or prepared for something towards the end. Just. Trigger warnings all around.
That said, Mark Bramhall is INCREDIBLE and it was like listening to a Broadway play. He is so amazing, every character felt truthful and unique, and each and every of O'Conner's words felt significant in his voice.
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- test.audible18
- 09-02-10
Geat Book To check
I found out this book excellent. Check out all the review and then go for it.
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- Warren Lanphear
- 01-06-24
Christian damnation
I listened to this for its literary merit and thankfully it's not too long. The story is uncomfortable to listen to. The reader is excellent.
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- Darwin8u
- 10-22-12
Biblical, American and Absolutely Brutal
O'Connor was ruthless in her vision. The struggle of Tarwater and his uncle Rayber against their joint destinies and the pull of fundamentalism and secularism is fully realized in this short novel. The Violent Bear it Away is biblical, American and absolutely brutal in both its imagery of destruction and language of redemption. I can only think of a handful of writers who seem to grab both my brain, my spine and my gut at the same time. O'Connor can't be over-appreciated; she was an absolute genius of passion and power. So brilliant and terrible was this novel, that I still exceedingly fear and quake.
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76 people found this helpful
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- bookscdsdvdsandcoolstuff
- 05-25-13
Expertly read edition
This book is easily one of the best I have ever listened to. It is Flanery O'Connor, so one must be prepared to read this text like someone who understands literature. Remember that O'Connor is deeply rooted in Catholicism, and scholasticism. Remember that she is first and foremost a committed Christian. Her characters will be grotesque, and there will be tremendous violence and disturbing images, but the book will stick with you forever. It will point to deeper transcendent truths that are timeless and eternal.
Reading Flannery O'Connor will enrich your life, but please understand that you are not listening to surface level romance novels / John Grisham stuff here. This takes hard work and patience, but it is work that will be deeply enriching should you undertake it.
The narration is perfect. The southern accent throughout is very important, and the individual voices of each character are pitch perfect. Simply outstanding.
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40 people found this helpful