Victorian London
The Life of a City, 1840-1870
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Narrated by:
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Anton Lesser
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By:
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Liza Picard
About this listen
This period of mid-Victorian London encompasses a huge range of subjects: Victoria's wedding and the place of the royals in popular esteem; how the very poor lived, the underworld, prostitution, crime, prisons and transportation; the public utilities, Bazalgette on sewers and road design, Chadwick on pollution and sanitation; private charities, Peabody, Burdett Coutts, and workhouses; new terraced housing and transport, trains, omnibuses, and the Underground; furniture and decor; families and the position of women; the prosperous middle classes and their new shops, e.g. Peter Jones, Harrods; entertaining and servants, food and drink; unlimited liability and bankruptcy; the rich, the marriage market, taxes and anti-semitism; the Empire, recruitment and press-gangs.
The period begins with the closing of the Fleet and Marshalsea prisons and ends with the first (steam-operated) Underground trains and the first Gilbert & Sullivan. All the splendours and horrors of Victorian life will be vividly recalled.
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Lark Rise is Flora Thompson's childhood memories of a north Oxfordshire village, the people who lived and worked in it, and a way of life that has totally disappeared. The story is built around Laura and her brother Edmund, through whose eyes are seen 'old Sally', whose grandfather built the house she lived in before the enclosure of the heathland, children's games, the interaction of village and gentry, and the way in which the seasons governed life.
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A glimpse...
- By Shananiganians on 05-31-20
By: Flora Thompson
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The Five
- The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper
- By: Hallie Rubenhold
- Narrated by: Louise Brealey
- Length: 10 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Polly, Annie, Elizabeth, Catherine, and Mary-Jane are famous for the same thing, though they never met. What they had in common was the year of their murders: 1888. The person responsible was never identified, but the character created by the press to fill that gap has become far more famous than any of these five women. For more than a century, newspapers have been keen to tell us that "the Ripper" preyed on prostitutes. Not only is this untrue, as historian Hallie Rubenhold has discovered, but it has prevented the real stories of these fascinating women from being told.
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Everyone needs to read/listen to this book
- By AAHickman on 12-05-19
By: Hallie Rubenhold
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London in the Nineteenth Century
- By: Jerry White
- Narrated by: Neil Gardner
- Length: 21 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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Jerry White's London in the Nineteenth Century is the richest and most absorbing account of the city's greatest century by its leading expert. London in the nineteenth century was the greatest city mankind had ever seen. Its growth was stupendous. Its wealth was dazzling. Its horrors shocked the world. This was the London of Blake, Thackeray and Mayhew, of Nash, Faraday and Disraeli. Most of all it was the London of Dickens. As William Blake put it, London was 'a Human awful wonder of God'.
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SO DETAILED..SO VERY VERY DETAILED.
- By Count B on 06-16-19
By: Jerry White
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Upstairs & Downstairs
- My Life In Service as a Lady's Maid
- By: Hilda Newman, Tim Tate
- Narrated by: Helen Lloyd
- Length: 6 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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The year was 1935: the twilight of the English aristocracy. It was a time of wealth and glamour; of lavish balls and evening gowns; of tiaras and a coronation. As personal maid to Lady Coventry, Hilda Newman had a unique insight into the leisured life of one of Britain's most noble families. In her fascinating memoir of life upstairs and down, Hilda takes us back to this period between the wars; a gilded era which would soon be dramatically changed by the Second World War.
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Wonderful listen!!
- By J.T. on 09-25-19
By: Hilda Newman, and others
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A Brief History of Life in Victorian Britain
- By: Michael Paterson
- Narrated by: Mark Meadows
- Length: 11 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Performance
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Story
The Victorian era has dominated the popular imagination like no other period, but these myths and stories also give a very distorted view of the 19th century. The early Victorians were much stranger than we usually imagine, and their world would have felt very different from our own. It was only during the long reign of the Queen that a modern society emerged in unexpected ways.
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Brief, But Insightful
- By Troy on 07-17-13
By: Michael Paterson
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The Wapshot Chronicle
- By: John Cheever
- Narrated by: Joe Barrett
- Length: 11 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Performance
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Story
Based in part on Cheever's adolescence in New England, the novel follows the destinies of the impecunious and wildly eccentric Wapshots of St. Botolphs, a quintessential Massachusetts fishing village. Here are the stories of Captain Leander Wapshot, venerable sea dog and would-be suicide; of his licentious older son, Moses; and of Moses' adoring and errant younger brother, Coverly.
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Beautiful 1950s Great Expectations-like Novel
- By Darwin8u on 05-31-13
By: John Cheever
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The Little Princesses
- The Story of the Queen's Childhood by Her Nanny, Marion Crawford
- By: Marion Crawford, Jennie Bond - foreword
- Narrated by: Sophie Roberts
- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Originally published in 1950, The Little Princesses was the first account of British Royal life inside Buckingham Palace as revealed by Marion Crawford, who served as governess to princesses Elizabeth and Margaret.
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The Beginnig of My Interest on the Royal Family
- By A. Bauza Higuera on 12-30-22
By: Marion Crawford, and others
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How to Be a Tudor
- A Dawn-to-Dusk Guide to Tudor Life
- By: Ruth Goodman
- Narrated by: Heather Wilds
- Length: 10 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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On the heels of her triumphant How to Be a Victorian, Ruth Goodman travels even further back in English history to the era closest to her heart, the dramatic period from the crowning of Henry VII to the death of Elizabeth I. Drawing on her own adventures living in re-created Tudor conditions, Goodman serves as our intrepid guide to 16th-century living. Proceeding from daybreak to bedtime, this charming, illustrative work celebrates the ordinary lives of those who labored through the era.
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Excellent book!
- By Kathi on 02-18-16
By: Ruth Goodman
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Wait for Me!
- Memoirs
- By: Deborah Mitford Duchess of Devonshire
- Narrated by: Anne Flosnik
- Length: 14 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Deborah Mitford, Duchess of Devonshire, is the youngest of the famously witty brood that includes the writers Jessica and Nancy, who wrote when Deborah was born, "How disgusting of the poor darling to go and be a girl." Deborah's effervescent memoir chronicles her remarkable life, from an eccentric but happy childhood in the Oxfordshire countryside, to tea with Adolf Hitler and her controversially political sister Unity in 1937, to her marriage to the second son of the Duke of Devonshire.
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The last of the Mitford Sisters
- By Irene on 01-11-11
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Cocaine Blues
- By: Kerry Greenwood
- Narrated by: Stephanie Daniel
- Length: 5 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
It's the end of the roaring twenties, and the exuberant and Honourable Phryne Fisher is dancing and gaming with gay abandon. But she becomes bored with London and the endless round of parties. In search of excitement, she sets her sights on a spot of detective work in Melbourne, Australia. And so mystery and the beautiful Russian dancer, Sasha de Lisse, appear in her life. From then on it's all cocaine and communism until her adventure reaches its steamy end in the Turkish baths of Little Lonsdale Street.
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A series that just gets better
- By Barbara Kindle Customer on 02-01-11
By: Kerry Greenwood
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The Diary of a Nobody
- By: George Grossmith, Weedon Grossmith
- Narrated by: Martin Jarvis
- Length: 4 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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Performance
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Story
The Diary of Nobody (1892) created a cultural icon, an English archetype. Anxious, accident-prone, occasionally waspish, Charles Pooter has come to epitomize English suburban life. His diary chronicles encounters with difficult tradesmen, the delights of home improvements, small parties, minor embarrassments, and problems with his troublesome son. The suburban world he inhabits is hilariously and painfully familiar in its small-mindedness and its essential decency.
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Hilarious and Suprebly Read
- By Virginia Waldron on 10-15-08
By: George Grossmith, and others
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Jerry White's London in the Nineteenth Century is the richest and most absorbing account of the city's greatest century by its leading expert. London in the nineteenth century was the greatest city mankind had ever seen. Its growth was stupendous. Its wealth was dazzling. Its horrors shocked the world. This was the London of Blake, Thackeray and Mayhew, of Nash, Faraday and Disraeli. Most of all it was the London of Dickens. As William Blake put it, London was 'a Human awful wonder of God'.
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SO DETAILED..SO VERY VERY DETAILED.
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Interesting but gaps in info, narration difficult
- By redsrule1 on 01-11-15
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Like its popular and acclaimed predecessor, Restoration London, this book is the result of the author's passionate interest in the practical details of the everyday life of our ancestors, so often ignored in more conventional history books.
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charming
- By Panda Pandersson on 11-29-18
By: Liza Picard
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The Victorian City
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Judith Flanders, one of Britain's foremost social historians, explores the world portrayed so vividly in Dickens' novels, showing life on the streets of London in colorful, fascinating detail. From the moment Charles Dickens, the century's best-loved English novelist and London's greatest observer, arrived in the city in 1822, he obsessively walked its streets, recording its pleasures, curiosities, and cruelties.
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UNFORTUNATLY DISAPPOINTED, IS NOT INTERESTING
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Hard to Follow Along
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Brief, But Insightful
- By Troy on 07-17-13
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SO DETAILED..SO VERY VERY DETAILED.
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From the immense staff running a lavish Edwardian estate and the lonely maid-of-all-work cooking in a cramped middle-class house to the poor child doing chores in a slightly less poor household, servants were essential to the British way of life. They were hired not only for their skills but also to demonstrate the social standing of their employers - even as they were required to tread softly and blend into the background. More than simply the laboring class serving the upper crust - as popular culture would have us believe - they were a diverse group that shaped and witnessed major changes in the modern home, family, and social order.
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Interesting but gaps in info, narration difficult
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Dr. Johnson's London
- By: Liza Picard
- Narrated by: Fiona Shaw
- Length: 6 hrs and 25 mins
- Abridged
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Overall
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Performance
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charming
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By: Liza Picard
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Overall
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UNFORTUNATLY DISAPPOINTED, IS NOT INTERESTING
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What listeners say about Victorian London
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Simone
- 02-17-19
Very interesting!
This book had been on my “to read” shelf for almost 7 years! It was worth the wait.
Very interesting and informative.
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- ArianaAZ
- 05-09-24
A series of interesting facts and stories but somewhat disorganised
I quite enjoyed listening to the book because I am fascinated by Victorian history but the chapter structures were very loose - it often wasn’t obvious why the author had switched from one fact or story or another. One set of stories was clearly about education but, they appeared in a chapter with things that are only loosely related. The author also quoted things like how much it cost to rent an umbrella - but not when in the 30 year period the book covers. So it’s entertaining in that record but not useful as a reference. Still there is a lot of good information for my goals, researching a book about Victorian England and perhaps the sources are listed in the digital book? For an even better books about Victorian England, check out the works of a Judith Flanders.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Ryan Turner
- 01-13-21
Great book, terrible abridgement
The book itself is absolutely wonderful however, the abridgement has removed copious amounts of information and reduced this to a brief collection of ephemera. Do Liza Piard a favor and buy a physical copy to enjoy her wry asides and superb research, but for an audiobook look elsewhere unless you want a bare bones account of Victorian trivia. A real shame because the narration was excellent!
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4 people found this helpful
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- Newenglander18
- 04-06-19
Entertaining but not particularly insightful
This book is a whole series of tidbits about life in Victorian London and, in that regard, totally delivers on the promise of its title. But beyond that, there isn’t much depth in terms of scholarship or analysis. It’s entertaining, though, and Anton Lesser is enjoyable as a narrator.
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- Adeliese Baumann
- 05-27-18
Unforgettable journey into the past
This title was an accidental discovery: I found it while searching for something narrated by Anton Lesser. What a nice surprise to find the book is not only narrated beautifully, but well written, fascinating, and highly entertaining!
If you enjoy the minutiae of history, this is great stuff. Go ahead and double that if you're already familiar with London. Ms Picard brings the city to life in truly unforgettable detail. I've studied a lot of English history, but I've neglected the Victorian era in favor of other periods. This book reminded me how much reading I've yet to do. That's a real treat with this kind of history: it leads you onward to still more discoveries.
I know this is a sign of getting old, but I find myself more and more unable to deal with people whinging and moaning about absolutely nothing. I'd like to put every snowflake (and helicopter parent and anyone else lacking what used to be known as a backbone) into a room with this book and let them listen until they could consider their blessings.
I enjoyed it so much I picked up the other three titles offered by Ms Picard. If they are as good as this, I'll be in for a triple treat. I recommend it without hesitation.
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11 people found this helpful
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- James E. Lyon
- 11-13-22
Good but abridged
Excellent book, but it is sadly abridged. Anton Lesser is a wonderful narrator, however. Tentative recommendation despite the abridgment.
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- RC
- 04-21-19
Why abridged?
Author Liza Picard is great but why can't we get the whole of her book?
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8 people found this helpful