The Metropolis

By: Upton Sinclair

Narrated by: Peter Lerman

Length: 10 hrs and 24 mins

Publisher's summary

Published in 1908 and available as an audiobook for the very first time.

In The Metropolis, the muck-raking author of The Jungle and the tireless social justice warrior Upton Sinclair uses a fictional tale to expose the excesses and decadence of Gilded Age Society in New York City in the early 20th Century.

The audiobook is produced and narrated by Audiofile Magazine Earphones Award-winning narrator Peter Lerman. He has also narrated three other books by Sinclair.

Our protagonist comes to New York as a lawyer seeking to make his name and build a career. His younger brother has come before him and has already been successful in working his way into the inner circles of the High Society. The younger brother introduces him to the moguls with their extraordinary fortunes, amassed by owners of the Trusts, the Monopolies, the Banks, and the Financiers. With all the money in the world has come all the power. And, with all the money and the power has come the grotesque excess and the decadence and the moral rot.

The working people who are building the palaces, making the fine clothing, cooking, and serving the banquets, are relegated to slums and tenements. The impoverished coal miners, lumberjacks, railroad workers, factory workers, etc., are the collateral damage created by the accumulation of this vast wealth in the hands of the few...who never even see their faces. Who barely know they exist.

Public Domain (P)2021 Peter Lerman

A Very Good, Not Great Novel, Very Well Read

The story is a sort of morality story about New York City during the so called gilded age. There are descriptions of decadence and excessive spending. Be prepared for some dated ethnic stereotypes and nomenclature. I liked the novel but was not completely enthralled by it.

I am very happy to have read this novel. It was published around 1908 and follows the more celebrated, “The Jungle”. The book is fairly straightforward and not overly ornate and therefore makes a good candidate for an audiobook. The narration by Peter Lerman is very satisfactory, I read and listened simultaneously and the narration is very faithful to my copy of the novel.

I feel gaslit

Awards and accolades abound on this vocal performance. But, truly, it sounds like a prototype AI is haltingly attempting to render Sinclair’s matter-of-fact prose into human speech.

No character differentiation, no emotive expression, and barely a thought given to punctuation, I think this might be the single worst narration I’ve ever heard.

I have no idea where the awards are coming from, but this book is only worth pushing through if you’re committed to 100%-completing the works of Upton Sinclair.