How the Irish Saved Civilization

Yes, the opening chapter or two is on the Roman world, and it's slow. Once you get past that (feel free to skip ahead), it's absolutely fascinating. He gives fascinating information on Ireland, Patrick, the monks who copied all the old books, Irish art, and the unique Irish perspective on life.

Worth every penny - once you get past the Roman intro. He does that to give a foundation, but the first time you listen to it, just skip it. Go back later and listen to it.

This is a quick review - interesting content...dreadful delivery. The narration was either very uneven or SOOOO SLOW and PONDEROUS that I quickly drifted off. Buy the book instead, unless you need a sleeping aid (for which I use this recording).

Very well read. You have to get used to the parts where he alters his voice to emphasize characters speaking, but then again, after a few hours even that turns out to be kind of humerous at times and quite enjoyable.

This is not a Fodor's guide to Ireland or even a day by day history of Ireland, it's an account of how the Irish monks saved history in written form (among other things.) While the world was burning all the books it could the Irish monastic leaders were collecting all the works of their neighboring world and translating (even transcribing) them for study and posterity. A society that was once nearly illiterate SAVED scores of written works! (Are you not with me here?) The stories of the Romans, Greeks and barbarians are necessary to understand just how (and why) the Irish managed to save the written texts and thus the history of a great deal of what is now Europe. Forget the negative reviews, for they are from people that wanted a history of Ireland and ordered the wrong book.

Not just the Irish - the entire medieval history is fair game for this meandering but intelligent and fun author. I listened to it at a faster speed to save time.

From my early school days this part of our history I always found drab and boring. The time of the Tuatha De Danan, St Patrick and the Celts were more about rocks and stones than people, but this book makes a difference. It is filled with fascinating characters, gives an intriguing background to stories such as the Táin Bó Chulainn etc. Donal Donnelly reads it well but sometimes lapses into stage Irish when quoting. Overall a rich and rewarding listen. Highly recommended.

Completely, totally rad, dude!!!! Awesome voices by the narrator. Always fun to hear a history from another perspective!

The reader is awful. Listening to the man try to pronounce Latin, or anything that requires an accent, is torturous. His pace is excrutiatingly slow. The content was fascinating but the guy who read it was horrible and took a lot of enjoyment out of this audiobook for me.

I found this to be extremely well written with an occasional condecending tone (not sure if it was implied by the reader or from the author, I'd have to listen to those sections again)when expressing a personal observation.
The reading was excellent and appropriate to the subject. It may not be the accustomed style, but worked well here.

If you expect to learn about the awesome history of the Irish clergy and the early history of the Irish people, try another book. This book seems to be a compilation of the author's lectures which range from Virgil onward. Very disappointing and not worth the time and money.

Love history but this book is too philosophical to satisfy my tastes. Cahill writes extensive passages about the works of some ancient writers, but the argument he tries to make get lost.

I thought this would be a book I'd rave about. You almost need cliff notes to understand what Cahill is means. He use Latin, Greek, Gallic to no effect. He also dives into the Toine which has about as much meaning to me as Beowulf.

That said there are sections of the book I found intriguing but many chapters that could serve as melatonin.

Okay. Many words not pronounced as American would. Many names of the ancient writes are not what Americans would recognize due to pronunciation.

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