A Diary from Dixie

By: Mary Chesnut

Narrated by: Mary Baker

This is the original diary of the wife of Confederate General James Chesnut, Jr., who was an aide to President Jefferson Davis. It is a fascinating narrative of all the years of the American Civil War. It focuses on the daily lives and hardships of all who suffered through the war, from ordinary people to the Confederacy's generals and political elite.

Mary Chesnut's prose has lost none of its provocative bite through the ages: "I think incompatibility of temper began when it was made plain to us that we get all the opprobrium of slavery while they, with their tariff, get the money there is in it." Nor any of its ironic sense of humor: "We try our soldiers to see if they are hot enough before we enlist them. If, when water is thrown on them they do not sizzle, they won’t do; their patriotism is too cool."©2017 Audioliterature (P)2017 Audioliterature

Bad narration

The book contains some interesting perspective from a southern woman’s point of view. However the narration is hard to listen to for very long. I wish this book had been done with a professional narrator

Must read—unique view of Antebellum, bellum & post bellum Southern life

A students of the Civil War, I highly recommend this book. Nowhere else is captured the trials, sentiments, & intimate insight to Southern life in the late 1850s and early 1860s. The annotations wrt the prominent military & government figures as well as battles is masterfully woven into the diary.

No other Civil War account covers the ground that this one does.

What’s missing? More perspectives of the poor black & white people during this time. Mary Chestnut was the wife of a senator and confederate officer which must be remembered as she gives her thoughts & assessments of the time. Even so, this is a must read if you endeavor to understand the American Civil War & its aftermath which is still felt today in the groundwater of the nation.

lots of hype in history class

This is was supremely boring and uninsightful. There is another book called "Notes from A Georgia Plantation" written by a white woman who married the master of the plantation. THAT one BLEW my mind. This is about a boring dowdy woman married to high ranking military officer going to balls in the capitol of the confederacy while the nameless faceless common soldiers fight a the war. Nothing interesting except for a single quip about who the fathers of the slave children often are...the plantation owners. One compound sentence about the behavior of her neighbor's husbands. Its 90% "we're going on a carriage ride" no insight, no drama, no lessons. Just "we're going to a ball and I'm going to write a letter about good manners."

One of the best books on the Civil War.

A gerat birds eye view, even if it's from a Confederate's POV. An extremely well done take on life in the South during those times. A must-have for fans of history of the American Civil War.

Great insight!

A very interesting perspective on the Civil War. I live by Natchez, MS that still has hundreds of antebellum homes. As I pass by I always wonder about the lives led in the years past in those beautiful homes.

Favorite book

Love the story and the narrator! I like that her voice is without emotion. It makes it soothing

I cannot recommend it

This is a book that is better read, then listened to. The emotionless droning of the narrator’s voice is like a fly or mosquito that keeps hovering by your ear on a hot day. It is ceaseless, pitiless, and just goes on and on and won’t stop. I remember very clearly the woman’s voice that narrated brief excerpts from this diary in the Ken Burns documentary on the Civil War. That voice was deep, mellifluous and seemed to speak for the entire Civil War experience of a class of gentlewoman born and bred under the peculiar institution. This narrator sounds like an unjustly peeved school marm. The diary is fascinating when read, a Bataan Death March when listened to.