A Tale of Two Cities [Tantor]

De: Charles Dickens

Narrado por: Simon Vance

This novel provides a highly charged examination of human suffering and human sacrifice, private experience and public history, during the French Revolution.

A Tale of Two Cities is one of Charles Dickens's most exciting novels. Set against the backdrop of the French Revolution, it tells the story of a family threatened by the terrible events of the past. Doctor Manette was wrongly imprisoned in the Bastille for 18 years without trial by the aristocratic authorities. Finally released, he is reunited with his daughter, Lucie, who despite her French ancestry has been brought up in London. Lucie falls in love with Charles Darnay, another expatriate, who has abandoned wealth and a title in France because of his political convictions. When revolution breaks out in Paris, Darnay returns to the city to help an old family servant, but there he is arrested because of the crimes committed by his relations. His wife, Lucie, their young daughter, and her aged father follow him across the channel, thus putting all their lives in danger.

Public Domain (P)2008 Tantor

Reseñas de la Crítica

Charles Dickens's classic of the French Revolution is expertly dramatized by Simon Vance. It's also a grand romance. Charles Darnay, the French émigré who relinquishes his title in disgust at the poverty wrought upon the peasants by the titled class, and Sydney Carton, the world-weary drunken London barrister, both love Lucie, the daughter of the unjustly imprisoned Dr. Alexandre Manette. Vance will have listeners weeping as Carton greets Madame Guillotine with some of the most famous lines in literature. Carton's depression and ultimate redemption are crystal clear; Madame Defarge, with her clicking knitting needles, takes on appropriate menace; and Jarvis Lorry, the reliable "man of business," loves Lucie as if she were his daughter." (AudioFile magazine)

Bittersweet Tale

If you could sum up A Tale of Two Cities in three words, what would they be?

Grim historical time. I'm past the half-century mark and read this in high school...didn't remember it at all except that I didn't do so well on my book report! I am living in Paris for a few years so I have been trying to listen to some European classics. I just didn't realize/appreciate the gravity of the French Revolution until I came to live here. As an American, I just don't have much appreciation for world history...I'm getting some! The opening lines of this novel are iconic...they are familiar even to me...if I was a contestant on Jeopardy I would not have put Dicken's poetry with this tale...I feel so much better prepared now for any future contests. The narration is outstanding. I tend to favor male narrators as I find very few women's voices do justice to male roles, and this novel is dominated by male characters. As with the few books I have read placed in this time period, it is a tale full of extreme sadness...at times...hopelessness. To my limited view, it captures the terror of the French revolution all too well. If time travel becomes possible at some point, avoid Paris during the French revolution because no one was safe from Madame Guillotine.Dickens is able to take a sad storyline and somewhat give us a happy ending. If you are a fan of Dickens, this is definitely a story you will want to hear as he takes this time in history and creates a timeless tale.

The Master Weaver

The genius of Charles Dickens is, in my opinion, most poignantly evident in the mastery with which he weaves ornate tapestries of plotlines like colored thread and the majestic soul of the embroidered product. When reading Dickens, I feel as though I am watching the master draw forth here a thread of one color and there one of quite another that often seems discordant or at least out of place. However, as the inevitability and profound beauty of first the pattern, then the picture, and finally the panorama dawns, one cannot but help rejoicing in the author’s brilliant and steady hands.

As is true of all great artists, authors, and composers, it is not merely the technical prowess that is honored by posterity, for many may possess it, but rather the soul which it so faithfully preserves. The abilities of Dickens as a writer need not be mentioned, for they are plain enough. While it is easy to lose oneself in the delicate balance and aesthetic perfection of Dickens’ stories, the sooner one moves on from this revery and instead reflects upon the silent impact made in their own heart, the sooner they will begin knowing something about Charles Dickens.

This impact is unabashedly and undeniably of a spiritual, and primarily of a Christian nature. Convinced secular minds can certainly appreciate the literary talent but, by their very commitment to secularity, will remain unequal to the task of penetrating the most moving innermost themes in this and other novels by Dickens. Either these themes are vacuous drivel or eternal truths. This is no forum for philosophical debate but this is the crossroads all readers must navigate when reading authors of spiritual conviction.

This book, or shall I say, Charles Dickens himself is worthy of your time and attention. The wisdom he imparts, especially through the character of Sydney Carton, will forever change an open heart.

If you haven't read it since high school...

It's been decades since I read this book, and honestly, it had become conflated in my memory with all the other books, movies and biographies I have read from the time of the French Revolution. Literary types will tell you this is not 'Dicken's best work'-- but it's darn good... and though completely predictable it's worth revisiting if you haven't read it as an adult.

I am addicted

Would you listen to A Tale of Two Cities again? Why?

Very well written. Love the narrator's voice. It took me 300 years back so softly and without knowing I am deep drowned in the story.

What was one of the most memorable moments of A Tale of Two Cities?

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Which character – as performed by Simon Vance – was your favorite?

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Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

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Any additional comments?

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Incredibly inspiring tale & performance

Incredibly inspiring tale & performance! Worth every minute - only wish it were longer! Dickens is a master storyteller, and the very talented cast brought his masterpiece to life!