Babel

Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators’ Revolution

By: R. F. Kuang

Narrated by: Chris Lew Kum Hoi, Billie Fulford-Brown

Length: 21 hrs and 45 mins

Publisher's summary

THE #2 SUNDAY TIMES AND #1 NYT BESTSELLER

Traduttore, traditore: An act of translation is always an act of betrayal.

Oxford, 1836.

The city of dreaming spires.

It is the centre of all knowledge and progress in the world.

And at its centre is Babel, the Royal Institute of Translation. The tower from which all the power of the Empire flows.

Orphaned in Canton and brought to England by a mysterious guardian, Babel seemed like paradise to Robin Swift.

Until it became a prison…

But can a student stand against an empire?

An incendiary novel from award-winning author R. F. Kuang about the power of language, the violence of colonialism, and the sacrifices of resistance.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2022 R.F. Kuang (P)2022 HarperCollins Publishers Limited

Critic reviews

"Kuang has crafted a masterpiece that resonates with power and knowledge. Babel is a stark picture of the cruelty of empire, a distillation of dark academia, and a riveting blend of fantasy and historical fiction – a monumental achievement, from the footnotes to the final page." (Samantha Shannon, author of Priory of The Orange Tree)

"Ambitious, sweeping and epic." (Evening Standard)

"An ingenious fantasy about empire’." (Guardian)

An interesting, exciting book

WOW! What an amazing story. It has a unique magic system that is super cool. Read this if you like learning things while being entertained.

Glorious, well researched, fascinating

Never thought that languages and our ability to verbalise plays such an integral role in our civilizatiom status and power. Our ability to be tolerant and think critically linked to our ancestry and prejudices. Excellant.

Wonderful story, strange performance

The story is gripping and won’t let you go until you finish the book!
But keep in mind that naration is not the best one as some words or phrazes are taked over during edition probably. But I got used to it quite quickly and just allowed the story to overwhelm me

Slow start but oh was it worth it

I don’t think i would have gotten through half of the book manually but as an audiobook it went swimmingly and all the setup and worldbuilding was worth it in the end. The story really sped up after the halfway point and i was on the edge of my seat for the whole end of it after that!

Simply brilliant!

Honestly, I’m still trying to process this book. So, this short review is post-listening emotions. Forgive me, I’m still raw.

Kuang masterfully paints a portrait of language, power and revolution in a fictionalized version of Oxford University, that grips the reader from chapter one and leaves their hearts asunder by the close of the epilogue. In this, we set on a journey through Robin’s eyes and close it through those of Victoire’s and in between one is made to care, love, empathize, hate and understand the other dominant voices in this story. This is true storytelling. The kind yearned but rarely given. Kuang tells a story that any marginalized voice can listen to and relate with because she does what so few authors can do: she tells stories relatable to a large audience. An audience that the very classics quoted within, fail to reach. This book is marvelous. This book is intelligent, masterfully written. This book is devastating! I will be purchasing a copy because I need to relive all of this with pencil, ruler and highlighter in hand.

I would love to say that this book had wide appeal, but it may bore those who care not for etymology or infuriate others who fail to see perspectives other than their own. Therefore, I’d recommend this to the reader who is marginalized by things they can’t change. This book, is for us. You and I.

Wonderful combined voices to emphasise the languages

The audible is great because you hear the sounds of the language and I really enjoyed all the footnotes being read in a different voice it was excellent

Poor narration and disappointing writing

The novel has a fascinating premise but is disappointingly executed with one dimensional characters and the moral questions at its centre are dealt with without nuance or depth. The narration is distracting: many mispronunciations and glitchy editing

Expected better; a plot full of holes and choppy narration

I listened to the whole book but couldn’t wait for it to be over.

There’s an issue with the narration, where the narrator has mispronounced things and they’ve patched in another take to fix them, but not matched the microphone/recording so words here and there stick out like a sore thumb.

Then there’s the book itself. It’s very virtue-signally and preachy, with one-dimensional characters and a plot so full of holes it could be used as a jacket for a millipede. I was really looking forward to this book, and was really surprised by how poorly it was constructed.

I recommend saving the credit and using it on something better.