-
The Secret Agent
- Narrated by: Peter Joyce
- Length: 11 hrs and 44 mins
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $19.63
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
Publisher's summary
Inspired by an actual terrorist attack on Greenwich Laboratory in 1894 ‘The Secret Agent’ is arguably Conrad’s greatest work. Mr. Verloc, the spy, is roused to action by his masters. He is to instigate an act ‘of destructive ferocity so absurd as to be incomprehensible, inexplicable, almost unthinkable; in fact, mad’. All does not run smoothly however and leads to Mr Verloc’s wife, Winnie, demonstrating how quickly rational equilibrium can change to frenzied destruction. Setting his story in a subterranean grimy London peopled by deceptive, dishonourable characters, Conrad not only reminds us of the futility of mindless aggression but also of how near it is to the surface of human behaviour.
Critic reviews
About Assembled Stories: Over the years the national press have reviewed Assembled Stories titles as "excellent", "remarkable", "entrancing", "superb", "magic for sure", "masterly", "wonderful", "a class act" and "a splendid example of audio at its best".
More from the same
Related to this topic
-
Victory
- By: Joseph Conrad
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 13 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From one of the greatest modern writers in world literature comes a magnificent story of love, adventure, and rescue played out against the shimmering South Seas. Alone on a tropical island, a Swedish baron and a beautiful violinist discover the long-lost joys of love. But when two treasure hunters arrive on the beach, the lovers know that evil has invaded their romantic paradise—an evil they are powerless to stop.
-
-
Beautiful, sad and powerful
- By Darwin8u on 01-20-13
By: Joseph Conrad
-
Anna of the Five Towns
- By: Arnold Bennett
- Narrated by: Peter Joyce
- Length: 9 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set in stifled, industrial Staffordshire in the late 19th century, against a strong evangelical background, Anna of the Five Towns tells of the courting of hard businessman Ephraim Tellright's daughter by prosperous and accomplished Henry Mynors. As her father's fortune grows, so does Anna understanding. She realises her legacy and responsibility for the possible ruination of her father's tenants, Titus Price and his son, Willie, who also loves her.
By: Arnold Bennett
-
Dombey and Son
- By: Charles Dickens
- Narrated by: Frederick Davidson
- Length: 36 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this carefully crafted novel, Dickens reveals the complexity of London society in the enterprising 1840s as he takes the listener into the business firm and home of one of its most representative patriarchs, Paul Dombey.
-
-
Perfect pair
- By Philip on 03-25-08
By: Charles Dickens
-
The Lost World (AmazonClassics Edition)
- By: Arthur Conan Doyle
- Narrated by: Gary Furlong
- Length: 7 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
There’s only one way for Professor George Edward Challenger to prove that dinosaurs still roam the earth. He invites skeptical journalist Edward Malone to accompany him and a group of adventurers to see the creatures with his own eyes. But when they arrive at the fantastic volcanic plateau in the Amazon where time stands still, their expedition quickly becomes one of survival. With its cliff-hanging escapes, rousing humor, and nailbiting suspense, The Lost World is a pioneering work of fantasy-adventure that paved the way for every thrill ride to follow.
-
-
Wonderful book!
- By Arron on 03-07-21
-
The Best Ghost Stories Ever Told
- Best Stories Ever Told
- By: Stephen Brennan - editor
- Narrated by: J. M. Badger, Imelda Pot
- Length: 24 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A big, brilliant, spooky collection of classic and contemporary ghost stories that will make you hesitate before turning off that light.
-
-
A very mixed review
- By Michael Mayer on 08-05-15
-
The Scarlet Pimpernel
- By: Baroness Orczy
- Narrated by: Mary Sarah
- Length: 7 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set during the Reign of Terror following the start of the French Revolution... The title character represents the original "hero with a secret identity" that inspired subsequent literary creations such as Don Diego de la Vega (El Zorro) and Bruce Wayne (the Batman). The popularity of the novel encouraged Orczy to write a number of sequels for her "reckless daredevil" over the next 35 years. The original play was performed to great acclaim in France, Italy, Germany, and Spain, while the novel was translated into 16 languages.
-
-
This version does not do the novel justice!
- By Wayne on 12-04-18
By: Baroness Orczy
-
Victory
- By: Joseph Conrad
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 13 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From one of the greatest modern writers in world literature comes a magnificent story of love, adventure, and rescue played out against the shimmering South Seas. Alone on a tropical island, a Swedish baron and a beautiful violinist discover the long-lost joys of love. But when two treasure hunters arrive on the beach, the lovers know that evil has invaded their romantic paradise—an evil they are powerless to stop.
-
-
Beautiful, sad and powerful
- By Darwin8u on 01-20-13
By: Joseph Conrad
-
Anna of the Five Towns
- By: Arnold Bennett
- Narrated by: Peter Joyce
- Length: 9 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set in stifled, industrial Staffordshire in the late 19th century, against a strong evangelical background, Anna of the Five Towns tells of the courting of hard businessman Ephraim Tellright's daughter by prosperous and accomplished Henry Mynors. As her father's fortune grows, so does Anna understanding. She realises her legacy and responsibility for the possible ruination of her father's tenants, Titus Price and his son, Willie, who also loves her.
By: Arnold Bennett
-
Dombey and Son
- By: Charles Dickens
- Narrated by: Frederick Davidson
- Length: 36 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this carefully crafted novel, Dickens reveals the complexity of London society in the enterprising 1840s as he takes the listener into the business firm and home of one of its most representative patriarchs, Paul Dombey.
-
-
Perfect pair
- By Philip on 03-25-08
By: Charles Dickens
-
The Lost World (AmazonClassics Edition)
- By: Arthur Conan Doyle
- Narrated by: Gary Furlong
- Length: 7 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
There’s only one way for Professor George Edward Challenger to prove that dinosaurs still roam the earth. He invites skeptical journalist Edward Malone to accompany him and a group of adventurers to see the creatures with his own eyes. But when they arrive at the fantastic volcanic plateau in the Amazon where time stands still, their expedition quickly becomes one of survival. With its cliff-hanging escapes, rousing humor, and nailbiting suspense, The Lost World is a pioneering work of fantasy-adventure that paved the way for every thrill ride to follow.
-
-
Wonderful book!
- By Arron on 03-07-21
-
The Best Ghost Stories Ever Told
- Best Stories Ever Told
- By: Stephen Brennan - editor
- Narrated by: J. M. Badger, Imelda Pot
- Length: 24 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A big, brilliant, spooky collection of classic and contemporary ghost stories that will make you hesitate before turning off that light.
-
-
A very mixed review
- By Michael Mayer on 08-05-15
-
The Scarlet Pimpernel
- By: Baroness Orczy
- Narrated by: Mary Sarah
- Length: 7 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set during the Reign of Terror following the start of the French Revolution... The title character represents the original "hero with a secret identity" that inspired subsequent literary creations such as Don Diego de la Vega (El Zorro) and Bruce Wayne (the Batman). The popularity of the novel encouraged Orczy to write a number of sequels for her "reckless daredevil" over the next 35 years. The original play was performed to great acclaim in France, Italy, Germany, and Spain, while the novel was translated into 16 languages.
-
-
This version does not do the novel justice!
- By Wayne on 12-04-18
By: Baroness Orczy
-
The Cater Street Hangman
- By: Anne Perry
- Narrated by: Davina Porter
- Length: 10 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When a maid in the upper class Ellison household is strangled, Inspector Pitt is called in to investigate. He finds a world ruled by strict manners and social customs, where the inhabitants of the Ellison's neighborhood appear to be more outraged by the thought of scandal than they are by murder. Inspector Pitt finds a most unlikely ally in Charlotte, the Ellison's spirited daughter. But as the murders continue, Charlotte and Pitt find themselves drawn together by more than the investigation.
-
-
I really like this book but it's not for everone
- By Ancient Warrior on 03-14-11
By: Anne Perry
-
Piccadilly Jim
- By: P. G. Wodehouse
- Narrated by: Frederick Davidson
- Length: 8 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
He was a gossip columnist’s dream. Piccadilly Jim’s life was a collage of broken promises and drunken brawls. And his straight-laced Victorian aunt was not amused. So, she decided to reform him. Unfortunately, her reform project started at a time when Jim had fallen in love and had already decided to reform himself. Thus, life became complicated. Jim pretends to be himself - a beautiful display of Wodehousean logic; hilarious indeed!
-
-
Glad to Finally Have Frederick Davidson’s Version
- By John on 11-09-22
By: P. G. Wodehouse
-
The Secret Adversary & N or M?
- Two Bestselling Agatha Christie Novels in One Great Audiobook
- By: Agatha Christie
- Narrated by: Hugh Fraser
- Length: 13 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Tommy and Tuppence are young, in love… and flat broke. Restless for excitement, they decide to embark on a daring business scheme: Young Adventurers Ltd.—"willing to do anything, go anywhere." But they get more than they bargained for when their first assignment for the sinister Mr. Whittington draws them into a diabolical conspiracy. It isn’t long before they find themselves plunged into more danger than they ever could have imagined.
-
-
Hugh Fraser is great!
- By Cheryl McInerney on 09-06-22
By: Agatha Christie
-
The Metamorphosis and Other Stories
- By: Franz Kafka
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 8 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the bizarre world of Franz Kafka, salesmen turn into giant bugs, apes give lectures at college academies, and nightmares probe the mysteries of modern humanity’s unhappiness. More than any other modern writer in world literature, Kafka captures the loneliness and misery that fill the lives of 20th-century humanity.
-
-
Great assortment of stories
- By Himanshu Modi on 08-20-18
By: Franz Kafka
-
Jude The Obscure
- By: Thomas Hardy
- Narrated by: Stephen Thorne
- Length: 15 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This is the story of a young country workman obsessed by his ambition to become an Oxford student, interwoven with his fraught relationships with two women.
-
-
Staggering
- By Tad Davis on 02-16-10
By: Thomas Hardy
-
The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Other Tales of Terror
- By: Robert Louis Stevenson
- Narrated by: Michael Kitchen
- Length: 5 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This dark psychological fantasy is more than a moral tale. It is also a product of its time, drawing on contemporary theories of class, evolution and criminality, and the secret lives behind Victorian propriety, to create a unique form of urban Gothic.
-
-
The Dark Human Heart
- By Jefferson on 01-30-11
-
Mrs. Osmond
- A Novel
- By: John Banville
- Narrated by: Amy Finegan
- Length: 12 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Isabel Archer is a young American woman swept off to Europe in the late 19th century by an aunt who hopes to round out the impetuous but naïve girl's experience of the world. When Isabel comes into a large, unexpected inheritance, she is finagled into a marriage with the charming, penniless, and - as Isabel finds out too late - cruel and deceitful Gilbert Osmond, whose connection to a certain Madame Merle is suspiciously intimate.
-
-
Clever Continuation of Henry James
- By Fate_D on 03-18-18
By: John Banville
-
Lady Audley's Secret
- By: Mary Elizabeth Braddon
- Narrated by: Olivia Poulet
- Length: 13 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From the author of The Christmas Hirelings comes this Audible Exclusive production of Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s classic sensation novel Lady Audley’s Secret. English actress Olivia Poulet gives an assured and captivating narration; a cornerstone of the genre and a scandal at the time of its publication, Lady Audley’s Secret is an entertaining and shocking tale of high drama and shifting perceptions.
-
-
Classic 19th Century “sensation novel”
- By Susan on 08-20-19
-
Nostromo
- By: Joseph Conrad
- Narrated by: Frank Muller
- Length: 16 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
One of the great adventure novels of our language creates a most engaging central character, Nostromo. A picturesque man of action and popular hero, Nostromo lives to be "well-spoken of" by the citizens of Costaguana, the mythical South American banana republic where the story takes place. Around this figure, Conrad spins a story of revolution, politics, and racial conflict as complex as Nostromo, the man whose greatest enemy is himself.
-
-
Wow!
- By Amazon Customer on 07-11-03
By: Joseph Conrad
-
Crime and Punishment
- By: Fyodor Dostoyevsky
- Narrated by: Constantine Gregory
- Length: 22 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A century after it first appeared, Crime and Punishment remains one of the most gripping psychological thrillers. A poverty-stricken young man, seeing his family making sacrifices for him, is faced with an opportunity to solve his financial problems with one simple but horrifying act: the murder of a pawnbroker. She is, he feels, just a parasite on society. But does the end justify the means? Rodion Romanovitch Raskolnikov makes his decision and then has to live with it.
-
-
A masterpiece
- By Timothy on 02-20-16
-
Beware of Pity
- By: Stefan Zweig
- Narrated by: Nicholas Boulton
- Length: 14 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the twilight of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, a young cavalry officer is invited to a dance at the home of a rich landowner. There - with a small act of attempted charity - he commits a simple faux pas. But from this seemingly insignificant blunder comes a tale of catastrophe arising from kindness and of honour poisoned by self-regard. Beware of Pity has all the intensity and the formidable sense of torment and of character of the very best of Zweig's work. Definitive translation by the award-winning Anthea Bell.
-
-
One of my favorite authors
- By Adeliese Baumann on 03-21-18
By: Stefan Zweig
-
The Shuttle
- By: Frances Hodgson Burnett
- Narrated by: Tabi That
- Length: 19 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Rosalie Vanderpoel, the daughter of an American multimillionaire marries an impoverished English baronet and goes to live in England. She all but loses contact with her family in America. Years later her younger sister Bettina, beautiful, intelligent and extremely rich, goes to England to find what has happened to her sister. She finds Rosalie shabby and dispirited, cowed by her husband's ill-treatment. Bettina sets about to rectify matters.
-
-
More than Lovely
- By jTacy67 on 01-17-18
What listeners say about The Secret Agent
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Ann Edwards
- 12-15-12
Slow and confusing
What did you like best about The Secret Agent? What did you like least?
The Secret Agent is because I was assigned this for an English class. I had planned to use this as a way to reference back to it when I finally wrote the paper. My main complaint about this audio book is that the chapters do not match the book. This made it useless as a reference.
Would you be willing to try another book from Joseph Conrad? Why or why not?
I would not try another if it is set up in the same format.
What does Peter Joyce bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?
Peter Joyce did a good job in his performance.
If this book were a movie would you go see it?
I have seen the movie adaptation of this book. I enjoyed the book more than the movie.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- alex sullivan
- 05-27-16
Dont waste a credit
I heard this was a classic spy novel bit I was hesitant to commit due to the mixed reviews. Perhaps the printed version is a better experience, but the audio version is hard to tolerate; its the first audiobook I did not finish.
The story seems to jump around to the point of confusion. The author writes almost in a victorian style of incessant description of mundane details. Major plot points seem to be rushed and its very difficult to stay engaged in a plot that has much promise.
The Day of the Jackal is a much better rendition of a turn-of-the-Century espionage. And Woman in White far surpasses The Secret Agent in a suspenseful period piece.
The narration was adequate. I don't want to blame the performance for what may have been a writing or editing flaw. Voices were distinguishable and the tempo and inflection carried things along. Alas, the narration was not enough to prop up the overall experience.
I'm very sad to say this was the most frustrating audiobook and I regret having it on my wish list for so long. Save your credit and find a more fulfilling book.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!