Crime and Punishment
-
- $12.99
-
- $12.99
Publisher Description
Brought to you by Penguin.
This Penguin Classic is performed by Don Warrington, known for his roles in Death in Paradise and The Five as well as his multiple Shakespearean performances. This definitive recording includes an Introduction by Oliver Ready.
'A truly great translation . . . This English version really is better' - A. N. Wilson, The Spectator
TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2014
This acclaimed new translation of Dostoyevsky's 'psychological record of a crime' gives his dark masterpiece of murder and pursuit a renewed vitality, expressing its jagged, staccato urgency and fevered atmosphere as never before. Raskolnikov, a destitute and desperate former student, wanders alone through the slums of St. Petersburg, deliriously imagining himself above society's laws. But when he commits a random murder, only suffering ensues. Embarking on a dangerous game of cat and mouse with a suspicious police investigator, Raskolnikov finds the noose of his own guilt tightening around his neck. Only Sonya, a downtrodden prostitute, can offer the chance of redemption.
Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821-1881) was born in Moscow and made his name in 1846 with the novella Poor Folk. He spent several years in prison in Siberia as a result of his political activities, an experience which formed the basis of The House of the Dead. In later life, he fell in love with a much younger woman and developed a ruinous passion for roulette. His subsequent great novels include Notes from Underground, Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, Demons and The Brothers Karamazov.
Oliver Ready is Research Fellow in Russian Society and Culture at St Antony's College, Oxford. He is general editor of the anthology, The Ties of Blood: Russian Literature from the 21st Century (2008), and Consultant Editor for Russia, Central and Eastern Europe at the Times Literary Supplement.
Translation copyright (c) Oliver Ready 2014 (P) Penguin Audio 2020
Customer Reviews
Brilliant book
The books speaks for itself. The Narration, however, is another matter. I’ll start by saying I loved it!
But it was a journey to be sure. It starts of difficult to hear and understand. Then it gets clearer as you warm up to the style and the pacing. Then his voice makes more sense, the roughness, the tone, the cackles, the coarseness, the darkness of it.
Finally, it becomes inseparable from the book itself! Not so much taking on a life of its own, as it is breathing life into the story and its characters.
I can hardly imagine another voice for it now, they all seem so stupid anyway! And I tried, to be sure!
Awful audio
The narrators accent is distorted, therefore muffling words and making it difficult to read this classic.