Disapointing

This is a great book. However, it does not lend itself to an abridged version. Sure, you get the plot, but miss out on all the interesting philosophical sections. Debra Winger narrates the book. Her voice is rather monotonal and this book, a somewhat dark Russian novel filled with mostly male characters, really does not lend itself well to a female narrator. I truly wish an unabridge version was available, with the same narrator that does the unabridged version of Crime and Punishment (available from Audible). I downloaded Crime and Punishment just after listening to Brothers Karamazov and it was much more satisfying (from the standpoint of narrators voice and unabridged).

37 people found this helpful

Don't Buy This

What disappointed you about The Brothers Karamazov?

My goodness, that an actress could read so poorly and her director and editors let it pass is a big disappointment

And, I must have missed that it was an abridged version. Argh! Don't do this with the great classics

What was one of the most memorable moments of The Brothers Karamazov?

I had to stop listening

What didn’t you like about Debra Winger’s performance?

Wooden, mono-stress, one word at a time reading, not honoring comma pauses much less full stops.

Any additional comments?

Get a good reader and do an unabridged version. Thanks

19 people found this helpful

No Grand Inquisitor

Though abridged I'd have thought they would keep the Grand Inquisitor parable but it is missing. Disappointed in Debra Winger's performance which I thought was leaden.

6 people found this helpful

Very disappointed

This is the most disappointing purchase I've made from Audible. I'd hoped for a lively "refresher" after having read the full novel many years ago. But as others note, the abridgement just doesn't cut it. And the narration is particularly bad, slow and expressionless - puts me to sleep. Please don't let Ms. Winger try this again! There were some breaks where it seemed like the narrator was pausing for a drink of water or something.

6 people found this helpful

Too abridged, uneven performance

Eager to hear the 1990 translation by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky, I bought this abridgment. Debra Winger's performance was uneven. There were oddly long pauses, too. This newer translation is a great improvement, very natural. I hope Audible will produce an unabridged version.

3 people found this helpful

A better narration for the definitive English translation please

I’m not going to review the book. That would be ridiculous. The narration though deserves mention:

I’ve rarely heard one worse. It was (possibly literally) phoned in. It was lazy and emotionally dead and the narrator seemed not to have read the book before, let alone researched it in any way.

2 people found this helpful

Abridged

I wish I had known it was abridged before I got this. Very disappointing. Debra Winger is asked to do a major disservice to this. She succeeds.

2 people found this helpful

Get A Different Version

Obviously, It's a great book. It's a classic, the translation is beautiful as all of Pevear and Volokhonsky's translations are. However...

The performance alternates between overacted and totally flat which would be excusable if not for the poor sound quality.

It sounds like it was recorded in a bedroom with a dynamic mic and then EQ'd and compressed within in an inch of its life. The lo-fi "this is audible" mnemonic that precedes all Audible books, sounds better. You'll find yourself checking to see if your audio device is working during the many slightly too long pauses. You'll be jarred by the sloppy edits. This book shouldn't have passed QC. It's drastically worse than any other audible book I've ever downloaded.

That said, it's still a classic if you can get through the performance and recording.

1 person found this helpful

Useless

Only Pevear/Volokhonsky translation available, wish i had seen it was abridged before i bought it. Reading it for a class, so yeah, useless.

1 person found this helpful

Incomplete

I would have loved this audiobook had it actually been the book in it's entirely but a good deal of it was just skipped. At first it just seemed like a few sentences here and there were missed, but then I noticed some of the dialogue didn't make sense because a whole paragraph was missing from the middle of the conversation. This happens throughout the recording and unless you are reading along while listening you won't know what happened in the parts that are skipped. Because of that, this audiobook is practically useless to me.

1 person found this helpful