It's no Middlemarch

This is obviously a very well-written book and, awful as she is, I loved Gwendolen and was always engaged in her side of the story. She's a character who would be just as fascinating in a modern novel as a 19th century one. Grandcourt too is a brilliant character.

Daniel, unfortunately, was a lot less interesting and so were the somewhat 2 dimensional characters that populated his half of the story. The proto-Zionist theme is both over and under-developed somehow and doesn't seem to lend itself to Eliot's incredible psychological insight and empathy for humans in all their frailty. Mordecai is more like a symbol than a real character.

The reading was OK. I like that she didn't read too slow and that she attempted some accents. I couldn't help hearing some of the Jewish characters as South African though which didn't seem right!

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Great Except for Foreign Names

The book is brilliant. Let's leave George Eliot out of this.
The reader was very good. There are lots of characters and lots of different accents. She did a remarkable job. But she had two ways of pronouncing Mordechai, neither correct, which she she seemed to have randomly chosen between over and over again. Even if there are only 200,000 Jews in Britain, she might have found one and asked how to pronounce it. I know it is petty but it took me out of the story each time it happened.

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1 person found this helpful

George Eliot examines race, faith, fate and, as always, female behaviour.

I had not read this in a while so was listening to ‘find’ it again … and my first comment is that Nadia May read it in a way that was perfect for me, something in her tone seemed to fit George Eliot’s observing eye. There are two central female characters with Daniel Deronda standing between them. Gwendolen is first drawn to Daniel because he is not attracted to her, though ultimately he becomes drawn to her need, just as he was drawn to Mirah, trying to drown herself quietly in the Thames. Nothing about Gwendolen is quiet. I had forgotten how horrendous it is watching her manipulate others, even if there is also reason for pity. As always with Eliot there are small interesting characters to note: ghastly Mr Lush (half financial adviser and ‘fixer’, half spy), exotic music teachers, kind gentlewomen who work and support themselves so their son/brother can concentrate on his art (!), other devoted sisters, passionate Jews, cruel husbands, cast-off mistresses and a long-lost mother-princess. Yes, this book IS long but it is never boring. It is about self-acceptance and finding a path you care about, using any talent for good. Daniel himself, though he has his insecure and even huffy moments, knows himself. He also finds it impossible to resist the chance to help anyone. This is recommended if you are in the mood for something a little off the beaten track.

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Couldn’t get into it

The slightly grating tone of the narrator didn’t help as I tried in vain to get into the story. It just didn’t capture my attention and after an hour and a half I called it a day.

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Brilliant!

This was a wonderful, thought-provoking novel. Well read and paced. Made my summer a delight!

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1 person found this helpful

An Eliot classic but unfortunately poor narration

This is a classic and one of Eliot's best, although the sub plot of the plight of the Jews in Europe can seem a little indulgent and tangential to many devotees of Eliot but its always worth persevering through that for the exquisite literature of Eliot alone and it does provide an essential, if rather long and exhausting, foundation for the final reveal.

My problem with this version is the narrator; Nadia May, who has an unfortunately grating and somewhat didactic tone that makes it difficult to enjoy the literature. ( A reminder of boring English lit classes at school with the teacher droning on indifferent to the class who are already looking out of the window, sleeping or doing other things.)
Nadia also speaks way too fast to digest all the characters and the setting and in a somewhat monotonous way that makes it difficult to concentrate on what is already a challenging read.
I'm afraid I found myself drifting off and not listening many times and having to go back and listen again.

Works of great 19th century literature need a narrator who can flow with and meld into the literature, so that you are no longer aware that there's a narrato at all. This requires a slow, clear, crisp and pleasing diction and variable expressive intonations at the right times to adapt to the emotion of the story.

This needs Juliet Stephenson to tackle it.

Thankfully there are other versions available on Audible with better narrators.

You get what you pay for.

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An audible treat!

It was very well read, the different characters voices were believable, good stirring story.

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A WONDERFUL CHALLENGE

Eliot's final novel is a wonderfully challenging read because the book's enormous strengths and its weaknesses are here in abundance, waiting for the Reader to discriminate between what works and what fails to work and why exactly. It is no "Middlemarch": Eliot is exploring the lives of a very limited and pretty repulsive social class with little to endear them and the main protagonist is a sort of Rosamond Vincey mark two: an egotistical airhead with beauty but a self-destructively selfish, narcissistic outlook. it's like reading about Macbeth or Coriolanus her tragedy is presented at arm's length. Few people will empathise with Gwen Harlech. Deronda too is a difficult man to admire unconditionally. There are very few jokes. But many of the minor characters: Klesmer, Sir Hugo and Frans, Caroline Arrowhead and her parents are masterpieces in miniature.

The huge flaw is Eliot's Zionist fantasy and the two dimensional characters she generates to explore that unfortunate theme.

But some of the writing contains the most penetrating psychological analysis to be found in any modern novel. And we feel we are in the company of a powerful and fascinating creative mind. The book is even better second and third time through.

Nadia May's is a superb and intelligent reading but Juliet Stevenson's on Naxos is even finer! She takes more time, has an even better ear for characters and crucially we get translations of the important epigraphs in French and German. The silly little Audible voice at the end asking if we've enjoyed the show is particularly irritating!

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worth listening to

I was surprised to find, when I checked, that this book had only been rated with two stars, as I actually found it very rewarding. There were some difficult bits in it (theories concerning Jewish ideas in the 19 century etc) which I'm afraid did tend to go in one ear and out the other, but the theme of the book in general was, I thought, very powerful. Despite the fact that it was written about 130 years ago, some of the characters experienced thoughts and emotions which wouldn't have been out of place in a modern novel, and although obviously the story can't help being dated, it is no less absorbing for that.

I would have struggled to get through a novel of this size in book form, and I am glad to have had the opportunity to discover it this way instead - any effort I had to make was definitely rewarded.

My only real quibble is that the reader seemed to have trouble in being consistent with her pronunciation of the name 'Mordecai', which she kept varying rather irritatingly, sometimes even in the same phrase. However, other than that I thought she read it with expression and I found it a reasonable quality.

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15 people found this helpful

Lovely listen

Written before women had equality and rights. I enjoyed every thing about this story. Informative and educational.

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