Leviathan

By: Thomas Hobbes

Narrated by: Philip Stevens

Brought to you by Penguin.

This Penguin Classic is performed by Philip Stevens. This definitive recording includes an introduction by Christopher Brooke.

Thomas Hobbes lived through the Thirty Years War and Britain's civil wars, and the trauma of these events led to his great masterpiece of political thought. How could humankind rescue itself from life in the natural state, which was 'poor, nasty, brutish and short'? What form of politics would provide the security that he and his contemporaries craved?

Vilified and scorned from the moment it was published, Leviathan was publicly burnt for sedition, but ever since it has exercised a unique fascination upon its readers, both for its ideas and its remarkable prose. Its concepts helped to drag Europe into a new world - one in which we still live today.

© Christopher Brooke 2017 (P) Penguin Audio 2021

An insightful argument towards tyranny

The British Civil War birthed this amazing book of philosophy. While it argues for tyranny, it is endlessly insightful into why and how one might want a tyrant in the first place.

Pointless and Boring

This was the most pointless and boring audio book I have listened to. Leviathan is considered one of the important literary works and is often quoted by other writers. It is for that reason that I stuck it out and continued listening, thinking there would be a point near the end where it all comes together. Not so. Long winded and boring. Three or four salient points could be summed up in a twelve minute review.