Lord Jim

By: Joseph Conrad

Narrated by: Jim Roberts

Joseph Conrad was a native of Poland, yet many critics regard him as one of the greatest English novelists. This is all the more remarkable, since he did not learn to speak English fluently until he was in his 20s.

He became a naturalized British citizen in 1886. He wrote many books and stories, but the two that remain most popluar are Heart of Darkness and Lord Jim. Lord Jim is both an adventure story and a story of tragedy and repentence.

©1900 Blackwood's Magazine (P)1980 Jimcin Recordings

Lord Jim - The Spiral of Decent for Honor

Story: It is classic so I have nothing new to add. I found the book interesting in the exploration of a person to trying to recapture their honor which reflects the times of the writer. The story move a slower pace than I used to but that reflects the art of the times and there were some good explorations of the characters that made up for or were the reason for the slowing of the story.

Reader: Good.

Production: Good. The sound quality was good but it could have been better. The reader's voice was flat.

Terrible narration; poor sound quality

Is there anything you would change about this book?

The sound quality is uneven, but the actor mispronouces horribly and often: sailors walk along the KWAY and the esplanad-AY, and poignant becomes POIG-nant. It's testing my patience. Cognac is COG-nac, gunwale is gunWALE (not gunnel).

How could the performance have been better?

He could learn the basic vocabulary.

If this book were a movie would you go see it?

Yes.

Poor audio

Although the storyline was good, the audio was poor. It sounded like the narrator was in an empty room with a bad echo.

raw but good

By "raw" I mean that this recording does not sound quite as polished as more recent versions. But it has a very authentic intensity in the reading that I thought was missing in the others I tried. Very easy to get caught up in this one.

Poor audio and dull reader

Gretchen is spot on with her review: "Although the storyline was good, the audio was poor. It sounded like the narrator was in an empty room with a bad echo."
To this I would add the reader Jim Roberts reads the story in a flat monotone which makes an interesting story almost unbearable.