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Herman Melville's Moby Dick
Audible Audio
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
June 30, 2021
I first read this book over 30 years ago & really struggled just with the way it was written. Pretty sure I was just not mature enough to appreciate it & have been nervous ever since about reading it again.
I sort of chickened out & had this as an Audible abridged dramatised version & I loved it. It only lasted just over 7 hours but I found it a great way to appreciate the story. In fact, I loved it so much I shall be adding the book to my (re)read list.
I sort of chickened out & had this as an Audible abridged dramatised version & I loved it. It only lasted just over 7 hours but I found it a great way to appreciate the story. In fact, I loved it so much I shall be adding the book to my (re)read list.
February 19, 2022
I tried reading Moby Dick 3 times, and then I started this audio play and immediately finished it, so I think that speaks for the value of adapting (dense) classics into other media. This is abbreviated, of course, though from the plot and characters themselves it's not noticeable at all. It's a great adaptation that focuses on the dialogues and the action scenes, with a whole landscape of sea sounds and a huge cast. We even get sea shanties sung at different points! Most of the voice actors are unfamiliar to me but they do a great job. David Morrissey is the big name who sells the thing, and I love him as Ahab. He has a lot of range and plays the character with empathy and care. I had a great time listening to this and it did make me more motivated to tackle the original (someday). Recommended both to Moby Dick fans and to people daunted by the text itself.
March 4, 2025
I thought that I would like it more, but it was kinda boring compared to modern novels.
September 28, 2021
This production was my first experience with several performers and completed with sound effects I liked it very much. The last three episodes I skimmed. I had had it with Captain Ahab and he took a lot of the stage. I don't have the patience to listen to lunatics or superstition and combined with religious visions, dreams and feverish ramblings it became tedious to me.
November 29, 2023
A podcast adaptation of Moby-Dick in 15 episodes lasting about 15 to 45 minutes each. I thoroughly enjoyed it as I immersed myself in 6 mediums of Moby-Dick: The Marvel graphic novel; the podcast; Cliff’s Notes; Spark Notes; the young readers Illustrated Classics; and the Spanish translation of the novel Moby-Dick itself, to keep that language alive in my life.
June 12, 2021
I've not read the original (and now I definitely would, but allow some time to pass first...) but as adaptations go this was lovely, accessible and well-paced, busting through the novel in 15 episodes (of 12-45 mins each, which was a little erratic) without losing sight of the characters or the central themes. The 'men on the boat all scream' sound effects was frequently deployed of course, and I appreciated all the ship/sea noises to develop the atmosphere of the whaling ship.
A good shortcut to appearing better-read than you actually are, and quite entertaining. Smashed through in one day of gardening and chores!
A good shortcut to appearing better-read than you actually are, and quite entertaining. Smashed through in one day of gardening and chores!
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December 10, 2022After having been a big fan of Marty Ross's adaptation of Treasure Island for Audible, and having signed up for the new Moby-Dick online book club Whale Weekly, I thought I would give this a listen. I found it to be something of a mixed experience.
One of the biggest problems for me with this production was that I really didn't find that most of the voices were well-distinguished from one another. David Morrissey's Ahab was certainly recognisable, as was Pip's voice, and Fedallah and the Manxman's accents set them apart, but even Queequeg and Daggoo sometimes sounded similar to my ear, let alone all the New Englanders who sounded practically identical.
Then there's the fact that an awful lot of the story seems to be fairly repetitive action sequences, interspersed with Ahab soliloquising and Starbuck and the rest of the crew expressing concern at his rapidly deteriorating state of mind, over and over again. No doubt this stems from the source material. I'm not very far into the novel yet, but I'm finding it enjoyably witty, even if my liberal use of the glossary is slowing my progress a bit. I think that, for me, the digressions and observations that are inevitably left on the cutting room floor in an adaptation like this are probably going to be the parts I respond to more than the action which gets left in, though of course that remains to be seen.
On the positive side, Ross's approach to the relationship between Queequeg and Ishmael is both funny and, as a queer person, appreciated (I ran a quick search on the full text of the novel to see if the references to their marriage were from the original, and unsurprisingly Ross embellished that side of things a bit).
One note: at some point a character claims that the word 'banshee', from the Irish 'bean sídhe', is derived from bán, the Irish word for white. Not so! 'Bean' means 'woman', and 'bean sídhe' roughly means 'woman of the mound' (meaning a mound belonging to the good people). I'm not sure if the mistake belongs to Ross, Melville or the character himself, but as an Irish learner it stood out to me. I'm just happy I've become proficient enough with the language to be pedantic about something like that.
Bottom line, this didn't work as well for me as Ross's take on Treasure Island; I'll be interested to return to it once I'm more familiar with the novel itself to see how it holds up in comparison.
One of the biggest problems for me with this production was that I really didn't find that most of the voices were well-distinguished from one another. David Morrissey's Ahab was certainly recognisable, as was Pip's voice, and Fedallah and the Manxman's accents set them apart, but even Queequeg and Daggoo sometimes sounded similar to my ear, let alone all the New Englanders who sounded practically identical.
Then there's the fact that an awful lot of the story seems to be fairly repetitive action sequences, interspersed with Ahab soliloquising and Starbuck and the rest of the crew expressing concern at his rapidly deteriorating state of mind, over and over again. No doubt this stems from the source material. I'm not very far into the novel yet, but I'm finding it enjoyably witty, even if my liberal use of the glossary is slowing my progress a bit. I think that, for me, the digressions and observations that are inevitably left on the cutting room floor in an adaptation like this are probably going to be the parts I respond to more than the action which gets left in, though of course that remains to be seen.
On the positive side, Ross's approach to the relationship between Queequeg and Ishmael is both funny and, as a queer person, appreciated (I ran a quick search on the full text of the novel to see if the references to their marriage were from the original, and unsurprisingly Ross embellished that side of things a bit).
One note: at some point a character claims that the word 'banshee', from the Irish 'bean sídhe', is derived from bán, the Irish word for white. Not so! 'Bean' means 'woman', and 'bean sídhe' roughly means 'woman of the mound' (meaning a mound belonging to the good people). I'm not sure if the mistake belongs to Ross, Melville or the character himself, but as an Irish learner it stood out to me. I'm just happy I've become proficient enough with the language to be pedantic about something like that.
Bottom line, this didn't work as well for me as Ross's take on Treasure Island; I'll be interested to return to it once I'm more familiar with the novel itself to see how it holds up in comparison.
September 1, 2021
This book is so different than I expected it. It holds themes of racial injustice and gay marriage, along with the story of Captain Ahab being one of poor mental health. Weird that all these years I thought this was something entirely different.
July 11, 2021
Maybe it was just this abridge audio version, but I kind of boring and hard to get into.
August 16, 2022
Although I've already read the book this slimmed down audiobook with a full cast was amazing
December 21, 2024
The adaptation is really nice but the story is nothing special. Only check it out since I've heard so much about Moby Dick and then Rodney M'kay was scared of it so wanted to see what's the big deal.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews