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Moby Dick cover art

Moby Dick

By: Herman Melville
Narrated by: William Hootkins
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Summary

"Call me Ishmael." Thus starts the greatest American novel. Melville said himself that he wanted to write "a mighty book about a mighty theme" and so he did. It is a story of one man's obsessive revenge-journey against the white whale, Moby-Dick, who injured him in an earlier meeting. Woven into the story of the last journey of The Pequod is a mesh of philosophy, rumination, religion, history, and a mass of information about whaling through the ages.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your My Library section along with the audio.

Public Domain (P)2005 NAXOS AudioBooks Ltd.

What listeners say about Moby Dick

Average customer ratings
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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Magnificent book!

An extraordinary work. He weaves the detail and the story together in an unforgettable way. Wonderfully written, wonderfully narrated. This is a book that gains much from bring read aloud so effectively.

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19 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Bad edition

There are random pauses in the middle of phrases every so often, and it doesn't have the metadata for the chapters of the book so good luck trying to find any chapter in the book later on.
The kind of edition quality one would expect from a free audiobook someone recorded in their house, not a paid one! Amazon should start putting some quality controls here before people go somewhere else to get nice audiobooks

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14 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

History brought to life

A great yarn about the sea and one man's obsession for an ultimate goal. Melville, who had whaling experience, describes, to the readers of his day, the thrills, the dangers and the way of whaling in his time. We see the type of men that took part, learn about the uses of the whale to society then, such as lighting lamps and umbrella frames. For the modern reader it is first hand knowledge from the past told through the excitement and thrust of story. The narrator, William Hootkins does a good job with the character's voice accents.

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13 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

A journey of words

the missing link between Shakespeare to modern English literature.

the narrative is bogged with literacy's wonders and you will constantly be learning new/old words that don't fit into modern day living.

I would recommend this book for the writing and the authors use of the language but the story was average at best for me and I found the chapters describing whales and their habits long needless and boring. it was like a book within a book at times.

hope this helps the average reader.

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11 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

one annoying problem

this is an amazing book and a wonderful performance. however whoever did the layout did an awful job. I was surprised to see it saying it had only 19 chapters as I had known it to be over 100. howere I realised that each "chapter" did in fact consist of multiple chapters. not really a problem as I normally listen to an hour a day anyway so I thought 1 "chapter" a day would do me nicely. however what I found most annoying is that a "chapter" didn't end with the end of a chapters of the book. but instead ended half way through chapters. so when I set the timer to stop reading at end of chapter I was very much concerned when it suddenly stopped mid sentence. don't know if other versions of the story on here are like that but I did finding it really annoying and it did take me out of the book a few times.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Wonderful storytelling

Would you listen to Moby Dick again? Why?

I certainly will listen again. This is a story of such depth and humour, and so wonderfully and passionately told.

What was one of the most memorable moments of Moby Dick?

The ending rises to a powerful crescendo, but actually some of the parts I enjoyed most were right at the start of the book, as the main characters are being introduced.

What about William Hootkins’s performance did you like?

His range of voices and the fire of his performance, which build and builds in the most dramatic moments.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

It's too long for a single sitting, but certainly I got through it much more quickly than I would've read the book on its own.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Captivating!

My most enjoyable listen so far. Moby Dick was a book I kept promising myself to read but never got round to doing so. Listening to the brilliant narration bringing all the cast alive made the whole experience truly amazing. Surely a hard act to follow.

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5 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

outrageously good performance

As well acted as any audio book could be. Hootkins captures the madness of Ahab perfectly. He cuts through the dense prose to communicate the meaning so that you don't really have to understand the literal meaning of each word.

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5 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Marvellous classic

A great read and marvellously narrated, albeit on a unpalatable subject that does go into great detail on the slaughter of the poor whales. . .

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

briliant reading of a brilliant and unique book

the narrator of this story is superb and im sure adds to what is already a brilliant book.

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3 people found this helpful