A short introduction to a Very Long Book

Would you listen to The Novels of Charles Dickens: An Introduction by David Timson to Bleak House again? Why?

I don't think I would listen to it again - Bleak House is one of my favourite Victorian novels, and Timson's introduction made me want to go and read it again. I enjoyed Timson's overview of the novel, but I'm more likely to reread the novel than relisten to the introduction. The introduction is probably aimed at people who want a general idea of what the book is about and who the characters are - there wasn't really anything new in there for me.

What did you like best about this story?

It was interesting to hear a brief overview of Bleak House - the introductions at the beginning of classic novels tend to be academic essays rather than actual introductions, so this audiobook did a much better job of introducing the novel.

What about the narrator’s performance did you like?

He knows the book, he talks about the book, he doesn't go off on a thirty-page tangent about some obscure literary theory and doesn't reference sixty other novels that I haven't read...

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

No, but that really isn't what I was expecting from this one, so it's no criticism.

Any additional comments?

I do intend to listen to some more of Timson's introductions to the works of Dickens at some point, but perhaps not to the novels that I've already read.

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