Why so many dramatic pauses?

The language is a lot more convoluted than History of Britain, which meant that the story was harder to stay engaged with.

Team that with the pauses for dramatic effect or sometimes even just an upcoming noun of the narrator and this was a lot less than I'd hoped it would be.

Re-listening might help the story so I'll try that, but it won't help the narration which I already had on x 1.2 just so the pauses were a bit more manageable.

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Remarkable

This is a remarkable book. It is beautifully written and engagingly read.

The other reviews are right, you need to know the French Revolution already. Unless you already know your Estates General from your Assembly from your Convention you had better get your overview somewhere else; this work is to beautifully paint in the details. This is for people who want to know what was on Charlotte Corday's bookshelf.

Schama puts people and place in the centre stage, and demotes grand historical forces to play second fiddle. This was retro-subversive in 1989, and to my ears in 2022 it still feels like a fresh approach. I would listen to the first half of the preface at least twice if I were you, it is the framework that hangs the whole thing together.

I liked the narrator. She has a really nice style that emphasises certain parts with great personality, and probably makes the prose better than it would read on a page. She switches between English and French accents seamlessly. She has a slight lisp as others have mentioned, but when I meet people with lisps in real life I never feel particularly like I want to punch them. Anyway, you'll be spending 38 hours with her so you had better just go with it.

All in all, I absolutely loved this book. It brought the French Revolution totally alive for me.

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Incisive

Excellent dispelling of myths revealing true violence nature of the French Revolution. Excellent narration.

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Combines the sweep of history with cohesive narrative

A throughly enjoyable and enlightening book, very well performed and very amenable to performance. Achieving both depth of insight and the grand sweep of events is a tough balance but Schama makes it seem effortless. The book was written nearly 40 years ago but is as fresh as ever.

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An history of the French Revolution

A fascinating window on the events surrounding the French Revolution. This is a highly detailed account and a must for the history buff.

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Immersive dive into late 18th Century France

Having studied the French Revolution years ago at school & found it very confusing, this listen brought colour & clarity to it's story. It was somewhat confusing to follow the great trail of characters with difficult French names (took me a while for example to find the spelling of "Talleyrand" to be able to look him up on google! ) Perhaps the only one I even remembered from school was Robespierre. In some ways then might be better to read this as a book rather than listen to an audiobook. Apparently the author got a lot of stick in 1989 as a party pooper on the bicentennial "celebrations", so don't prepare in this listen to be enamored by the Revolution. He does however appear to try get the listener immersed in the period & the characters with fairness and generosity. I really only have 2 disappointments with this - firstly that this long listen came to an end & secondly he has not written a follow up volume in Napoleon !

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A fantastic chronicle

A great chronicle of a truly interesting event. Although it could be overly detailed, it gave a good summary of all of the key events of the revolution. The narrotor is fantastic and really captures some of the author's wit.

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Fabulous but horrific

The author and narrator might , perhaps, be surprised to be reminded of their work so long after the event.
Wonderful research, painfully evocative descriptions, I found The Terror sickening and upsetting, analogies with the 20th century were justifiably drawn. Man's inhumanity to man keeps on repeating itself, The Holocaust too will probably be repeated and justified by the same Diabolical influences. Thank you, Simon Schama.
A word for Sara Powell, thank you, a long read and as an 'ancien prof de francais' I admired your French.

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The best way to encounter the Revolution is through its people

THE history of the Revolution even 35 years on. A pleasure to revisit it via audible.

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France revolution

The narrator didn’t vary her voice much. The story was good and covered the facts.

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