Hard Times (Abridged) Audiobook

" not my favorite dickens but necessarily great literature- this is dickens after all. the imagery of one of his characters falling, repeatedly, as if down a large staircase, in her descent to destruction. masterful. again, this is dickens. "

" excellent explain as young boy "

" Brutal- BRUTAL!!!! Oh the pain- This is Dickens at his blackest- You'll never guess why they call it hard times! "

" dickens at his stupidest. an educator named gradgrind bores his students to misery while teaching them nothing of use. a bit ironic that this book is now taught in high school classes everywhere. "

" I enjoyed this quite a bit for the first half to two-thirds. I had never read anything by Dickens before, a sure sin as a Literature major to have not read him by this point, and so I was very excited to get into it. The beginnings was so simple and absurd that it was fun in the same way that a children's novel is, especially with such over the top characters as Mr. Bounderby and Mr. Gradgrind (whom I imagined as Rex Harrison from My Fair Lady and Sam Eagle from the Muppets, respectively). Though the shifting focuses throughout the novel were tell-tale signs of its original serial publication, it was still filled with very interesting characters, in what I've come to learn is a very Dickensonian style of giving each character one or two repetitive and very distinguishing characteristics. It reminds me of something that Matt Groening said of his character design in The Simpsons and Futurama, in that each character should be recognizable by silhouette. It seems like Dickens' characters' personalities are very recognizable by silhouette, and that certainly is what makes them memorable. Whereas Adam Bede, my previous Victorian novel, took 600+ pages to create a layered series of recognized characters, Dickens takes a different approach and achieves the same result without being so exclusionist as George Eliot was in regards to her audience. Hard Times is good pulp-Victorian literature, and as far as I can tell, isn't a proper representative of a typical Dickens' novel. Even with a slightly disappointing ending, mostly because it didn't really feel like it ended at all, this book made me want to read more of Dickens, beyond the feeling that I am required to read more of Dickens. "

" I love Dickens but just found this novel a bit too didactic. "

" This isn't one of Dickens's most popular books (it's probably one of his most negative--he was more of an optimistic writer), but I still really like it. It's basically the story of what happens when you leave no room for imagination in life. "

" I love this, as I do most of Dickens'. I love to lose myself in the world as it was then. "

" i found this difficult to read; it's one of those required book readings back in high school. "

" not that well known, but I really liked "

" I love Charles Dickens but this book was quite depressing. "

" Utilitarianism and how it's screwing our generation! "

" An original piece of work, especially those who are interested in the Romantic/Victorian Era. It was hard to follow at first, but then the pieces came together and I fell in love with characters. Dickens is the man. Many valuable lessons from this one. "

" Hated it, read the first third, skipped to the end and read the final chapter. I really hate Dickens' prose. "

" I had already read quite a bit of Dickens by the time I read this. I think this was the first of Dickens' I read and realized all his characters fill a kind of cast in each of his stories. I like it despite that. "

" it was quite a hard book to read, especially the characters who spoke with an accent. i did enjoy it in the end though. "

" I really enjoyed this book by Dickens more than many of his other books. It captured my attention quite well and was a good read. "

" I was ready to give this book only three stars, but the ending changed my mind. The ending is well written and so worth the slow beginning. Supposedly Dickens wrote this book purely for the money, but it does not show. I highly recommend this book when studying industrialism in 19th century England. "

" A classic must-read. The plot is prevalent with the time. It would probably help to know what was going on in that era to fully understand the motivations of several characters. Overall, a good read. "

" Realized that I'm not a fan of Dickens. "

" At times almost as windy as Mr Bounderby himself, mostly very good "

" it is a classic however for todays generation the style is quite heavy this is why I rated it okay ( the only reason ) "