Heart of Darkness: A Signature Performance by Kenneth Branagh
By: Joseph Conrad / Narrated By: Kenneth Branagh
Length: 3 hrs and 49 mins
Creepy story; BRILLIANT narration!
Kenneth Branagh narrates this.
Need I say more?
No, I don’t think so.
…But since you asked… I remember reading Heart of Darkness whilst in high school, and the entire class ADORED it! It’s well written; it’s sick; it has killer lines like: Fascination of the abomination. Heads on spears. Arrows flying through the air. A Russian sycophant who thinks Kurtz is, well yeah, maybe a liiiittle off his rocker, but BOY is the guy a poet, or what?
And Kenneth Branagh narrates this.
Oh wait, you want more?
Well, let’s dissect Branagh’s narration. He does Swedish accents! He does Russian! He does upper crust British! He does sailor accents; he does military tones! He does excitement! Fear! Trepidation! All of which kept me, the lowly listener, at the edge of my seat. This from the man who brought us Digory and Polly and mad Uncle Andrew in The Magician’s Nephew by C.S. Lewis.
Tell me: What other person can deliver a child’s tale then knock your socks off by telling about chucking a dead body into a river, telling about throwing shoes filled with the dead man’s blood into that river? Can whisper, “The horror… the horror…” with such guttural flare!
Of COURSE you’ll think of “Apocalypse Now” as well you should. I think the movie brilliantly captured Conrad’s tale of the darkness of men’s souls.
And by the way, since I was Googling An Eagle Named Freedom, I went ahead and hit Wikipedia for extra info on this book. Turns out it’s thought of as racist by many people. I can see that. If I was a person of color, I sure as heck wouldn’t want my race depicted as primitive and savage as Conrad does. But I think it’s understandable in the story as such judgments are delivered by elitist British individuals who are on that continent only to exploit it and get rich through exploiting it and its people.
But whatever your beliefs? Give this audiobook a try. Cuz…
It’s narrated by Kenneth Branagh…
And that should say enough.
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