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If audiobook
- By: Christopher Benfey
- Narrator: Joshua Kane
- Category: Biography & Autobiography, Literary
- Length: 7 hours 27 minutes
- Publisher: Penguin Random House Audio Publishing Group
- Publish date: January 01, 2019
- Language: English
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If Audiobook Summary
A New York Times Notable Book of 2019
A unique exploration of the life and work of Rudyard Kipling in Gilded Age America, from a celebrated scholar of American literature
At the turn of the twentieth century, Rudyard Kipling towered over not just English literature but the entire literary world. At the height of his fame in 1907, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, becoming its youngest winner. His influence on major figures—including Freud and William James—was pervasive and profound. But in recent decades Kipling’s reputation has suffered a strange eclipse. Though his body of work still looms large, and his monumental poem “If—” is quoted and referenced by politicians, athletes, and ordinary readers alike, his unabashed imperialist views have come under increased scrutiny. In If, scholar Christopher Benfey brings this fascinating and complex writer to life and, for the first time, gives full attention to Kipling’s intense engagement with the United States—a rarely discussed but critical piece of evidence in our understanding of this man and his enduring legacy.
Benfey traces the writer’s deep involvement with America over one crucial decade, from 1889 to 1899, when he lived for four years in Brattleboro, Vermont, and sought deliberately to turn himself into a specifically American writer. It was his most prodigious and creative period, as well as his happiest, during which he wrote The Jungle Book and Captains Courageous. Had a family dispute not forced his departure, Kipling almost certainly would have stayed. Leaving was the hardest thing he ever had to do, Kipling said. “There are only two places in the world where I want to live,” he lamented, “Bombay and Brattleboro. And I can’t live in either.”
In this fresh examination of Kipling, Benfey hangs a provocative “what if” over Kipling’s American years and maps the imprint Kipling left on his adopted country as well as the imprint the country left on him. If proves there is relevance and magnificence to be found in Kipling’s work.
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If Audiobook Narrator
Joshua Kane is the narrator of If audiobook that was written by Christopher Benfey
About the Author(s) of If
Christopher Benfey is the author of If
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If Full Details
| Narrator | Joshua Kane |
| Length | 7 hours 27 minutes |
| Author | Christopher Benfey |
| Category | |
| Publisher | Penguin Random House Audio Publishing Group |
| Release date | May 02, 2024 |
| ISBN | 9781984888624 |
Subjects
The publisher of the If is Penguin Random House Audio Publishing Group. includes the following subjects: literature, classics, jungle book, biographies of famous people, biography, history, history books, american history, history gifts, gifts for history buffs, the jungle book, biographies, rudyard kipling, kipling, if, essays, literary criticism, anthology, us history, autobiographies, historical books, american history books, gifts for book lovers, book club, library, book lovers gifts, american, gifts for readers, autobiography, book lovers, book gifts, nerd gifts, literary gifts, history teacher gifts, book lover, Biography & Autobiography, Literary, History, United States, 19th Century The BISAC Subject Code is Biography & Autobiography, Literary
Additional info
The publisher of the If is Penguin Random House Audio Publishing Group. The imprint is Penguin Audio. It is supplied by Penguin Random House Audio Publishing Group. The ISBN-13 is 9781984888624.
Global Availability
This book is only available in the United States.
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