Hard Times, Locked Out and On Strike: Free Audiobook and Listening Guide

Hard Times, Locked Out and On Strike, credited to Charles Dickens, is available as a LibriVox volunteer audiobook. This guide identifies the recording, its source summary and its audio tracks.

About the work

The LibriVox catalogue summary, preserved with the recording, reads:

LibriVox recording of Hard Times (version 2), Locked Out and On Strike by Charles Dickens. Read by Phil Benson Hard Times was Dickens's shortest novel and the only one to be set in the industrial north of England. A fast moving story with a typical cast of larger than life characters, the novel is a vehicle for a humanist critique of both utilitarian education ('Teach these boys and girls nothing but facts', says Mr. Gradgrind in the opening paragraph) and the mutual antagonism between capital and the trade union. A humanist education system, it turns out, is Dickens's solution to the class struggle. Hard Times is set in the fictional Coketown and was partly inspired by a visit to Preston during the factory lockout that brought the town's industry to a standstill in 1853. This version is read as it appeared in 20 issues of Dickens's weekly Household Words from April to August 1854. It is followed by two earlier articles - Locked Out and On Strike - that describe Dickens' visit to Preston and do much to clarify his thinking on education and class conflict. - Summary by Phil Benson

Recording facts

• Recording title: Hard Times, Locked Out and On Strike
• Author credits: Charles Dickens
• Language: English
• Original MP3 tracks: 22
• Listed recording duration: 11:41:42

Catalogue topics

• education
• Lancashire
• preston
• trade unions

Track guide

1. 01 - 1 April 1854 - Chapters 1-3 — 28:19
2. 02 - 8 April 1854 - Chapters 4-5 — 30:11
3. 03 - 15 April 1854 - Chapter 6 — 29:49
4. 04 - 22 April 1854 - Chapters 7-8 — 28:43
5. 05 - 29 April 1854 - Chapters 9-10 — 29:46
6. 06 - 6 May 1854 - Chapters11-12 — 29:20
7. 07 - 13 May 1854 - Chapters 13-14 — 28:39
8. 08 - 20 May 1854 - Chapters 15-16 — 30:09
9. 09 - 27 May 1854 - Chapter 17 — 29:24
10. 10 - 3 June 1854 - Chapters 18-19 — 29:10
11. 11 - 10 June 1854 - Chapters 20-21 — 34:24
12. 12 - 17 June 1854 - Chapter 22 — 27:02
13. 13 - 24 June 1854 - Chapter 23 — 28:25
14. 14 - 1 July 1854 - Chapter 24 — 29:28
15. 15 - 8 July 1854 - Chapters 25-26 — 29:02
16. 16 - 15 July 1854 - Chapters 27-28 — 30:34
17. 17 - 22 July 1854 - Chapters 29-30 — 34:00
18. 18 - 29 July 1854 - Chapters 31-32 — 42:03
19. 19 - 5 August 1854 - Chapters 33-34 — 42:50
20. 20 - 12 August 1854 - Chapters 35-36 — 54:04
21. 21 - Locked Out — 19:32
22. 22 - On Strike — 36:48

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Source and rights

This is a record from LibriVox's official Internet Archive collection, with a public-domain licence recorded in its metadata. LibriVox's policy includes its catalogue summaries as well as its recordings. Its public-domain assessment follows United States law; copyright status can differ elsewhere. The summary and track facts are reproduced and reformatted from that record. Dates attached to the archive upload are not treated as original book publication dates.