Obermann: Free Audiobook and Listening Guide

Obermann, credited to Étienne Pivert de Senancour, 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 Obermann by Étienne Pivert de Senancour. (Translated by Arthur Edward Waite.) Read in English by Jim Locke; jftocanada This is a 1903 translation of Étienne Pivert de Senancour's immensely influential work Obermann. Although it was almost completely ignored by the reading public when it was first published during the period of Napoleonic Wars in 1804, it was rediscovered almost 30 years later by the Romantics, praised by none less than Balzac and George Sand, as well as Franz Liszt and other illustrious persons of that time period. Obermann is an epistolary novel in the form of a journal intime, in which the inner life of the main character is the most important element, rather than the physical action. The story spans ten years, in which Obermann describes historical events, the progress of philosophical ideas, and, most strikingly, his emotional development. A.E. Waite succeeds to translate this work in a fittingly poetic way, transporting haunting images of loneliness, nausée, and lack of orientation. - Summary by Carolin

Recording facts

• Recording title: Obermann
• Author credits: Étienne Pivert de Senancour
• Language: English
• Original MP3 tracks: 58
• Listed recording duration: 17:35:17

Catalogue topics

• poem
• paris
• Alps
• Switzerland
• romantic
• enlightenment
• 1903
• 1804

Opening tracks: first 24 of 58

1. 01 - Biographical and Critical Introduction by A.E. Waite, part 1 — 23:07
2. 02 - Biographical and Critical Introduction by A.E. Waite, part 2 — 31:23
3. 03 - Biographical and Critical Introduction by A.E. Waite, part 3 — 30:23
4. 04 - Biographical and Critical Introduction by A.E. Waite, part 4 — 30:57
5. 05 - Biographical and Critical Introduction by A.E. Waite, part 5 — 34:46
6. 06 - Prefatory Observations by the Author — 8:47
7. 07 - First Year, Letters I and II — 25:55
8. 08 - First Year, Letters III and IV — 36:10
9. 09 - First Year, Letters V and VI — 19:07
10. 10 - First Year, Letters VII and VIII — 19:19
11. 11 - First Year, Letter IX and Second Year, Letter X — 9:00
12. 12 - Second Year, Letters XI and XII — 21:26
13. 13 - Second Year, Letters XIII and XIV — 9:31
14. 14 - Second Year, Letters XV, XVI and XVII — 5:14
15. 15 - Second Year, Letters XVIII, XIX and XX — 12:40
16. 16 - Second Year, Letters XXI and XXII — 24:53
17. 17 - Second Year, Letters XXIII, XXIV and XXV — 8:42
18. 18 - Third Year, Letters XXVI, XXVII and XXVIII — 7:02
19. 19 - Third Year, Letters XXIX, XXX and XXXI — 12:09
20. 20 - Third Year, Letters XXXII and XXXIII — 10:02
21. 21 - Third Year, Letters XXXIV and XXXV — 12:21
22. 22 - Fifth Year, the First Fragment — 14:00
23. 23 - Sixth Year, the Second Fragment — 8:14
24. 24 - Sixth Year, Letters XXXVI and XXXVII — 14:42

Listen to this recording

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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.