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A History of the Peninsular War 1807-1809

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A History of the Peninsular War 1807-1809

By: Charles Oman
Narrated by: Felbrigg Napoleon Herriot
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About this listen

FNH Audio presents a reading of Charles Oman's classic military history A History of the Peninsular War. In this first volume, a detailed examination is made of the first years of the war, 1807 to 1809. The campaign is examined from both sides using reference materials from British, French, Spanish, and Portuguese sources. This book covers the invasion of Spain and Napoleon's trickery in luring the Spanish crown into prison. It also features Wellington's first peninsular battle and of course the famous retreat to Corunna and the battle at that place.

This history, written many years after Napier's, draws its information from more first-hand accounts and corrects some of more glaring mistakes and biases of Napier. Although this audiobook is abridged, the only text removed is a number of the non-English sections of the Appendix, namely sections one, two, three, four, and seven. All English text from the appendices is present.

©2012 FNH (P)2012 FNH Military War Imperialism Portugal Latin American

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All stars
Most relevant  
For the love of God, this is a vast book on history, attach maps to this audiobook!!

Incredibly deep book, mediocre narrator

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if you can get past the fact the narrator can't pronounce things the book itself is full of great info. just be aware the narrator will miss pronounce nearly everything so may take some effort to understand what he's talking about at times

narrator terrible book good

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What did you like most about A History of the Peninsular War 1807-1809?

This is a great book and one that due to its extension and structure invites itself to an audiobook. A great classic.

What did you like best about this story?

It provides a real view of the situation in Spain, despite the regular drop of over-simplification of Spanish personalities, likely motivated by the Victorian (technically Edwardian) superiority complex to explain weak monarchs as only motivated by imbecility. Spanish governance had actually other severe problems as did the Portuguese at that moment - implying it was the monarchs and not a broader issue that placed both countries in ridiculous circumstances falls all too well in Oman's comtemporary narrative.

How did the narrator detract from the book?

It is ludicrous that someone is retained - a very good narrator notwithstanding this particular point - that cannot pronunciate a single Spanish word correctly, considering War Histories mention location every 10 words, it is often unintelligible to understand what location or council or person is mentioned. You would expect that for such a task a narrator that can say "Guadala'h'ara". It is also funny how over time he improves, but in the first 2 hours are just hillarious.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

YEs

Classic book, insufferable Spanish pronunciation!

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Superb audiobook for those seeking knowledge of the Peninsular War. Very comprehensive, great value for your money.

Deep!

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The repeated mispronunciation of almost every place name is bad enough. (You have to listen to the pronunciation of Valladolid, Pamplona and Aranjuez it’s side splitting) Compounded by simple phrases such as ‘coup de main’ repeatedly mispronounced as ‘coup de mane’. But the routine mispronunciation of English words often repeated in differing ways is unforgivable, in-fact it gets so bad that I thought it was a sort of Monty Python comic parody. I stopped listening to the story and was waiting for the next ‘Spanish inquisition sketch’ comedy moment. If this is the narrator of all the volumes I will read them on kindle instead. But thanks for the laughs.

Absolutely shocking narrator of a great classic

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This reading is a disgrace, and is so poor a product that you have to wonder if Audible have considered basic quality control so that customers aren't ripped off.

It sounds like a bad Pete 'n' Dud sketch! Who is "Felbrigg Napoleon Herriot"? Presumably an nom de plume so that the man behind this appalling audiobook can escape the ire of his listeners. It's so bad you end up wondering if he is in fact the late Peter Cook playing a joke and reading a classic work of history in the voice of E.L. Wisty.

As others have noted he not only fails to pronounce foreign names with even a semblance of accuracy, but he can't even pronounce English. Hilariously, having mangled the French, he then pronounces the word "Catastrophe" as "Catas-troff" - thus, for once, giving the correct French pronunciation, only in the wrong place! There is a famous French cavalry commander called Lefebre Denouettes - and it's difficult to describe the car-crash that results from 'Herriot's" reading of this name. Not only that, he gives several different versions of the same name through the book.

One of the problems of Audible's rating system is that by giving 5 stars to the story, for example, the average might give the impression that the audiobook is worth considering. Oman is brilliant - but not in this reading!

The worst narrator on audible

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A classic work I've longed to hear, absolutely mauled by incompetent narration. I could have wept. Even basic words like catastrophe were mispronounced. The tale is a magnificent work of late Victorian painstaking research. Oh, for a remake!

A Classic Mauled

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A fascinating history read by someone who appears to have never heard English spoken out loud or bothered to learn the French, Spanish or Portuguese pronunciation of place names and peoples names. I had to imagine that he was attempting to read it in the style of John Bull circa 1890 as it was the only way to make sense of the madness!
If you are familiar with the events and personalities it really helps otherwise you might be at a complete loss!

Eccentric pronunciation giving him the benefit of the doubt!

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