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Lord of the World

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Lord of the World

By: Robert Hugh Benson
Narrated by: Simon Vance
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About this listen

Secular humanism has triumphed. Everything the late Victorians and Edwardians believed would bring human happiness has been achieved: Technology has made it so no one needs to work for a living, the social sciences ensure a smooth-running social order, and, in the name of tolerance, religious beliefs have been uprooted and eliminated except for a single holdout - a largely discredited and rapidly shrinking Catholic Church. Yet people are unhappy.

What has been created is a sterile world of crass materialism, a world without spiritual dimension, a world where people daily choose legalized euthanasia over the emptiness of existence. Out of this culture of despair, there arises a charismatic leader: Julian Felsenburgh. Soon the masses are in Felsenburgh's thrall, and he becomes leader of the world. But in their eagerness for change, have the citizens of the world embraced the Antichrist and hastened the end of days?

Father Percy Franklin remains a bastion of stability, even as the Catholic Church disintegrates around him. Finally outlawed and driven underground, it is only this small and shrinking church that stands against the "Lord of the World".

Public Domain (P)2017 Blackstone Audio, Inc. Classics Drama & Plays European World Literature Middle ages

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All stars
Most relevant  
Excellent. Muddled. Confusing. This book will be a troubling and hard to follow piece of fantasy for those who like their sci-fi crisp or their mysticism worldly; moreover, I suspect that this mix is exactly what Benson intended. Don't look for Verne or Wells, Huxley or Heinlein, for what lies before you is a world of Bingen and Eckhart, Dante, Ferrer and Loyola; it is not for faint hearts or easy riders, yet it is all too human. Simon Vance does well with what has to be an alien format for any modern narrator, in a story that is at once trite but also troubling. So, suspend disbelief, and let the fantastic do its work - sneering at you even more than you may want to sneer at it.

Excellent

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This book is brilliantly written, imaginatively constructed and prophetic in nature. I highly recommend this book to anyone.

I love this book

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This historical novel reminds me of Damian North’s trilogy, Pontifex Maximus … a brilliant dystopian novel from the Catholic / Christian point of view. A classic, recommended by Pope Francis and Pope Benedict.

Incredible

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The reading of this classic work was GREAT! Simon Vance has a pleasant and dynamic voice for all the characters.

Simon Vance is amazing

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If you're Catholic and concerned about current events this will speak to you, because even though it was written in 1907 it's on the nose in relation to post-modern secular trends. If you're not Catholic or religious in any way then you probably won't enjoy it. It was written by a Priest and not a professional author, so literary critics won't like its overly descriptive prose and lack of character development etc. But it's not meant to be a work of literary art, it's meant to be a meditation on faith and what that means in the modern world

Must if you're Catholic

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To be read and re read. There are parts that perhaps only catholics will really understand, but this is an insightful vision of the future for all open-minded readers. I really liked this narration too; it was a clear, articulate and thoughtful reading.

Prophetic and beautifully written.

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The first time I had to stop and recalibrate my ears. The second listen - I couldn’t stop listening.

Difficult but worth it

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As a vision of what religion can do to save humanity it is uninviting and completely unconvincing.
Written as a vehicle to convey ideas, and without literary skills, the story is a reactionary denunciation of modernity with characters as flat and non-human as Ayn Rand's stock puppets. The elitist and violent values advocated to stem the encroachment of Commie materialism include the pope's visionary reintroduction of the death penalty, a wailing at high rates of tax on inherited wealth compared to earned wealth. This desolate and depressing view of humanity is hardly going to serve as a recruiting sergeant for the Catholic church.

Wooden, dogmatic, unconvincing, indigestible

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