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    Oliverio Twist
    Oliverio Twist
    Oliverio Twist
    Audiobook (abridged)2 hours

    Oliverio Twist

    Written by Charles Dickens

    Narrated by Fabio Camero

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Dickens fue un maestro de la narrativa y entre sus obras se destacan Las aventuras de Oliverio Twist, una novela de aventuras con trasfondo social, que cuenta la historia de un muchacho al que la vida ha destinado a ser delincuente pero que es salvado por su personalidad. El autor, ademas de mostrar que la vida del bandido no tiene el romanticismo con que la dibujaron otros autores de la epoca, crea una serie de acertados dibujos psicologicos de una serie de personajes, que van desde lo mas malvado y pervertido, hasta la ternura que acaba por redimir al protagonista. La obra, que fue publicada por entregas en la primera mitad del siglo XIX es considerada como una de las mas profundas creaciones de Dickens. Esta edicion, leida por el conocido actor Fabio Camero, presenta al publico una historia fascinante.
    LanguageEspañol
    PublisherYOYO USA
    Release dateOct 5, 2001
    ISBN9781611552652
    Oliverio Twist
    Author

    Charles Dickens

    Charles Dickens (1812-1870) is the most popular and, many believe, the greatest English author. He wrote many classic novels, including David Copperfield, Oliver Twist, and A Christmas Carol. Great Expectations and A Tale of Two Cities are available from Brilliance Audio.

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    Reviews for Oliverio Twist

    4/5

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    • 5/5
      I heard it said somewhere once that a first novel is always the author's most personal. Not so with Dickens, who had to let his thoughts churn over the concept behind "Oliver Twist" while experimenting with the earlier "Sketches by Boz" and "Pickwick Papers." It can definitely be said, though, that "Oliver Twist" is the first novel that Dickens gets right. Instead of feeling like you're reading chapters in isolation that stretch the story for the sake of getting paid for additional instalments, everything fits together beautifully. The plot is by turns tragic, comical, philosophical, romantic, and suspenseful. Dickens manages to follow different characters on their own particular arcs rather than just presenting everything through Oliver's point of view, but there are very few sections that feel like they are dragging the reader away from the main story. The message reflects the developing sensibilities of the new Victorian era while addressing concerns about poverty, morality, and charity that remain relevant to this day. In spite of its time period, however, it shows progressive tendencies, most notably in the excellent characterisation of Nancy, a vast improvement over all the simpering and fainting women of "Pickwick Papers." And while the story is very likely familiar from a number of different adaptations, I found that the author was still able to pull me out of the cynicism of saying "yes, I know what's going to happen" and to surprise me, both in terms of plot details and style. This is a book that stands in conversation with the author's later works and with the other great works of literature that take on the moral questions of their time. It has, as Calvino said, never finished saying what it has to say.
    • 5/5
      Afortunado relato y conmovedor, excelente narración, lo disfruté mucho gracias
    • 3/5
      There were parts of this book that I really enjoyed. In the latter chapters, the action picked up and Dickens did a great job of keeping the intensity up and leading the reader along, something I imagine would be especially important for a book published in episodes.

      I also liked how innocent Oliver was, always trying to do the right thing despite the circumstances. He seemed a little too good to be true, but I liked him so much, I didn't mind that he was a bit unbelievable. He just had so much spirit.

      One thing I don't quite understand in a lot of these 19th-century books is how easily people fall ill. Emotional strain or just a walk in the cold can put them into fits or lay them low with a life-threatening fever. Were people back then really that delicate, or were the pathogens present in 19th-century London just so dangerous and ready to pounce that people were always a head cold away from death? What were these mysterious fevers people were always getting?

      The most unpleasant part about the book is Dickens's insistence on referring to Fagin primarily as "The Jew". According to the notes at the end of my version, Dickens responded to critics who claimed his portrayal of Fagin was anti-Semitic by saying that at the time the story took place, most of those in Fagin's line of work were Jews. I don't know if this is true or not, but the way that he calls him "The Jew" at least as often as he calls him by name suggests that he's actually saying he's in that line of work because he's Jewish, which is a very different thing than just saying he's in that line of work and happens to be Jewish.

      In addition, there's a scene in which Oliver sees Fagin and shouts, "The Jew! The Jew!" It seemed strange to me that Oliver would have referred to him like that because I thought other characters generally referred to Fagin by name, and Oliver would have done the same.

      And then there's the way that Dickens time and again describes Fagin in ways that suggest he's less than human, like in chapter 47 when Dickens says that Fagin "disclosed among his toothless gums a few such fangs as should have been a dog's or rat's." I don't recall Dickens comparing other non-Jewish characters to animals in this way.

      I also considered the possibility that Dickens was just writing about Fagin as the culture at the time would have seen him, but I could buy this notion a lot better if these nasty things were said only by other characters in the story, but by and large, it's not other characters who are saying these things; it's our narrator (whom I read as Dickens). All of this suggests to me that Dickens's portrayal of Fagin wasn't merely a reflection of the demographics of a particular type of criminal in London at that time but truly was (and is) anti-Semitic.

      But aside from this admittedly very large part of the book, I enjoyed the story. I nearly always enjoy Dickens's dark storytelling and psychologically tormented characters, and I find the female characters in his book refreshingly strong-willed (refreshing because not every strong-willed woman is punished for it (though most of them are)).
    • 1/5
      If this had been my first Dickens novel, I never would have read another. The protagonist, for the most part, is acted upon instead of acting. His great heroic moment takes place when he runs away from home and walks 70 miles to London (a moment he remembers in great excitement at the end of the book). But for the remainder of the story, he merely suffers, miserably and passively, as he is humiliated, degraded, hunted, starved, sickened, and beaten. As a reader it is too much to bear, because Oliver has no way to fight back. If he only had an internal monologue that kept him strong, mentally, that might have been enough to maintain my empathy; but when he is just a simple, blank slate of a suffering child, his misery does not make a satisfactory read. Even in the chapters of the happy ending, he sits passively as adults explain his (convoluted) history. Fair disclosure. I did not manage to finish the book. I got up to the point where Oliver has to relinquish his clean, new suit of clothes for the rags he had thought were gone forever; and I just couldn't bear his suffering anymore and had to stop. I read the rest of the plot on wikipedia; and then read the last few chapters, to decide whether the ending was brilliant enough to justify trudging through the novel. When I discovered, instead, that the ending was just long passages of exposition regarding missing members of Oliver's family, I felt satisfied with the decision not to continue. Normally, I don't post a review when I haven't finished the book; but this time I decided to go ahead just to encourage anyone who agrees with me about this book not to give up on Dickens altogether: I can recommend Hard Times and Great Expectations, and will give the remainder of the oeuvre a try.Side note: Perhaps if I had read this with my eyeballs, instead of by audiobook, I would have been able to finish it; since I could have read it very quickly. But by audiobook, you are forced to completely digest each sentence.
    • 4/5
      [Oliver Twist] is the story of an orphan boy who is sent to several workshouses and finally ends up in the home of a benevolent widow and her female companion. The plot and ending of the story are very predictable. Compared to Dickens' [Bleak House] and [A Tale of Two Cities], [Oliver Twist] leaves much to be desired.
    • 4/5
      Frankly, I thought Oliver Twist would be a bit of a chore, but instead I really looked forward to it each night (I chose to read most of the book following the original serialization breaks marked in my edition). The story is melodramatic and sentimental, and the coincidences in the plot are extremely far-fetched, but it’s a fun ride and an interesting exposure of social welfare and the criminal justice system of the time.

      It’s admittedly difficult to read Dickens’ characterization of Fagin (“the Jew”) today, but there were other “bad” characters who were exceptionally drawn, such as the Bumbles or Bill Sikes, and other characters I would have liked to see more of, such as Mr. Grimwig or Jack Dawkins (who disappears unceremoniously from the narrative at a certain point). The portrayal of the relationship between Nancy and Bill Sikes is particularly strong and sadly relevant even today.
    • 4/5
      I always loved Oliver Twist the most of the Dickens books I've read. He seemed to come to life in my head the most of all Dickens' characters.
    • 4/5
      [Oliver Twist] is the story of an orphan boy who is sent to several workshouses and finally ends up in the home of a benevolent widow and her female companion. The plot and ending of the story are very predictable. Compared to Dickens' [Bleak House] and [A Tale of Two Cities], [Oliver Twist] leaves much to be desired.
    • 3/5
      Overheersend: humoristische en vooral sarcastische stijl. Sterke zwartwit-tekening van de karakters. Oliver is uiteraard de held, maar eerder schaapachtig; alleen in het begin aanzet tot eigen karakter, daarna drijft hij mee en evolueert zijn karakter niet (is grote zwakte van de roman)Uiteraard is er een sociale achtergrond: de achterbuurten van Londen, de schandalige Poor?s Law, de hypocrisie van de kerkelijken. Lichtelijk melodramatisch, vooral op het einde nogal melig.
    • 5/5
      Writing: 5.0; Theme: 5.0; Content: 4.5; Language: 4.5; Overall: 5.0; This was a wonderful volume that shares the rough, yet heart-warming story of Oliver Twist. Oliver travels through life battling the evils of this world while growing up in the poor conditions of a street youth. This story resembles the process that many Christians go through. As Christians, like Oliver, we are persecuted in this life, but in the end those who were the persecuted will one day receive glorious rewards if they live their lives pleasing to Christ. Great tome! Highly recommend. ***March 5, 2019*** (read with Jonathan)
    • 4/5
      It had been many years since I read Charles Dickens, but this is pretty much exactly what I remember of him. This was a classic story where the good guys end up being good, and the bad guys end up being bad. The writing style and the atmosphere are where Dickens makes his money, and I loved being transported back to 19th century London. The story itself was not really a page-turner for me, but I did enjoy the characters enough to have no trouble getting through the novel. I will certainly be reading more of Dickens.
    • 5/5
      Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens was published 175 years ago in 1838 and there's no doubt it's an enduring classic. Most people know Oliver Twist is an orphan and of course his well-known request for "more".I don't know why it's taken so long for me to read Oliver Twist, perhaps because I didn't really enjoy Great Expectations. Having said that, I fell in love with Oliver Twist and am now a true Dickens fan.Rather than share some of the plot (which most people know one way or another), allow me to share some of my favourite quotes/excerpts.On considering sending young Oliver to sea on page 20: "the probability being, that the skipper would flog him to death, in a playful mood, someday after dinner, or would knock his brains out with an iron bar, both pastimes being, as is pretty generally known, very favourite and common recreations among gentlemen of that class."Page 52, regarding Oliver's drowsy state: "There is a drowsy state, between sleeping and waking, when you dream more in five minutes with your eyes half open, and yourself half conscious of everything that is passing around you, than you would in five nights with your eyes fast closed, and your senses wrapped in perfect unconsciousness. At such times, a mortal knows just enough of what his mind is doing, to form some glimmering conception of its might powers, its bounding from earth and spurning time and space, when freed from the restraint of its corporeal associate."Page 176, this had me laughing for ages: "Unembellished by any violence of gesticulation, this might have seemed no very high compliment to the lady's charms; but, as Mr Bumble accompanied the threat with many warlike gestures, she was much touched with this proof of his devotion, and protested, with great admiration, that he was indeed a dove."I could go on, but I hope that's enough to influence you to give Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens a try if you haven't before. The language was such a delight, I couldn't do it justice by reading it at my normal pace, and really had to slow right down to savour his words and his writing.I savoured being amongst the pages and recommend Oliver Twist to all who appreciate the English language.
    • 5/5
      One of Dickens' tightest novels, with very few spare characters or superfluous plotlines.
    • 2/5
      I don't consider myself an especially sensitive person, I grew up in a Gentile neighborhood so I've heard it all forever, and I knew ahead of time about Dicken's bigotry and who Fagin was, but I was surprised to be so put off. After a while, I felt like things would be going along OK and then I would be slapped in the face. So here are two stars, don't spend them all in one place.
      ==================
      I think I've selected the wrong edition. I read the Norton Critical Edition and the included essays are very good.
    • 3/5
      Written in 1837, during Dickens' astronomical rise to success, Oliver Twist is his third major work, second novel, and the negative counterpart to its exact contemporary, The Pickwick Papers. One could argue it's still the work that has had the greatest impact on the public psyche: Dodger, Fagin, Nancy, and Bill loom large in the collective cultural consciousness, don't they? Who can forget Oliver asking for more, or the climactic tightrope walk? In truth, this is not a brilliant work. Only Fagin has any sparks of internal life, and he's an unfortunate anti-Semitic caricature common to the era. Oliver Twist, carrying the torch from some of Dickens' sentimental Sketches is a rather lifeless little twig. What works in the story is the vividness of "low" culture, and Dickens' already fierce moral stance on the inhumanity of much of 19th century English culture. Certainly a worthwhile read, but possibly the least of Dickens' "Big Fifteen". The relatively straightforward Twist will give way to the diffuse, picaresque Nicholas Nickleby, and then the real Dickens will be formed.
    • 3/5
      I don;t know what you can say about this that hasn't been said already. I was slightly surprised that what I remembered from the film took place within the first half of the book - I remembered nothing about the unveiling of Oliver's identity or Mr Monks and his shenanigans. I also had forgotten quite how feeble Iliver is at times - I;m surprised he;d have made it in the tough end of London. There is a huge level of co-incidence that you need to suspend disbelief over, but I suppose I can live with that. It feels, as so often with Dickens, that he spends a lot of the book setting up the final few chapters, and so it is here. The pacing is uneven, and, at times, it feels that we're revisiting certain characters for padding's sake. It does feel like there is a certain amount of glee with which the fate of the less reputable characters are dealt with. But then, the Artful Dodger just vanishes, and he;d one of the more memorable characters. And poor Nancy. Oh!
    • 4/5
      I enjoyed this a lot more than The Pickwick Papers. But it was also totally unlike what I expected. All the bits that you know from popular culture are here but in much smaller doses than you might expect.
    • 4/5
      Good novel of an orphan who gets mixed up with pickpockets. I liked the musical too. Dickens is good at making memorable characters!
    • 4/5
      I reread this recently for the first time since I was a teenager and found (not surprisingly) that I was interested in very different parts of the story than I was when I was younger. I was much more interested in the character of Bill Sykes, and his haunted guilt, fleeing the law. There is a fabulous scene that I had not remembered where he heroically lends a hand during a fire in a desperate effort to rejoin humanity after murdering a friend. Hellfire and damnation mixed in with attempted atonement. It was really quite mesmerizing.
    • 3/5
      I don't know, but this is still my least favorite Dickens book. Something about it just doesn't appeal to me. Too many characters and none that I really care for including the title character. The book is kind of slow too with the exception of the first and last few chapters. This isn't a bad book though. It's a classic, just not one I ever cared for and I thought the book would help change my mind. I still like Dickens. I liked the characters and plot of Christmas Carol better and I found A Tale of Two Cities better writing. I still have a long way to go before I read David Copperfield and Great Expectations, but some reason I feel like I'll like those better. I still think everyone should read at least one Dickens novel in their life.
    • 5/5
      I still remember taking my paperback edition of Oliver Twist with me to summer camp when I was twelve years old. It was my first Dickens and I was mesmerized by the characters and incidents, especially Oliver. While as I have read most of Dickens' other books over the succeeding decades, this novel continues to hold a special place in my reading life.
    • 5/5
      Great story. Oliver is resilient and resourceful but the powers that be seem hell bent on having their way with him. Dickens is always dark and his characters always suffer. No matter the story, his writing is peerless and amazingly literate.
    • 5/5
      A long, enduring tale of one orphan child in England, and the lives he encounters.
    • 5/5
      So many others have written excellent reviews of Dickens' classic that I will only comment on a couple of Christian themes that stand out and adorn this classic with such beauty. First of all the is the Redemption motif -- Redemption offered and rejected, as well as Redemption finally received. Some of the scoundrels whom which Oliver's earliest life in London is associated reveal this double-sided coin both beautifully and tragically. Secondly is the concept of Sovereign Grace which is abundantly displayed in the life of Oliver Twist. Writing this hours after turning the last page, I still cannot take my mind off of my favourite character in the novel -- the prostitute Nancy. She, above all, pictures both sides of the Redemption theme. As for Oliver, whose life was once mired in the same slime as that of his earliest compatriots, we see him through a series of "coincidences", rescued from his hopeless condition.
    • 3/5
      Oliver lives the inevitably difficult life of an orphan born in a Victorian-era rural poorhouse and after escaping to London encounters a variety of fascinating personalities in what most would consider the dregs of the city before discovering kindred and kind spirits elsewhere.I went into this novel knowing mostly just, "Please sir I want some more" and the names of Fagin and the Artful Dodger. Beyond that I hadn't really been exposed to the plot of the novel before so had little expectations except those built in from my other experiences with Dickens. I did enjoy the read but of this cast of characters Oliver is the least interesting part. Instead its the other people he encounters along the way who are the true draw here, whether it's conflicted Nancy, the hypocritical Bumbles, or the kind and clever Brownlow and Rose. There's glimpses of the humour and observations I've loved in other Dickens novels but they're lighter on the ground here. There's also a whole heaping pile of anti-Semitism in the character of Fagin (and at least one notable dig at the Irish); not unusual for the period but still not cool. Glad to have experienced for all the many cultural references that come from this one but not destined to make it into my list of top Dickens' novels.
    • 4/5
      The first half of this novel is suffering-porn. The second half is an excellent murder/birth story mystery. When the novel veers away from Oliver's suffering and focuses on the satire of wealthy corruption, it is engaging and focused. I realize that Dickens cannot stay away from the picaresque, but I like his legal thrillers and intrigues more than tales of suffering and woe.
    • 3/5
      I think I like Dickens’ truly comedic books more than his melodramas. This one does have many of his engaging features, like situations that evoke a reader’s sympathies, characters so bad that they become villainous archetypes, and settings that match the characters most extreme emotions. And (almost) everyone gets their just deserts in the end, however contrived that may seem.What makes this novel problematic is, first, that poor Oliver is such a weak character. He has little character of his own beyond his innate sense of rightness and injustice, and since he is always the victim of injustice it takes little virtue for him to object to it. I think that everything that happens to him, whether good or bad, is imposed on him by other characters, from the governors of the orphanage or the evil den of thieves to the wealthy and principled family and friends who save him. Perhaps they would have been less inclined to save him had he not had such a pure and noble character, although they do try to save Nancy, too. But this is also a problem. Oliver is pure and noble only because he was born of a pure and noble mother, not because of anything he learned in his miserable upbringing. But Nancy has a common birth and she is too far gone to be saved, even though she is generous and protective toward Oliver. Dickens’ Victorian morals reserve good character to those of good birth, and only they are saved. I don’t know if Dickens was conscious of this, but it puts his sympathies for the working classes on a very limited basis.Nevertheless, this is a social satire, and a pointed one. The contrast between Oliver’s true saviors and those who are appointed to help the orphans is acute. The self-serving, greedy middle-class governors of the orphanage and the small business owners who bully and exploit their child workers are little better than the criminal gang that Oliver escapes to – perhaps worse, as Oliver seems generally well-fed and warm with Fagin’s gang, and enjoys the company of Charley and Jack the Artful Dodger. Of course, the gang does threaten and intimidate him into thievery that Oliver clearly wants no part of. He only avoids them by the luck of being captured by good-hearted saviors who turn out to be the only people in London who can discover his true story.In Dickens, it’s always the characters that make the story memorable, and their strength makes Oliver himself fade away. This story presents the pompous Bumble and the avaricious wife he ties himself to, the cheerful Dodger, the truly nasty Bill Sikes and his unhappy partner Nancy, and the conniving Fagin. These are such colourful characters that they overshadow the purity of Mr Brownlow, Harry and Rose, and even Oliver himself. The villains are always more colourful.Unfortunately, it’s hard to ignore the anti-Semitism that colours Dickens’ portrait of Fagin, whom he commonly simply calls the Jew and shows hovering over his hoard of stolen treasure. The stereotype of the Jewish criminal miser leaves an unpleasant taste. Fagin only stops being a caricature in his final days when he faces death and Dickens shows his disordered torment with surprising sympathy. The Victorians had quite a taste for maudlin sentimentality, and that is one of the forces driving the story. Dickens’ characters and his descriptive writing elevate the novel beyond that, but modern audiences must have a hard time getting beyond the sentimentality. I suppose that’s why modern adaptations like the movies and the musical leave a lot of the story line out to create a celebration of the characters that is fun, if not very close to Dickens’ original.
    • 5/5
      Annual re-read of a Dickens Classic ... this book rocks.
    • 4/5
      I'll be honest, the first third or so of Charles Dickens' "Oliver Twist" really dragged for me. I started wondering why it is so beloved. However, by the final third, I thought it was both fun and fairly riveting. As most people probably know, the novel is about Oliver, a young orphan who is led into crime circles by The Artful Dodger. A series of mishaps and adventures ensue impacting Oliver's life in both good and bad ways.Once it got going, this was really an interesting tale.
    • 4/5
      Dicken's second book. This is a story of Oliver Twist, a boy orphaned and birth. Oliver manages to stay pure and innocent regardless of all the negatives in his life. Born to the work house, indentured out, taken in by thieves and mistreated and bullied, starved and abused yet he stays sweet and innocent. Oliver would be a case for genes overcome environment. Dickens wrote this novel as social commentary of the criminal dark side of London. His usual larger than life characters fill up this book. One character is Mr Fagin, referred to as The Jew. Mr Fagin is a fence and he is symbolized as the devil. He is described as standing over the fire holding a toasting fork. The settings are dark nights, dim rooms and unusually cold weather. As with Dickens, his stories are written as serials, pay by the word and has a happy ending. This is not my favorite Dickens but it is still a good read.