Rupert Brooke - Life, Death and Myth cover art

Rupert Brooke - Life, Death and Myth

Preview

Try Premium Plus free
1 credit a month to buy any audiobook in our entire collection.
Access to thousands of additional audiobooks and Originals from the Plus Catalogue.
Member-only deals & discounts.
Auto-renews at $16.45/mo after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Rupert Brooke - Life, Death and Myth

By: Nigel Jones
Narrated by: Richard Littledale
Try Premium Plus free

$16.45 per month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for $23.99

Buy Now for $23.99

Confirm Purchase
Pay using voucher balance (if applicable) then card ending in
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions Of Use and Privacy Notice and authorise Audible to charge your designated credit card or another available credit card on file.
Cancel

About this listen

A revised edition of the candid, sometimes shocking, biography of Rupert Brooke revealing the very different reality behind the golden-boy façade of an English literary icon.

Paragon of youthful beauty, romantic symbol of a lost England, and precociously gifted poet, Rupert Chawner Brooke died in a hospital ship off the Aegean island of Skyros in April 1915, aged just 27. All England mourned his passing.

But behind the glow of myth lies a darker reality. At the height of his promise a disappointment in love triggered a mental and physical collapse that brought his inner complexities to the surface. Letters reveal a man who was bisexual, misogynistic, anti-Semitic – and sometimes alarmingly unstable.

This revised edition of Nigel Jones's admired biography, including an account of a previously unknown affair of Brooke's, reveals a more conflicted and troubled individual than the gilded Adonis of English literary myth.

Nigel Jones is an author, a former editor at History Today and BBC history magazines, and has been a TV and radio broadcaster. He is the author of several histories and biographies, including The War Walk: A Journey along the Western Front , Rupert Brooke: Life, Death and Myth and Sir Oswald Mosley.

©2022 SAGA Egmont (P)2022 SAGA Egmont
Authors Cultural & Regional England

What listeners say about Rupert Brooke - Life, Death and Myth

Average Customer Ratings
Overall
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    0
  • 4 Stars
    1
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Performance
  • 3 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    0
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    1
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Compelling

This is a superb biography of Rupert Brooke, a beguiling, complex and often very difficult man. Nigel Jones has obviously read everything ever written by or about Brooke and the vibrant literary, social and political circles in which he lived. It would be a forlorn task to attempt to summarise the highlights here, I can only say that it's one of the most interesting biographies I have ever read.

The Audible information about this book states that the narrator is Richard Littledale but in the final moments of the book the narrator names himself as John Sackville. Whoever he is, he has a lovely voice and accent which are well suited to the subject matter and he reads the extracts of poetry beautifully. But, oh dear, his mispronunciation of Keynes is a bugbear from start to finish. He pronounces it to rhyme with 'means' when correctly pronounced it rhymes with 'mains'. This might be a minor point had the Keynes brothers not featured so prominently in Brooke's life, but they are mentioned so many times the 'means' pronunciation is a huge negative.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

In the spirit of reconciliation, Audible acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.