Wednesday, September 3, 2008

The heard world


Movie • THE LOST WORLD • 1995 Audio book • Original book publication - 1912
Having seen the movie for the first time, I decided to listen to the audio book while I baked some cookies. Wow! The audio was almost 9 hours long, but I was entirely engrossed for the duration. The old writing made it amusing at times, but old-school racist also. If you can get past that, and listen knowing the sensibilities are archaeic you may enjoy the in depth descriptions, and playful commentary.
The love story is completely different, and almost completely absent once it’s established. I understand why they played up the love story in the movie, but I expected that there would be better resolution in the book.
The pterodactyl was the main dinosaur, and the ape men were the antagonists virtually missing from the movie. I was disheartened to see that the explorers were more concerned with conquering the Lost World
and its inhabitants than preserving it. Still, though — it was a brilliant story everyone should “read.” You will hear all the inspirations for modern dinosaur movies.I downloaded this unabridged recording of The Lost World by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and narrated by Paul Hecht. Audible.com has a great selection of audio books. They don’t take up space on the shelf where you may rather display your bone collection.

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