Fifty-four hours. Let that sink in for a second. I started this audiobook during the first week of October, walking the lakefront with Denise, and I finished it somewhere around Thanksgiving while grading a truly depressing stack of essays on The Great Gatsby. (My students have discovered that "the green light represents hope" is not, in fact, an original thesis.) Point is - this isn't a book you casually pick up. This is a commitment. A relationship. And honestly? David Clarke made those fifty-four hours feel like time well spent.
The Voice Behind the Story
Look, I need to be upfront about something. This is a LibriVox recording - free public domain audiobook, volunteer narrator. So if you're expecting Audible-level production with a celebrity voice actor, recalibrate your expectations right now. What you get instead is David Clarke, who sounds like a well-read Englishman who genuinely loves this book. And you know what? That counts for a lot.
Clarke's delivery is measured. Deliberate. Some listeners have called it slow-paced or even monotonous, and I get that criticism - if you're used to thrillers narrated at breakneck speed, this will feel like wading through honey. But here's the thing: Dumas wrote this as a serialized novel. It was meant to unfold slowly, to let readers (listeners, in our case) marinate in the plotting and scheming. Clarke understands that pause is punctuation. When Edmond Dantès finally escapes from the Château d'If after fourteen years of imprisonment, Clarke doesn't rush through it. He lets the moment breathe. My students would hate this. I love it.
His character differentiation is solid - not theatrical, but distinct enough that you can follow who's speaking without getting lost. The Count himself gets this measured, almost cold precision that perfectly captures a man who has transformed himself into an instrument of vengeance. The various villains each have their own flavor of despicable. Is it the most dynamic voice work I've ever heard? No. But it serves the text, and that's what matters.
What Dumas Gets Right (And Why It Still Works)
This is why we still read the classics. Seriously. If you loved The Shawshank Redemption, this is its spiritual ancestor - wrongful imprisonment, patience as a weapon, and revenge served so cold it's practically frozen. Dumas understood something fundamental about human nature: we want justice, but we also want to see the wicked squirm before they fall.
The first third of the book is relatively straightforward - young sailor betrayed by jealous friends, imprisoned on false charges, befriended by a fellow prisoner who teaches him everything from languages to swordfighting to the location of a massive hidden treasure. Standard adventure stuff, beautifully executed. But then Dantès emerges as the Count of Monte Cristo, and the novel transforms into this intricate chess game of social manipulation and psychological warfare.
I found myself pausing during faculty meetings (sorry, Principal Martinez) to appreciate how Dumas sets up dominoes in chapter 40 that don't fall until chapter 90. The man was writing a serialized potboiler, basically the 19th-century equivalent of prestige TV, and yet the plotting is tighter than most modern thrillers. There's a reason this story has been adapted roughly a thousand times - the 2002 film with Jim Caviezel is solid, but it compresses so much that you lose the slow-burn satisfaction of the novel.
The Listening Experience (And Fair Warning)
Okay, so here's where I have to be honest about who should actually attempt this.
Fifty-four hours is a lot. There are stretches in the middle - particularly some of the Parisian society scenes - where the plot slows to a crawl while Dumas describes dinner parties in exhaustive detail. I won't pretend I didn't zone out during a few of those passages, usually while simultaneously trying to decipher a student's handwriting that looked like a seismograph reading.
The audio quality is clean but basic. No music, no sound effects, just Clarke and the text. Some chapters have slight variations in recording quality - again, this is a volunteer production, not a studio job. If that kind of thing bothers you, you might want to spring for a commercial version instead.
But if you can settle into the rhythm, there's something almost meditative about it. I listened during lakefront walks, late-night grading sessions, and one memorable afternoon when Denise and I were stuck in traffic on the Kennedy for two hours. (The Count's elaborate revenge schemes made the gridlock almost bearable.) This is a book that rewards patience - which, come to think of it, is also the book's central theme.
The Verdict
Is this the definitive audiobook version of The Count of Monte Cristo? Honestly, I can't say - I haven't listened to all of them. But David Clarke delivers a performance that honors the text without getting in its way. He understands that Dumas's prose deserves to be savored, not rushed through. For a free recording, the quality is genuinely impressive.
If you're new to the novel, maybe sample first to see if Clarke's pacing works for you. If you've read it before and want to experience it again in a new way, this is worth the investment. And if you're a high school English teacher looking for something to make your commute feel less like a slow march toward death? This worked pretty well for me.
Just don't try to finish it in a week. Trust me. Let it breathe. The Count waited fourteen years for his revenge - you can wait a few months to finish his story.
