-
The Cossacks
- Narrated by: Jonathan Oliver
- Length: 7 hrs and 2 mins
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $15.60
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
Great first listens
Editorial reviews
Tolstoy's novella tells how a young, aristocratic Russian, doing military service among the Cossacks in the Caucasus, learns about life, love, and himself, upsetting his previous notions. Jonathan Oliver performs, rather than reads, varying the voices adeptly from person to person and among men and women, matching speech to how it's described, providing the proper expression and emotions. His voice is strong; he's best at Cossack men, especially the rambunctious Daddy Eroshka. The use of strong British accents to represent Russian accents, while reasonable for a British production, may strike American listeners as odd - but it's the best way to go, and the distraction passes. This is an able narration of a fine, subtle work.
Publisher's summary
Dissolute, disenchanted Dmitri Olénin decides to join the army as a cadet and is despatched to the Caucasus. There, he is transformed by seeing how the indigenous people live in harmony with nature, how their lives have more meaning than those of the superficial social elite in Moscow, and he finds a new sense of self and purpose. But nothing is ever quite that simple.
Love and loyalty are tested to the very limits in this semi-autobiographical novella, which is one of Tolstoy’s best-loved works.
Related to this topic
-
War and Peace (AmazonClassics Edition)
- By: Leo Tolstoy, Louise Maude - translator, Aylmer Maude - translator
- Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini
- Length: 55 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In early nineteenth-century Russia, the threat of Napoleon’s invasion looms, and the lives of millions are about to be changed forever. This includes Pierre Bezúkhov, illegitimate son of an aristocrat; Andrew Bolkónski, ambitious military scion; and Natásha Rostóva, compassionate daughter of a nobleman. All of them are unprepared for what lies ahead. Alongside their fellow compatriots - a catalog of enduring literary characters - Pierre, Andrew, and Natásha will be irrevocably torn between fate and free will.
-
-
Tremendous narration
- By steve thomas on 08-14-20
By: Leo Tolstoy, and others
-
War and Peace
- By: Leo Tolstoy
- Narrated by: Frederick Davidson
- Length: 61 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Often called the greatest novel ever written, War and Peace is at once an epic of the Napoleonic wars, a philosophical study, and a celebration of the Russian spirit. Tolstoy's genius is clearly seen in the multitude of characters in this massive chronicle, all of them fully realized and equally memorable.
-
-
Glad I finally decided to read it
- By Plumeria on 09-25-05
By: Leo Tolstoy
-
Birds Without Wings
- By: Louis de Bernieres
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 23 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Birds Without Wings is the story of a small town in Anatolia in the dying days of the Ottoman Empire told in the richly varied voices of the men and women (Armenians, Christians, and Muslims) whose lives are intertwined and rooted there: Iskander, the potter and local fount of wisdom; Philotei, the Christian girl of legendary beauty, courted almost from infancy by Ibrahim the goatherd, a great love that culminates in tragedy and madness; and many more.
-
-
Not for the faint of heart
- By a on 01-03-05
-
Master and Man
- By: Leo Tolstoy, Louise Maude - translator, Aylmer Maude - translator
- Narrated by: Walter Zimmerman
- Length: 2 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the story, a land owner named Vasili Andreevich Brekhunov takes along one of his peasants, Nikita, for a short journey to the house of the owner of a forest. He is impatient and wishes to get to the town more quickly to purchase the forest before other contenders can get there. They find themselves in the middle of a blizzard, but the master in his avarice wishes to press on. They eventually get lost off the road and they try to camp. The master's peasant soon finds himself suffering from hypothermia.
-
-
excellent. totally enngaging. naratorr quite wonderful!
- By J. RYBERG on 01-05-17
By: Leo Tolstoy, and others
-
The Centurions
- By: Jean Larteguy, Robert D. Kaplan - foreward
- Narrated by: Paul Woodson
- Length: 17 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When The Centurions was first published in 1960, readers were riveted by the thrilling account of soldiers fighting for survival in hostile environments. They were equally transfixed by the chilling moral question the novel posed: how to fight when the "age of heroics is over". As relevant today as it was half a century ago, The Centurions is a gripping military adventure, an extended symposium on waging war in a new global order, and an essential investigation of the ethics of counterinsurgency.
-
-
Superbly read. Unbelievably timely
- By Benjamin on 05-05-21
By: Jean Larteguy, and others
-
North and South
- North and South Trilogy, Book 1
- By: John Jakes
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 30 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Two strangers, young men from Pennsylvania and South Carolina, meet on the way to West Point.... Thus begins this brilliant novel of antebellum America, spanning three generations and chronicling the lives and loves of two great family dynasties. The Hazards and the Mains are brought together in bonds of friendship and affection that neither jealousy nor violence can shatter - until a storm of events sunders the nation and brings the cataclysm of war!
-
-
Captivating novel of the Civil War
- By 9S on 01-12-13
By: John Jakes
-
War and Peace (AmazonClassics Edition)
- By: Leo Tolstoy, Louise Maude - translator, Aylmer Maude - translator
- Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini
- Length: 55 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In early nineteenth-century Russia, the threat of Napoleon’s invasion looms, and the lives of millions are about to be changed forever. This includes Pierre Bezúkhov, illegitimate son of an aristocrat; Andrew Bolkónski, ambitious military scion; and Natásha Rostóva, compassionate daughter of a nobleman. All of them are unprepared for what lies ahead. Alongside their fellow compatriots - a catalog of enduring literary characters - Pierre, Andrew, and Natásha will be irrevocably torn between fate and free will.
-
-
Tremendous narration
- By steve thomas on 08-14-20
By: Leo Tolstoy, and others
-
War and Peace
- By: Leo Tolstoy
- Narrated by: Frederick Davidson
- Length: 61 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Often called the greatest novel ever written, War and Peace is at once an epic of the Napoleonic wars, a philosophical study, and a celebration of the Russian spirit. Tolstoy's genius is clearly seen in the multitude of characters in this massive chronicle, all of them fully realized and equally memorable.
-
-
Glad I finally decided to read it
- By Plumeria on 09-25-05
By: Leo Tolstoy
-
Birds Without Wings
- By: Louis de Bernieres
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 23 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Birds Without Wings is the story of a small town in Anatolia in the dying days of the Ottoman Empire told in the richly varied voices of the men and women (Armenians, Christians, and Muslims) whose lives are intertwined and rooted there: Iskander, the potter and local fount of wisdom; Philotei, the Christian girl of legendary beauty, courted almost from infancy by Ibrahim the goatherd, a great love that culminates in tragedy and madness; and many more.
-
-
Not for the faint of heart
- By a on 01-03-05
-
Master and Man
- By: Leo Tolstoy, Louise Maude - translator, Aylmer Maude - translator
- Narrated by: Walter Zimmerman
- Length: 2 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the story, a land owner named Vasili Andreevich Brekhunov takes along one of his peasants, Nikita, for a short journey to the house of the owner of a forest. He is impatient and wishes to get to the town more quickly to purchase the forest before other contenders can get there. They find themselves in the middle of a blizzard, but the master in his avarice wishes to press on. They eventually get lost off the road and they try to camp. The master's peasant soon finds himself suffering from hypothermia.
-
-
excellent. totally enngaging. naratorr quite wonderful!
- By J. RYBERG on 01-05-17
By: Leo Tolstoy, and others
-
The Centurions
- By: Jean Larteguy, Robert D. Kaplan - foreward
- Narrated by: Paul Woodson
- Length: 17 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When The Centurions was first published in 1960, readers were riveted by the thrilling account of soldiers fighting for survival in hostile environments. They were equally transfixed by the chilling moral question the novel posed: how to fight when the "age of heroics is over". As relevant today as it was half a century ago, The Centurions is a gripping military adventure, an extended symposium on waging war in a new global order, and an essential investigation of the ethics of counterinsurgency.
-
-
Superbly read. Unbelievably timely
- By Benjamin on 05-05-21
By: Jean Larteguy, and others
-
North and South
- North and South Trilogy, Book 1
- By: John Jakes
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 30 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Two strangers, young men from Pennsylvania and South Carolina, meet on the way to West Point.... Thus begins this brilliant novel of antebellum America, spanning three generations and chronicling the lives and loves of two great family dynasties. The Hazards and the Mains are brought together in bonds of friendship and affection that neither jealousy nor violence can shatter - until a storm of events sunders the nation and brings the cataclysm of war!
-
-
Captivating novel of the Civil War
- By 9S on 01-12-13
By: John Jakes
-
The Road Back
- A Novel
- By: Erich Maria Remarque
- Narrated by: Graham Halstead
- Length: 11 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After four grueling years, the Great War has finally ended. Now Ernst and the few men left from his company cannot help wondering what will become of them. The town they departed as eager young men seems colder, their homes smaller, the reasons their comrades had to die even more inexplicable. For Ernst and his friends, the road back to peace is more treacherous than they ever imagined. Suffering food shortages, political unrest, and a broken heart, Ernst undergoes a crisis that teaches him what there is to live for - and what he has that no one can ever take away.
-
-
Great Successor to All Quiet on the Western Front
- By BARRY on 02-20-19
-
Hannay: His 5 Adventures
- By: John Buchan
- Narrated by: Graham Scott
- Length: 49 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The Thirty-Nine Steps, Hannay struggles to thwart an assassination plot designed to hasten war between Britain and Germany. Later he is plucked from the trenches first, in Greenmantle, to frustrate a plot to ferment an uprising in the Islamic world; and then, in Mr. Standfast, to undertake a vital secret mission against a German spy ring operating among pacifist elements in England. After the war, his adventures continue in The Three Hostages; and then in The Island of Sheep, when an old oath to protect the son of a friend from his days in Africa draws him into new danger.
-
-
Values of a bygone era
- By Barbara on 03-16-24
By: John Buchan
-
Doctor Zhivago
- By: Boris Pasternak, Larissa Volokhonsky - translator, Richard Pevear - translator
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 23 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In celebration of the 40th anniversary of its original publication, here is a new translation of the classic story of the life and loves of a poet/physician during the turmoil of the Russian Revolution. Taking his family from Moscow to what he hopes will be shelter in the Ural Mountains, Zhivago finds himself instead embroiled in the battle between the Whites and the Reds. Set against this backdrop of cruelty and strife is Zhivago’s love for the tender and beautiful Lara.
-
-
Russian Philosophical Feast
- By Syd Young on 02-16-13
By: Boris Pasternak, and others
-
April Morning
- By: Howard Fast
- Narrated by: Jamie Hanes
- Length: 4 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Fifteen-year-old Adam Cooper is anxcious to join the excitement and action of the Revolutionary War. On the morning of April 19, 1775, he stands beside his Massachusetts farmer father to face the redcoats marching out of Boston. But suddenly, his father falls on the village green, and Adam’s hands are shaking as he shoots at columns of marching men. With realistic drama and riveting suspense, Howard Fast brings the glory and the agony of the colonial battlefield vividly to life.
-
-
A classic for a reason
- By Richard on 01-05-22
By: Howard Fast
-
Les Misérables
- Penguin Classics
- By: Christine Donougher, Victor Hugo, Robert Tombs
- Narrated by: Adeel Akhtar, Natalie Simpson, Adrian Scarborough, and others
- Length: 65 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Victor Hugo's tale of injustice, heroism and love follows the fortunes of Jean Valjean, an escaped convict determined to put his criminal past behind him. But his attempts to become a respected member of the community are constantly put under threat: by his own conscience and by the relentless investigations of the dogged Policeman, Javert. It is not simply for himself that Valjean must stay free, however, for he has sworn to protect the baby daughter of Fantine, driven to prostitution by poverty.
-
-
Great Book, Great Translation, 5 Great Narrators
- By Rain Wiegartner on 06-07-20
By: Christine Donougher, and others
-
Drums Along the Mohawk
- By: Walter D. Edmonds
- Narrated by: Mark Bramhall
- Length: 21 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Drums along the Mohawk, Walter D. Edmonds' masterpiece, is not only the best historical novel about upstate New York since James Fenimore Cooper, it was also number one on the bestseller list for two years, only yielding to the epic Gone with the Wind. This is the story of the forgotten pioneers of the Mohawk Valley during the Revolutionary War. Here Gilbert Martin and his young wife struggled and lived and hoped.
-
-
Wonderful
- By Robert on 09-06-15
-
Shaman's Crossing, Book One of the Soldier Son Trilogy
- By: Robin Hobb
- Narrated by: John Keating
- Length: 24 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Hugo and Nebula Award finalist Robin Hobb crafts intricate fantasy tales featuring larger-than-life characters and exotic landscapes. Nevare Burvelle survives the King’s Cavalla Academy—where nepotism and corruption reign—to become a soldier in the Gernian king’s army. As he and his fellow soldiers are thrust onto the front lines of the king’s brutal territorial expansion campaign, they struggle against the Plainspeople—forest-dwellers who possess a powerful magic long dismissed by the Gernians.
-
-
Sometimes Magic Isn't A Good Thing
- By Therese M. Woolley on 10-18-13
By: Robin Hobb
-
Crockett of Tennessee
- A Novel Based on the Life and Times of David Crockett
- By: Cameron Judd
- Narrated by: Allan Robertson
- Length: 17 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From humble beginnings in rural Tennessee to his heroic death defending the Alamo, frontiersman, adventurer, and politician David Davy Crockett embodies the spirit and ideals of the national character. Even during his lifetime, tales of the sharpshooting, skilled woodsman were - to his delight - told, retold, and elaborated on. As a US congressman, the former Creek War militiaman steadfastly opposed President Andrew Jackson's Indian Removal Act.
-
-
I highly recommend
- By That Man They Call Shad on 05-05-21
By: Cameron Judd
-
A Hero of Our Time
- By: Mikhail Lermontov
- Narrated by: Clive Chafer
- Length: 6 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In A Hero of Our Time, Grigory Pechorin is a bored, self-centered, and cynical young army officer who believes in nothing. With impunity he toys with the love of women and the goodwill of men. He is brave, determined, and willful, but his wasted energy and potential ultimately result in tragedy.
-
-
Genius Presentation of Ywtsaxt fas
- By Brad Isaak on 11-06-16
-
The Power and the Glory
- By: Graham Greene
- Narrated by: Bernard Mayes
- Length: 9 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Graham Greene explores corruption and atonement in this penetrating novel set in 1930s Mexico during the era of Communist religious persecutions. As revolutionaries determine to stamp out the evils of the church through violence, the last Roman Catholic priest is on the lam, hunted by a police lieutenant. Despite his own sense of worthlessness—he is a heavy drinker and has fathered an illegitimate child—he is determined to continue to function as a priest until captured.
-
-
Lousy recording quality of bad narration
- By Vincent on 10-08-12
By: Graham Greene
-
The Mark of the Beast
- By: Rudyard Kipling
- Narrated by: B.J. Harrison
- Length: 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When a carousing Englishman disgraces the consecrated effigy of Hanuman, a leprous "Silver Man" marks him with a hideous curse. The ensuing night brings new terrors to the house of the doomed man.
-
-
Must listen again
- By uffdasuzanne on 10-06-17
By: Rudyard Kipling
-
One of Ours
- By: Willa Cather
- Narrated by: Kristen Underwood
- Length: 13 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Claude Wheeler resembles the youngest son of an American fairy tale. His fortune is ready-made for him, but he refuses to settle for it. Alienated from his crass father and pious mother, all but rejected by a wife who reserves her ardor for missionary work, and dissatisfied with farming, Claude is an idealist without an ideal to cling to. It is only when his country enters the First World War that Claude finds what he has been searching for all his life.
-
-
Cather's writing is impeccable
- By Kelly on 12-20-19
By: Willa Cather
What listeners say about The Cossacks
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Amazon Customer
- 05-28-19
A delightful and short read from a master.
This story would make a great introduction for anyone interested in Tolstoy but who does not want to jump into Tolstoy's longer works. I enjoyed the story quite a bit. But, the historical information regarding life in the Caucaus mountains is worth the price of admission all by itself.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Jason
- 07-08-24
fantastic story, nearly ruined by bad translation
what did I like &/or dislike?
I love the prose of Tolstoy, who truly brings an epic essence to this that's purely his. I read Peter Constantine's translation while listening & hearing Uncle called Daddy over & over again nearly ruined it! Still, a great early piece by one of the world's greatest writers of all time.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Tad Davis
- 03-10-13
A surprisingly quiet story
This was more like Chekhov than anything else I've read by Tolstoy. "The Cossacks" is long on atmosphere and character, very short on plot. Dmitri Olenin forsakes Moscow society to help fight the Chechens(!) at the foot of the Caucasus mountains. The Russians and Cossacks are on one side of the Terek River, the Chechens on the other. There are skirmishes, an occasional hunting expedition (for game and humans), and one brief and violent shootout near the end. Olenin falls in love, is rejected, gains some insight, and leaves.
It's definitely not War and Peace in miniature.
But it IS a story of great warmth and beauty, and the characters are finely drawn, with Tolstoy's apparently effortless ability to penetrate their souls with a few deft phrases. Some of the descriptions of nature are breathtaking.
(Wikipedia says Tolstoy reworked the novel drastically after re-reading "The Iliad." If so, it could only have been to make something as unlike "The Iliad" as possible.)
I found Jonathan Oliver a bit strident for my taste. He's great with the dialogue: each character is clearly differentiated and the emotional tone is just right; but the narrative passages, whether public or private, tend to be voiced in the same declamatory style. (Better declamatory and audible than whispered and hard to hear, I guess; but there must be a happy medium somewhere.)
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
11 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Erika Kibitskaya
- 06-07-19
Beautiful story, interesting narration.
The only thing that really bothered me about this particular Audiobook is the accents of the Cossacks which were Irish. Now I know anyone would know those weren't there real accents but I felt like I was listening to a James Joyce novel instead Leo Tolstoy. I guess an Irish accent represents the "lower class" in Russian life.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful