Babel

Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution

By: R. F. Kuang

Narrated by: Chris Lew Kum Hoi, Billie Fulford-Brown

Length: 21 hrs and 46 mins

Publisher's summary

From award-winning author R. F. Kuang comes Babel, a thematic response to The Secret History and a tonal retort to Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell that grapples with student revolutions, colonial resistance, and the use of language and translation as the dominating tool of the British empire.

Traduttore, traditore: An act of translation is always an act of betrayal.

1828. Robin Swift, orphaned by cholera in Canton, is brought to London by the mysterious Professor Lovell. There, he trains for years in Latin, Ancient Greek, and Chinese, all in preparation for the day he’ll enroll in Oxford University’s prestigious Royal Institute of Translation—also known as Babel.

Babel is the world's center for translation and, more importantly, magic. Silver working—the art of manifesting the meaning lost in translation using enchanted silver bars—has made the British unparalleled in power, as its knowledge serves the Empire’s quest for colonization.

For Robin, Oxford is a utopia dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge. But knowledge obeys power, and as a Chinese boy raised in Britain, Robin realizes serving Babel means betraying his motherland. As his studies progress, Robin finds himself caught between Babel and the shadowy Hermes Society, an organization dedicated to stopping imperial expansion. When Britain pursues an unjust war with China over silver and opium, Robin must decide…

Can powerful institutions be changed from within, or does revolution always require violence?

Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2022 R. F. Kuang (P)2022 HarperCollins Publishers

Fantastic

Really enjoyed this story, and loved hearing the different etymologies. There was never any slow moments, things are paced really well. Like others have said, the performance is great, but the editing is sloppily done in places. it's clear where some clips were spliced in. I got used to it though, and overall didn't distract too much for me.

Bigotry is bad….over and over and over

The authors opinions (at time story takes place) of bigotry/victimization, superseded the plot development.
The constant beating of the (time periods) racism-drum was a failure to launch for me.

When it started, I empathized. Took stock/root in the protagonist’s challenges and started our journey. But I just got tired of hearing the about the periods injustices, by way of the English or the University. Yes, I get it. Arrogant, racist behavior. But I wanted story too.

Ambitious Success

In Babel, the author undertook an astonishing complex task — to write a fascinating novel with credible, flawed but accessible characters, in an alternative history setting in which the industrial revolution is fueled by silver and by the energy created by the transitions (continuities and discontinuities) of meaning among cognates of words in different languages. The book is an able critique of capitalism, slavery in its many forms, and tribalism. Kuang demonstrates a deep familiarity with nineteenth century Oxford, with linguistics, and with the mechanics of the industrial revolution and its reformer critics, and with individual human motivations and goals. The book is a stunning success on all these levels.
It was moving to hear Chinese words pronounced authentically (I think) with tonal stresses. For me, this underlined the complexities and contradictions within the protagonist.
From this book, I take away lessons about motivations and rationalizations, imperialism, the costs and benefits of capitalism and the challenges to cross-cultural communication. The story is wonderful, and its observations are applicable in the real world as well.

excellent! I hope all will read it!

I thought that this book was excellent and it's the second book that I've read by this author. I read her book yellow face and it made me immediately want to come and read other works. it's a stunning and at times extremely emotional and sometimes challenging to wrestle with some of the topics, but I loved it and I can't wait to read more from her

Pure Excellence

This one is for the academics. As someone who has been in higher academia for a long time, this spoke to me in a way nothing has in quite some time. The story is amazing, the magic system is interesting and relevant but not overwhelming, and the characters grip you. It's a story about revolution, colonization, love, language, and so much more. R.F. Kuang accomplished something great here. I've been thinking about this book since I finished it.

Side note - I ultimately bought the Kindle book as well so I could read along as I listened. There are footnotes, which are done very well in the audiobook with a different narrator, but it was fun to read them as well.

Love, love, LOVED this.

A Staggering Articulation of Truth

Babel is a remarkably realistic rendering of some deeptruths around race and class. The world built is well suited to the tone and craft of the storytelling. These are characters who will engage your mind and heart, a feat less common than it should be. Babel is compelling on every level and I recommend it.

Can’t rate highly enough

So smart, intellectual, interesting, erudite, surprising, well-researched, thought-provoking, unique, expansive - one of a kind book and an author I will now follow to the ends of the “earth.”

An absolute page turner.

Alternate history told in 1830s United Kingdom. On the surface, a fun romp through Oxford University and it’s Babel tower. Where students with a knack for language, are taught this world’s version of magic. Progress and industry and built around silver and etymology. Words from two languages, inscribed onto silver, produce results rooted in those words true meaning. The twist is not simply understanding the definition of the words, but understanding the true langue and history of the word. Living, breathing, and dreaming the language. Silver lines steam engines, works machines, powers boats, keeps buildings standing tall, holds up bridges, and more. The British Empire is built on silver.

The problem is, the words of the classical languages don’t hold the same power as they used to. Match-pairs (as they are called) of English to French, German, Spanish, even old English, don’t power the silver they way they did centuries ago. Enter the books central theme, colonialism. Our narrator, Robin (a name given to him by his English “savior”), is a boy from Canton, China (Present day Guangzhou). Robin, fluent in Mandarin, grew up with an English tutor, and developed a knack and a love for languages. He is saved from the Chinese cholera pandemic that took his mother, and offered to go to England with an Oxford Professor, with a spot within the University promised to him if he maintains his studies. While at Oxford, Robin forms a close relationship with students who share a similar background, and rooted in colonialism. Ramy (from Calcutta) and Victoire (from Haiti). A fourth, Letty, is English, the daughter of an English admiral, out of place simply for being a woman.

What begins as a an entertaining look into the everyday lives of Babel students and a wealth of world-building within the university, turns into the realization that England’s reign comes at a high cost. Paid for by its colonies, and its less technological rivals. Robin, Ramy, and Victoire were not granted acceptance to the most prestigious school in the world out of the kindness of the Crown’s heat, but because they are tools. To be guided, molded, used, and if one were to brake, cast away without a second thought. Here is where the full title starts to make sense.

The book isn’t perfect. I have decades of fantasy reading in my background and it still took me a few page rereads to grasp the magic system. It’s not the it’s complicated just, slightly unclear. There’s never a defined line of, “here’s how it works”, but it slowly opens up as you go along.

My biggest issue is the suspension of disbelief regarding the magic system itself in relation to the world stage. This is an alternate history story after all. Yet the 1830s we are set in is not all that different than our own. There was the rise and fall of Rome, America’s revolution, and the Napoleonic wars. Though, it was briefly described that Rome first discovered the magical properties of Silver, how did they fall? How and why did England gain all the power it did? You would think Rome, undefeatable, given their ability with Silver. Furthermore there is a backstory involving China and the real-life Opium Wars. In this case, the UK is pushing poppy imports in exchange for China’s vast silver supply. Yet, if China has this supply, how are the so weak? The knowledge of silver’s power has been around for centuries. From Rome, to Spain and Portugal, France, and England. If the secret is guarded, how and why was it passed around as is did? The narrator gives a brief explanation that the UK defeated France because of their deeper scholarly pursuits; the discovery of better and more unique match-pairs swung the power to England. I just wish I understood how the geopolitical stage was set the way it was in regard to silver.

This a great big book, and one I could not put down, but the world outside Oxford isn’t delved into as much as I would have liked. Not to explore it in any nuance, but to better understand the global power struggles that are often referenced throughout, and set up for the fast-pasted grade finale.

If you can set aside the questions you will have about the world around Oxford and England, you will fall in love with this book.

Meh…

I’m not sure how I feel about this book. Thought provoking with an interesting magical system. But I feel it could have been shorter. There were a couple of “I didn’t see that coming” moments but for the most part I felt it was pretty predictable. The narration was good which helped. Good book but not a repeat listen.

Easily one he best book I’ve read in the last couple of years!

It’s been a long time since I’ve had this bad of a book hangover. This book feels like a modern Victor Hugo fantasy book.

Yes, there are fantasy elements but they are so believably woven into this alternative history that I didn’t feel like I was reading fantasy. The writing is beautiful and so are the characters. They introduced me to so many interesting real linguistic concepts and the difficulties of translating. All that with the pain and suffering that colonialism and other atrocities of the Victorian era inflicted upon the world. Many times I had to put the book down because of how overwhelming I felt while wanting to pick it back up again because I needed to know what happens next. Thank you for this book. It’s been too long since I’ve experienced a world like this in a book.