A Brief History of Life in Victorian Britain cover art

A Brief History of Life in Victorian Britain

 Preview
Try Premium Plus free
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£8.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

A Brief History of Life in Victorian Britain

By: Michael Paterson
Narrated by: Mark Meadows
Try Premium Plus free

£8.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £15.99

Buy Now for £15.99

Confirm Purchase
Pay using card ending in
Switch payment method
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.
Cancel

About this listen

How a nation grew into an empire and the birth of a modern society

The Victorian era has dominated the popular imagination like no other period, but these myths and stories also give a very distorted view of the 19th century. The early Victorians were much stranger than we usually imagine, and their world would have felt very different from our own. It was only during the long reign of the Queen that a modern society emerged in unexpected ways.

Using character portraits, events, and key moments, Paterson brings the real life of Victorian Britain alive - from the lifestyles of the aristocrats to the lowest ranks of the London slums. This includes the right way to use a fan, why morning visits were conducted in the afternoon, what the Victorian family ate, and how they enjoyed their free time, as well as the Victorian legacy today: convenience food, coffee bars, window shopping, mass media, and celebrity culture.

©2012 Michael Paterson (P)2012 Audible Ltd 20th Century Europe Great Britain Modern England Funny

Listeners also enjoyed...

 Victorian London cover art
London in the Nineteenth Century cover art
London Labour and the London Poor cover art
Great and Horrible News cover art
London in the Eighteenth Century cover art
London in the Twentieth Century cover art
The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval England cover art
Restoration London cover art
A Brief History of America cover art
The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844 cover art
The Battered Body Beneath the Flagstones & Other Victorian Scandals cover art
A Brief History of Life in the Middle Ages cover art
Guns, Germs and Steel cover art
Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World cover art
Dr. Johnson's London cover art
Fighting on the Home Front cover art

Critic reviews

"Out of the babble of voices, Michael Paterson has been able to extract the essence of London itself. Read this book and re-enter the labyrinth of a now-ancient city." (Peter Ackroyd)
All stars
Most relevant  
The chapters are arranged thematically so that thd 64 years in question are treated alternatively from many perspectives.
Very enjoyable book from which I learned much.

Delightful, sympathetic and well organised

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
A beautiful book that puts you in the shoes of the worker, the rising middle class and the aristocracy of Victorian Britain. You will learn about Victorian culture, economics, literature, technology and even war. You get a new understanding and appreciation of Victoria and her realm with this book.

Shows all aspects of Victoria life

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I found this book very interesting with lots of information, quite a few nuggets too that were completely unknown to me before. I found it did not flow perfectly in places but the narrator was very good which I felt made up for this. Had the narrator not been as good I may have given up after early on.

Very Interesting

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
A good historical work on Victorian Britain, clearly well researched, and very well read. My only problem was the book became stodgy in places. But still readable and enjoyable. I'd recommend it to anyone interested in the Victorians or as a one of many source books for students.

What Vicky knew.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
A very informative and enjoyable book. It is well read and well paced - would recommend as a start into exploring the victorian world.

An interesting introduction into Victorian society

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
For anyone interested in this era, this is a really good place to start. True, the style is a bit dry at times - this tries to be comprehensive after all - but never boring. The reader tries his best to give live to the dry text and generally succeeds, aided by the relatively simple language. A gem for the interested layman.

A joy

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I've got an interest in Victorian Britain and this book covers many facets is decent detail of how the Victorians used to live. One thing that stood out to me was the amount of wars that Britain had and the state of conditions that the soldiers needed to contend with. This book will definitely get a second read in the future although I will be reading Simon Schama's history of Britain first as I know this will be more in depth and cover a wider period.

Very enjoyable

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Great book, excellent history and very well narrated. it was extremely in depth in all things during this period

The history and facts

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Overall it's a good audiobook outlining the Victorian Period.

However, early on in the book I noticed a few annoying inaccuracies eg: the author referring to Fanny Adams as a ''young woman cut up by her lover'' This is incorrect as it's well known that Fanny Adams was a 8 year old girl murdered by 29 year old bank clerk (not a lover!). Unfortunately, this glaring mistake made me doubt other facts. Narrator had a good voice though and on the whole this audiobook is ok.

A few inaccuracies

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
If you're interested in history read something else. There are so many inaccuracies and glossings over in this book that it amounts to fiction in some parts .

Full of inaccuracies

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews