A Clergyman's Daughter

By: George Orwell

Narrated by: Richard Brown

Dorothy Hare, the dutiful daughter of a rector in Suffolk, spends her days performing good works and cultivating good thoughts, pricking her arm with a pin when a bad thought arises. She does her best to reconcile her father’s fanciful view of his position in the world with such realities as the butcher’s bill. But even Dorothy’s strength has its limits, and one night, as she works feverishly on costumes for the church-school play, she blacks out. When she comes to, she finds herself on a London street, clad in a sleazy dress and unaware of her identity.

After a series of degrading adventures - picking hops in Kent, sleeping among the down-and-outers in Trafalgar Square, spending a night in jail, and teaching in a grubby day school for girls - she is rescued. But although she regains her life as a clergyman’s daughter, she has lost her faith.

©1936 Estate of Sonia Brownell Orwell (P)1991 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Good story, solid narration

The singing is difficult to listen to, but the narrator otherwise was really good. I would have advised a female narrator with a female lead character.

Defy Orwell’s wishes, read this book

I read on Wikipedia that Orwell asked that this book not be republished after his death - though his heirs found a loophole and did so anyhow. I may understand his request as it is not his strongest work. The best parts of the story are the details and experiences of doing transient agricultural labor and living on the street in London. It gets a bit preachy about the private school system in England at the time - though I trust the critique. The “dramatic form” chapter is hard to follow in oral form and is part of why i gave the overall rating 3/5 stars - though I appreciate the effort. I’m not satisfied with how Orwell represented the thoughts of his female antagonist, but taking away the gendered aspect, the ending is thought provoking despite the scientific questionability of the amnesia that commences the conflict in the story. Overall, it’s good read if you are an Orwell fan.

For confirmed Orwell fans, quite fascinating...

… but for anyone else, it’s probably not going to be a very satisfying read; and I can see why Orwell himself more or less disowned it.

It’s really like several different books not very well pasted together. It starts out like Arnold Bennett’s “Anna of the Five Towns,” with the small-town heroine’s monster of a father — selfish, snobbish, lazy, callous, dishonest — not very different from the skinflint father in “Anna.” Then, quite implausibly and without even an attempt at a convincing explanation, it shifts to a tale reminiscent of parts of “The Grapes of Wrath,” obviously drawing upon Orwell’s own experience as an ill-paid itinerant agricultural worker. There’s a strange, unpleasant nighttime scene using a medley of voices that sounds like “The Beggar’s Opera.” And then the story shifts again to a rather nasty, somewhat unpleasant Dickensian satire about English private schools, this one a small bottom-of-the-barrel establishment run by another caricatured monster. (The parents of the students are also caricatured as a pack of idiots.)

It’s all fairly interesting — Orwell is ALWAYS interesting, always worth reading — but it’s definitely not a successful or well-structured or believable work of fiction, and it leaves one feeling pretty unsatisfied.

The narration is especially unsatisfying. I can’t keep track of whether “Richard Brown,” “Joseph Porter,” and “Frederick Davidson” are one and the same person or a couple of different readers who sound the same, but — assuming it’s one person — he’s the very worst reader Orwell could have had (and Davidson is credited with a number of the books): He sounds like a parody of a snobbish, effeminate head waiter and has exactly the sort of exaggeratedly effete accent that Orwell himself detested. Worse, he tends to read every sentence the same, without a trace of understanding: rising UP at the end of every clause, again and again, then DOWN at the end. Bad luck for Orwell.

Dorothy Don’t Go Home!

In this wonderful book, a Clergyman’s daughter loses her memory and wanders away into a strange new world ,

Definitely worth a listen.

Narrator was great and I enjoyed the story. Was hoping for a happier ending, lol. Sounds natural and is easy to follow at 135% speed.

Captivating

As a Christian who feels his own faith evolving, this story, mostly at the end, had me pondering. It features a young lady place in a strict, but not overly so considering the time, Christian atmosphere who goes on to become aware of the gap between her beliefs and her practices. Whatever she retains of Christianity becomes meaningful in a different way.

Bottom-Shelf Orwell, but still G-D Orwell

“It is a mysterious thing, the loss of faith—as mysterious as faith itself.”
― George Orwell, A Clergyman's Daughter

Bottom-shelf Orwell, but still pretty good. I'm not sure I enjoyed the ending, but I'm glad Orwell left a small caveat and let this book be printed after his death, if only to benefit his heirs.

I liked it

This novel is so depressing. It’s just the kind of story I love. I can’t figure out why Orwell didn’t like it.

Really not bad Perhaps misunderstood

I enjoyed the story , enjoyed the dialogue between characters, but failed to understand the meaning through most of the book. I will submit that the story of the Clergyman’s Daughter isn’t of Dorothy’s journey through England and poverty. It is a story of Dorothy’s faith. If you have read the book , take a min to reevaluate it.

Europe Today, as Nietzsche Predicted

The main character, Dorothy, is a typical 20th century European. She had the habit of living in a Christian way. She lost faith and became atheist, but continued to live as a Christian out of habit. It made no sense, but without God nothing ultimately can possibly have any purpose, so one empty life is as good as another.