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Work · 5 recordings

The Brothers Karamazov

Fyodor Dostoevsky · read by Constantine Gregory

It tells a story. Hardcover files this book as fiction, and its readers there call it challenging and reflective. Facts, not factors: neither plays any part in our call.

Read it

Every book we have judged on how far the recording outruns the page: 201 of them, the page's answer at the left-hand end and the recording's at the right. Marked for scale: All the Light We Cannot See, To Kill a Mockingbird and Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. This one sits in the bottom 8% of our shelf of books for how far the recording outruns the page. −0.40, where we start backing the page; 0.40, where we start backing the recording.The Brothers Karamazov
emphatic · 1.44 clear of the line where this would stop being a read

Audio is doing this one no favours: 23 readers call it slow and 17% of the reviews we read called it demanding. That is a book that wants a page you can turn back to.

Length does not decide this

37h 04m to listen, at 1×29h 39m to listen, at 1.25×24h 43m to listen, at 1.5×21h 11m to listen, at 1.75×18h 32m to listen, at 2×about 27 hours to readabout 20 hours to readabout 16 hours to readabout 12 hours to readabout 10 hours to read

The runtime is Audible’s own, shown at the speed beside it. The reading time is our estimate: 796 pages at 30 pages an hour, the pace you told us. Ours is 50, about 300 words a page, read at 250 a minute. Treat the reading estimate as a floor on this one: this one runs 2.8 minutes of narration a page against a shelf median of 1.9, so there is more on each page than our 300-word average assumes and it will take you longer than we say.The runtime is Audible’s own, shown at the speed beside it. The reading time is our estimate: 796 pages at 40 pages an hour, the pace you told us. Ours is 50, about 300 words a page, read at 250 a minute. Treat the reading estimate as a floor on this one: this one runs 2.8 minutes of narration a page against a shelf median of 1.9, so there is more on each page than our 300-word average assumes and it will take you longer than we say.The runtime is Audible’s own, shown at the speed beside it. The reading time is our estimate: 796 pages at 50 pages an hour, which is about 300 words a page, read at 250 a minute. Treat the reading estimate as a floor on this one: this one runs 2.8 minutes of narration a page against a shelf median of 1.9, so there is more on each page than our 300-word average assumes and it will take you longer than we say.The runtime is Audible’s own, shown at the speed beside it. The reading time is our estimate: 796 pages at 65 pages an hour, the pace you told us. Ours is 50, about 300 words a page, read at 250 a minute. Treat the reading estimate as a floor on this one: this one runs 2.8 minutes of narration a page against a shelf median of 1.9, so there is more on each page than our 300-word average assumes and it will take you longer than we say.The runtime is Audible’s own, shown at the speed beside it. The reading time is our estimate: 796 pages at 80 pages an hour, the pace you told us. Ours is 50, about 300 words a page, read at 250 a minute. Treat the reading estimate as a floor on this one: this one runs 2.8 minutes of narration a page against a shelf median of 1.9, so there is more on each page than our 300-word average assumes and it will take you longer than we say.

If you must listen → dedicated listening only

Harder work in audio than The Handmaid's Tale.

All the books we hold · 222

Harder work in audio than 97% of the books we hold.

Fiction · 176

Harder work in audio than 97% of the fiction we hold.

Doorstoppers · 54

Harder work in audio than 93% of the doorstoppers we hold.

Reading load against listening load

Every book we hold placed by how much work it asks on the page, left to right, against how much it asks in your ears, bottom to top: 222 of them. Easy both ways is the bottom left corner, hard both ways the top right; above the dashed line the ears work harder, below it the page does. Marked for scale: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, To Kill a Mockingbird and The Diary of a Young Girl. This one is in the top 8% of our shelf of books for effort on the page and in the top 6% of our shelf of books for effort in your ears.
The dashed line is where a book would be same effort either way. This one sits above that line (audio asks more of you here than the page does), in the top 2% of our shelf of books for extra work in audio.
On the page1.23
In your ears2.11
Audio disadvantage2.24

Where that puts this one among the books we hold: in the top 8% of our shelf of books for effort on the page and in the top 6% of our shelf of books for effort in your ears. The middle of the scale is not the middle of the shelf (most books sit below the average on both), so a book at 0.00 is already in the top 43% for effort on the page. Each of the three is measured against the whole shelf separately, so the bottom figure is not the top two subtracted. It is this book’s own distance from the middle.

What the audio disadvantage is made of. Two things and no others: how fast readers say this one moves, and how demanding the reviews we read found it. There is no third: the structural one has no data source, so it contributes nothing rather than being guessed at. Both directions are declared priors we have never fitted against a real verdict, which is the weakest-evidenced part of the whole model.

Every book we could measure both features on placed by pace, fast to slow, against how demanding the reviews we read found it, plain to demanding: 166 of them. The easiest listens are the bottom left corner and the hardest the top right, which is the shaded one. Marked for scale: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, To Kill a Mockingbird and The Diary of a Young Girl. This one reads slower than most books we hold and more demanding than most, which is what leaves the format leaning towards the page.
This one reads slower than most books we hold and more demanding than most, which is what leaves the format leaning towards the page.

How the call was made

Where a bar carries ticks, the grey one is the middle of our shelf and a coloured one is a line we publish, cool where we start backing the page, warm where we start backing the recording. The evidence squares at the foot are a different thing: how far each of our four sources went, hatched where there was nothing to measure at all.

The audio case
−1.84It sits in the bottom 8% of our shelf of books for how far the recording outruns the page. Past the line where we start backing the page.
Narration payoff
0.40Constantine Gregory’s reading and the book are received about equally well: in the middle 40% of our shelf of books, on 6,174 ratings of the narration. This is a difference, not a score: it sets the reading against its own book, so a much-loved book with a merely good reading sits low on this shelf even where nobody disliked either. Asked the other way (how the reading stands against what the book’s own readers made of it, which is a different crowd rating a different thing), it comes out −0.63. We report that one and never score it: two crowds that do not overlap are held together by nothing but the standardising, which is a cost the figure above does not pay.
What is at stake
1.02It sits in the top 16% of our shelf of books for how well the print crowds think of a book: well enough regarded that a wasted first encounter costs more, so we lean towards protecting the page. Blended across 415,096 Goodreads ratings and 775 on Hardcover, each scored inside its own population first, and never added together.

For the page

  • A hard text to follow by ear
  • The print crowds think highly of it

For the recording

  • The voice and the book are received about level
  • 6,174 listeners behind it

So the case for the page won it clearly.

A bigger dot counted for more: the voice and the ear are sized by their share of the sum above, the other two by how much stands behind them. A hatched square is a reason that did not apply here, which is not the same as one that counted for little.

Evidence
1.00How much of the picture we actually have, out of 1.00: four questions, each answered as far as the source could answer it, less anything taken off for reading fewer reviews than we aim to.The reading6,174 people have rated this reading: as good as it getsThe second sourceHardcover knows this book, with 775 readers there: as good as it getsThe matchHow sure we are that the recording we scored is this book: as good as it getsThe reviewsWe read 300 reviews to judge how demanding it is: as good as it gets

What each crowd complains about

We would need 40 reviews from each crowd before setting the two side by side, and only 26 of the reviews we read said they listened to it. So we are not drawing this one.

What the two crowds said

Showing the stars as each shop prints them. The two crowds are not measured from the same place: on our shelf Audible’s listeners average 0.35 of a star above Goodreads’ readers, so a recording that is ordinary for Audible can still out-star a book that is genuinely well liked for Goodreads. Switch the toggle to take that difference off.Showing each figure as its distance from its own crowd’s middle on our shelf, in standard deviations, so 0 is a typical book for that crowd. Listeners start 0.35 of a star up, partly because anyone who finishes a twenty-five-hour recording chose it deliberately, and this takes that off. It is not a claim that audio is better, the story figure is still Audible’s own (people rating a story they heard), and none of it moves the verdict above.

4.59·Audible
overallAudible
overall, pooled by the shop, so we hold no ruler for it
73%5 stars: 73 per cent, 5,073 ratings
17%4 stars: 17 per cent, 1,171 ratings
6%3 stars: 6 per cent, 435 ratings
2%2 stars: 2 per cent, 136 ratings
1%1 stars: 1 per cent, 103 ratings

6,918 ratings · performance and story, as the shop pools them

4.70+0.34 sdAudible
the performanceAudible
the performance, against Audible’s own crowd
80%5 stars: 80 per cent, 4,930 ratings
14%4 stars: 14 per cent, 870 ratings
4%3 stars: 4 per cent, 254 ratings
1%2 stars: 1 per cent, 74 ratings
1%1 stars: 1 per cent, 60 ratings

How often this goes badly2.2% of the people who rated the performance gave it one or two stars. About typical for the shelf. The middle of our shelf is 2.0%, and half of it falls between 1.0% and 3.1%.

134 of 6,188 listeners gave the performance one or two stars

The shape of the room

  • United, this one
  • Warm
  • Split
  • Lukewarm

A united room: 80% of the listeners gave the performance five stars. A room that agrees this far leaves little to gamble on.

6,188 ratings

4.56+0.11 sdAudible
the story, as heardAudible
the story, as heard, against Audible’s own crowd
73%5 stars: 73 per cent, 4,492 ratings
16%4 stars: 16 per cent, 1,002 ratings
7%3 stars: 7 per cent, 451 ratings
2%2 stars: 2 per cent, 133 ratings
2%1 stars: 2 per cent, 96 ratings

6,174 ratings

4.40+0.97 sdGoodreads
the book itselfGoodreads
the book itself, against Goodreads’ own crowd
59%5 stars: 59 per cent, 245,072 ratings
27%4 stars: 27 per cent, 110,488 ratings
11%3 stars: 11 per cent, 43,636 ratings
3%2 stars: 3 per cent, 11,121 ratings
1%1 stars: 1 per cent, 4,779 ratings

415,096 ratings

Every reading we hold

5 complete readings of it, and one call above for the book: the verdict is a claim about format, not about a voice. Which voice to press play on is the next question, and this is our answer to it. Below 250 ratings of the reading we name a recording and decline to rank it.

  • Constantine Gregoryour pick37h 04m29h 39m24h 43m21h 11m18h 32m · One voice · Audible UK and US

    Performance 4.70 · Story 4.56 · 6,174 rated the reading · 2.2% of the people who rated the performance gave it one or two stars

    Hear it · Audible’s clip, its length read from them on load

  • Ben Milestoo few ratings to judge42h 16m33h 49m28h 11m24h 09m21h 08m · One voice · Audible UK

    Only 26 people have rated this reading, short of our published bar of 250, so we name it and print no scores for it.

    Hear it · Audible’s clip, its length read from them on load

  • Bruce Peerytoo few ratings to judge39h 13m31h 22m26h 09m22h 25m19h 37m · One voice · Audible UK

    Only 3 people have rated this reading, short of our published bar of 250, so we name it and print no scores for it.

    Hear it · Audible’s clip, its length read from them on load

  • Frederick Davidsontoo few ratings to judge34h 52m27h 54m23h 15m19h 55m17h 26m · One voice · Audible UK

    Only 72 people have rated this reading, short of our published bar of 250, so we name it and print no scores for it.

    Hear it · Audible’s clip, its length read from them on load

  • Gabriel Woolftoo few ratings to judge37h 50m30h 16m25h 13m21h 37m18h 55m · One voice · Audible UK

    Only 42 people have rated this reading, short of our published bar of 250, so we name it and print no scores for it.

    Hear it · Audible’s clip, its length read from them on load

1 other listing we set aside, listed with the reason for eacheach one is sold as this book and is not a complete reading of it
  • John de Lancie, Sharron Gless, Arye Gross, Harry Hamlin, Kaitlin Hopkins, Joseph Mascolo, Tom Virtue2h 15m1h 48m1h 30m1h 17m1h 08m · 5 ratingsNot a straight reading of the book

The recording we mean

Runtime
37h 04m at 1×
Read by
Constantine Gregory
Kind
One voice
ASIN
B00EZANR7Y · Audible UK
Rated in
Audible UK and US · 891 + 5,297 ratings of the performance
Judged on
6,174 ratings of the narration
Published
Naxos AudioBooks · 2012

Audible sorts a search by newest, so ours may not be the first one you are offered. The runtime is the check: if the one in front of you says 37h 04m, that is the reading these numbers describe. “Judged on” is the crowd behind every judgement we make about this reading: the smaller of the performance and story counts, which is why it is a little under the two shop counts added. We do not link out to a shop, and we take nothing if you buy there.