Audiobooks by Alberto Manguel

Alberto Manguel (Author), William Merryn Hill (Narrator)

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An exploration of Maimonides, the medieval philosopher, physician, and religious thinker, author of The Guide of the Perplexed, from one of the world’s foremost bibliophiles Moses ben Maimon, or Maimonides (1138–1204), was born in Córdoba, Spain. The gifted son of a judge and mathematician, Maimonides fled Córdoba with his family when he was thirteen due to Almohad persecution of all non-Islamic faiths. Forced into a long exile, the family spent a decade in Spain before settling in Morocco. From there, Maimonides traveled to Palestine and Egypt, where he died at Saladin’s court. As a scholar of Jewish law, a physician, and a philosopher, Maimonides was a singular figure. His work in extracting all the commanding precepts of Jewish law from the Hebrew Bible and the Talmud, interpreting and commenting on them, and translating them into terms that would allow students to lead sound Jewish lives became the model for translating God’s word into a language comprehensible by all. His work in medicine—which brought him such fame that he became Saladin’s personal physician—was driven almost entirely by reason and observation. In this biography, Alberto Manguel examines the question of Maimonides’ universal appeal—he was celebrated by Jews, Arabs, and Christians alike. In our time, when the need for rationality and recognition of the truth is more vital than ever, Maimonides can help us find strategies to survive with dignity in an uncertain world.

Alberto Manguel (Author), John Lescault (Narrator)

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Mientras embalo mi biblioteca

Debido a una circunstancia desfavorable, el escritor Alberto Manguel debe embalar la biblioteca que ha cuidado y amado durante tantos años, instalada en la casa que habita en la campiña francesa. El viaje que nos depara este libro empieza ahí: con el autor despidiéndose del jardín amurallado, de su casa, del granero que albergaba los miles de libros que un amante de la lectura y los objetos que la posibilitan había reunido hasta entonces. El deber de guardar en cajas los ejemplares se presenta como una ocasión dolorosa, angustiante, para el escritor, pero también como un acicate para recordar con emoción y ternura las estaciones de su biografía marcadas por cada una de las bibliotecas que ha poseído (o lo han poseído a él), a lo largo de mudanzas, edades, países y vidas. Este paseo por el amor a los libros contiene, como cada libro de Manguel, una variedad de temas que van de lo literario a lo histórico, que visitan los estantes de la religión y la filosofía, y que terminan por decirnos que todo es un pretexto para adentrarse en páginas extraordinarias.

Alberto Manguel (Author), Gonzalo Moreno (Narrator)

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Packing My Library: An Elegy and Ten Digressions

In June 2015 Alberto Manguel prepared to leave his centuries-old village home in France's Loire Valley and reestablish himself in a one-bedroom apartment on Manhattan's Upper West Side. Packing up his enormous, 35,000-volume personal library, choosing which books to keep, store, or cast out, Manguel found himself in deep reverie on the nature of relationships between books and readers, books and collectors, order and disorder, memory and reading. In this poignant and personal reevaluation of his life as a reader, the author illuminates the highly personal art of reading and affirms the vital role of public libraries. Manguel's musings range widely, from delightful reflections on the idiosyncrasies of book lovers to deeper analyses of historic and catastrophic book events, including the burning of ancient Alexandria's library and contemporary library lootings at the hands of ISIS. With insight and passion, the author underscores the universal centrality of books and their unique importance to a democratic, civilized, and engaged society.

Alberto Manguel (Author), James Cameron Stewart (Narrator)

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Curiosity

Alberto Manguel's The History of Reading was an international bestseller translated into thirty-four languages and for which Manguel earned the MEdicis Prize. Fourteen years later, Manguel anchors his new book in the primal connection between reading and curiosity. Tracing twenty-five centuries of human history, from the fourth century BC to the present day, Manguel dedicates each of his chapters to a single character-ranging from our best-known thinkers, scientists, and artists to seemingly minor figures of whom we know little more than one inspired utterance-in whom he identifies a particular way of asking the question "Why?". Above all, he aims to "awake in readers a consciousness of their own powers of enquiry and imagination, of their right to doubt and contest assumed answers, and of their responsibility in furthering the questions our ancestors were asking far away and long ago."

Alberto Manguel (Author), John McDonough (Narrator)

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Homer's The Illiad and The Odyssey: A Biography

Alberto Manguel (Author), Michael Prichard (Narrator)

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