Which Tale of Two Cities recording should you buy?
The complete readings of A Tale of Two Cities that we list run 13 hrs 39 mins to 17 hrs 57 mins. Some readers also have abridgements under the same title, and the BBC productions sold beside them run a fraction of that length although Audible's catalogue marks every one of them unabridged.
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Short answer
Simon Callow: complete and solo, part of The Audible Dickens Collection. Julian Rhind-Tutt, Miriam Margolyes, Andrew Sachs and the other complete readings in the table run 13 hrs 39 mins to 17 hrs 57 mins; choose on voice. Martin Jarvis and Anton Lesser each have a complete reading and an abridgement on sale, so read the runtime before you buy. The BBC productions — one with Charles Dance, one with Alison Steadman and Robert Lindsay, and a radio drama with Khalid Abdalla — are cast recordings, not readings, though the catalogue marks them all unabridged. The AI Voice Bob edition is a synthetic voice.
The recordings, compared
| Narrator | Length | Type | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Simon Callow Our pick | 15 hrs | Unabridged | Complete and solo. Part of The Audible Dickens Collection. |
| Martin Jarvis | 14 hrs 18 mins | Unabridged | Complete and solo. The same reader has an abridgement under the same title, below. |
| Julian Rhind-Tutt | 16 hrs 38 mins | Unabridged | Complete and solo, the Penguin Classics edition. |
| Miriam Margolyes | 17 hrs 57 mins | Unabridged | Complete and solo. |
| Anton Lesser | 14 hrs 41 mins | Unabridged | Complete and solo, from Naxos. The same reader has a Naxos abridgement, below. |
| Andrew Sachs | 14 hrs 18 mins | Unabridged | Complete and solo. |
| Simon Prebble | 14 hrs 42 mins | Unabridged | Complete and solo. |
| Simon Vance | 13 hrs 39 mins | Unabridged | Complete and solo. |
| Frank Muller | 13 hrs 57 mins | Unabridged | Complete and solo. |
| Buck Schirner | 17 hrs 9 mins | Unabridged | Complete and solo. Listed as the AmazonClassics Edition. |
| AI Voice Bob | 16 hrs 20 mins | AI narration (Virtual Voice) | The text read by a synthetic voice: Audible's catalogue flags it as a Virtual Voice title. |
| Charles Dance and a full cast | 6 hrs 23 mins | BBC full-cast dramatisation, marked unabridged | A BBC radio drama, dramatised by Nick McCarty, at 47% of the shortest complete reading here. Marked unabridged in Audible's catalogue; it is a play, not a complete reading. |
| Alison Steadman, Robert Lindsay and a full cast | 3 hrs 40 mins | BBC full-cast dramatisation, marked unabridged | Another BBC radio drama, dramatised by Mike Walker, also marked unabridged, at 27% of the shortest complete reading. |
| Khalid Abdalla, Lara Sawalha, Phil Davis and a full cast | 2 hrs 49 mins | BBC full-cast dramatisation | A radio play: subtitled "A BBC Radio Full-Cast Drama". |
| Anton Lesser | 3 hrs 51 mins | Abridged | ABRIDGED: the same reader and publisher as the complete Naxos reading above. |
| Tom Baker | 2 hrs 50 mins | Abridged | Abridged. |
| Martin Jarvis | 2 hrs 23 mins | Abridged | ABRIDGED: the same reader as the complete Audible Studios reading above. |