The Bridge of San Luis Rey - Thornton Wilder

Category: Classic, Historical Fiction, Literature
Language: English
Keywords: 1700's Multiple POVs Peru

Written by Thornton Wilder
Read by Sam Waterston
Format: MP3
Bitrate: 160 Kbps
Unabridged

(Cheers to Ants261 and jodindy for already posting great narrations for this novel. Please check them out! This version is interesting for being read by actor Sam Waterston, a powerhouse in stage and film, albeit arguably most known for his television presence, starring in Law & Order for a nearly 20-year run [combined between its first iteration and revival].)

The Bridge of San Luis Rey, Thornton Wilder’s second novel, won him the first of his three Pulitzer Prizes. The novel opens in the aftermath of an inexplicable tragedy-a tiny footbridge in Peru breaks, and five travelers hurtle to their deaths. Most townspeople think to themselves with secret joy, “Within 10 minutes myself….” But for Brother Juniper, a humble Franciscan friar who witnesses the catastrophe, the question is inescapable: Why those five? Suddenly, Brother Juniper is committed to discover what manner of lives these five disparate people led-and whether it was divine intervention that took their lives, or a capricious fate. Wilder maintained in his works that true meaning and beauty are found in ordinary experience. This is especially true of The Bridge of San Luis Rey. From the very beginning to the stunning conclusion, the listener is absorbed into the individual stories of the five victims, and how their destinies intertwine.

November 27 2002
3 hrs and 42 mins