The Bridge of San Luis Rey, Thornton Wilder
The Bridge of San Luis Rey, Thornton Wilder
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The Bridge of San Luis Rey

Author: Thornton Wilder

Narrator: Gary MacFadden

Unabridged: 3 hr 40 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 06/13/2023

Synopsis

Five people are killed when a heavily-traveled rope bridge in Peru collapses. Brother Juniper, a Franciscan friar, witnesses this event and this sets him on a quest: Who were each of these individuals? Why do unfortunate events happen to innocent or undeserving people? What led to these people being on the bridge at the fateful moment?While many view this novel as a serious reflection on life, death, and love, this narration highlights Wilder’s tongue-in-cheek stance, suggesting the author used humor, irony, and even sarcasm to examine faith, fate, and chance. Throughout the story, Wilder unleashes gentle sarcasm on the Catholic Church, the Peruvian administration, and Spanish American culture in general.In 1998 The Bridge of San Luis Rey was selected by the editorial board of the American Modern Library as one of the 100 best novels of the twentieth century.

About Thornton Wilder

Thornton Wilder (1897–1975) was an accomplished novelist and playwright whose works, exploring the connection between the commonplace and cosmic dimensions of human experience, continue to be read and produced around the world. His novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey won the Pulitzer Prize in 1928, as did two of his four full-length dramas: Our Town and The Skin of Our Teeth. Wilder’s The Matchmaker was adapted as the musical Hello, Dolly!. He also enjoyed enormous success with many other forms of the written and spoken word, among them teaching, acting, the opera, and cinema. His screenplay for Hitchcock’s Shadow of a Doubt remains a classic psycho-thriller to this day. Wilder’s many honors include the Gold Medal for Fiction from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and the National Book Committee’s Medal for Literature.

About Gary MacFadden

Gary MacFadden is a voice talent based in western Montana, USA. He works in commercial, e-learning, explainer videos, and audiobooks. Gary has narrated and produced over forty audiobooks, and has produced another dozen books for other narrators. 

Reviews

Goodreads review by Vit on March 29, 2025

The Bridge of San Luis Rey is a beautifully written book full of eternal questions. If there were any plan in the universe at all, if there were any pattern in a human life, surely it could be discovered mysteriously latent in those lives so suddenly cut off. Either we live by accident and die by acc......more

Goodreads review by Henry on October 24, 2024

On the 20th of July, 1714, in the Spanish colony of Peru five people descended to eternity when they fell into an enormous abyss. Ironically as colorful birds sung sweetly nearby a beautiful scene of snowy mountains far away seen, and green vegetation with pretty trees below. The noon collapse of th......more

Goodreads review by Emily May on September 19, 2016

"Some say that we shall never know, and that to the gods we are like the flies that the boys kill on a summer day, and some say, on the contrary, that the very sparrows do not lose a feather that has not been brushed away by the finger of God." You might think a book so focused on God and faith w......more

Goodreads review by Valeriu on August 02, 2023

O meditație asupra relației dintre hazard și necesitate: totul se petrece pentru că așa a vrut Dumnezeu sau totul se petrece la întîmplare? În data de 20 iulie 1714, în amiaza unei zile de vineri, puntea de rafie - zisă a Sfîntului rege Ludovic - se rupe și 5 oameni pier. A fost un hazard sau lucrare......more

Goodreads review by Olga on January 23, 2025

It was difficult put down this book, maybe because its subject is love in a broader sense. Or maybe because it is so beautifully written with vividly portrayed characters that it was a sheer pleasure to read. With the help of his elegant prose through the characters' life stories the author poses a l......more

Awards

  • Pulitzer Prize
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