Confessions of a Thug cover art

Confessions of a Thug

Preview

£0.00 for first 30 days

Try for £0.00
Thousands of incredible audiobooks and podcasts to take wherever you go.
Immerse yourself in a world of storytelling with the Plus Catalogue - unlimited listening to thousands of select audiobooks, podcasts and Audible Originals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Confessions of a Thug

By: Philip M. Taylor
Narrated by: Sanjiv Jhaveri
Try for £0.00

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically.

Buy Now for £21.99

Buy Now for £21.99

Confirm Purchase
Pay using card ending in
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.
Cancel

About this listen

Confessions of a Thug is an English novel written by Philip Meadows Taylor in 1839 based on the Thuggee cult in British India.This book is a tale of crime and retribution. Set in 1832 in India, the story lays bare the practices of the Thugs, or deceivers as they were called, who lived in boats and used to murder those passengers whom they were able to entice into their company in their voyages up and down the rivers.

Confessions of a Thug went on to become a best seller in 19th-century Britain. The book also became one of Queen Victoria's favourite novels. The story of the Thuggee cult was popularized by Confessions of a Thug, leading to the Hindi word "thug" entering the English language.

Public Domain (P)2011 Audible, Inc.
Classics Crime Thrillers Thriller Fiction Suspense Cult
activate_Holiday_promo_in_buybox_DT_T2

Listeners also enjoyed...

The Betrothed cover art
Beau Geste cover art
Marie cover art
Life and Adventures of Jack Engle cover art
Micromegas and Other Short Fictions cover art
The Brothers Karamazov cover art
Fresh Floods cover art
The Count of Monte Cristo cover art
The Cat of Bubastes cover art
In the Reign of Terror cover art
Dracula [Audible Edition] cover art
Queen Margot cover art
The Flight of the Heron cover art
Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship cover art
The Arabian Nights Entertainments cover art
The Betrothed cover art

Editor reviews

The term thug is now synonymous, in English, with any type of criminal or violent lowlife. This is in large part due to Englishman Philip M. Taylor’s tale of crime and murder based on his knowledge of the Thuggee cult in India. To modern ears the narrative at times feels dated and xenophobic, but Taylor did have a genuine interest in India and extensive knowledge of the culture, here chronicling what was a real and dangerous phenomenon. The tale itself is, of course, entertaining in its own right, told under the guise of a true confession. Sanjiv Jhaveri gives a gripping performance accenting the complacence of its narrator’s unapologetic recollections his of life of ritualistic crimes among organized, devoted killers.

What listeners say about Confessions of a Thug

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1
  • 4 Stars
    1
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Performance
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Awful and fantastic!

This story is captivating from first to last. It's something like a grisly novel combined with a true crime narrative, as a huge part of it is derived from factual sources. It's beautifully written and very descriptive of manners, places, people, tribes, cities and so on. Anyone familiar with the places in modern times, or being a traveller along those roads, can appreciate this old story has the aroma of truth and experience. The author achieves that amazing thing of presenting you with a terrible and amoral main character and by turns tricking you into sympathising with him and then recoiling from his horrible mentality and deeds. And then doing it again! And again! It's sometimes hard to remember that the author was writing in the 1830s as it is hard hitting and uncompromising and rather slyly funny and non-judgemental in places, in ways that we're more used to finding in edgy, modern works. The narration is really good, a rare thing in an Anglo Indian audio book. I'd go so far as to say beautifully read. This is one of the longest audio books I've listened to and I went through it with hardly a break!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!