Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of The Oxford Translators' Revolution

R. F. Kuang

Aug 2022 · HarperAudio · Narrated by Chris Lew Kum Hoi and Billie Fulford-Brown

About this audiobook

From award-winning author R. F. Kuang comes Babel, a thematic response to The Secret History and a tonal retort to Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell that grapples with student revolutions, colonial resistance, and the use of language and translation as the dominating tool of the British empire.

Traduttore, traditore: An act of translation is always an act of betrayal.

1828. Robin Swift, orphaned by cholera in Canton, is brought to London by the mysterious Professor Lovell. There, he trains for years in Latin, Ancient Greek, and Chinese, all in preparation for the day he’ll enroll in Oxford University’s prestigious Royal Institute of Translation—also known as Babel.

Babel is the world's center for translation and, more importantly, magic. Silver working—the art of manifesting the meaning lost in translation using enchanted silver bars—has made the British unparalleled in power, as its knowledge serves the Empire’s quest for colonization.

For Robin, Oxford is a utopia dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge. But knowledge obeys power, and as a Chinese boy raised in Britain, Robin realizes serving Babel means betraying his motherland. As his studies progress, Robin finds himself caught between Babel and the shadowy Hermes Society, an organization dedicated to stopping imperial expansion. When Britain pursues an unjust war with China over silver and opium, Robin must decide...

Can powerful institutions be changed from within, or does revolution always require violence? 

Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.

Ratings and reviews

Babel explores the colonialism and imperialism of the 1800s through a magically realist world. The heartwarming moments are foiled against the stark reality of life for even privileged non-white people of the time, giving the text both a warm and gut-wrenching inevitability as the plot progresses. Kuang depicts both a fantastic and painful Oxford, and gives us a picture of the exploitation of England while simultaneously stringing the reader along with hope. A delightful and emotional book delivered by excellent readers, I highly recommend giving it a listen.

I think this book is fantastic! I found the mechanisms of the story to be unique and an enthralling take on the harms of colonization, appropriation, and most especially the harm and pain if white feminism. Additionally, the characters are well developed which enhances the experience. Lastly, it was a special treat to have the multiple narrators included for accurate pronunciation. I definitely recommend listening to it!!

Too long and too good. Put me through horrible twists and then ... As a contrafactual look at the brit empire class system in the 1830s and forced free trade of opium in China, there is much to reflect upon.

About the author

Rebecca F. Kuang is the #1 New York Times and #1 Sunday Times bestselling author of the Poppy War trilogy, Babel: An Arcane History, and Yellowface. Her work has won the Nebula, Locus, Crawford, and British Book Awards. A Marshall Scholar, she has an MPhil in Chinese Studies from Cambridge and an MSc in Contemporary Chinese Studies from Oxford. She is now pursuing a PhD in East Asian Languages and Literatures at Yale, where she studies diaspora, contemporary Sinophone literature, and Asian American literature.