On Tyranny: Expanded Audio Edition: Updated with Twenty New Lessons from Russia's War on Ukraine

Timothy Snyder

Apr 2022 · Penguin Random House Audio · Narrated by Timothy Snyder

About this audiobook

The #1 New York Times bestseller, now in an expanded audiobook edition that includes detailed historical context for the democracy-threatening Ukrainian conflict and a call to action for modern times.

This edition includes the bestselling original essay collection On Tyranny, read by the author.

In this exclusive audiobook edition, which includes eight hours of new content, Snyder combines the original essays from On Tyranny with twenty new lessons that answer the questions everyone is asking about this war. With forays into history, he clarifies the causes of the Russian invasion and the meaning of Ukrainian resistance, and explains the war's connections to threats to democracy here in the United States and around the world. Linking past and present, speaking only from notes, he guides the listener into the larger moral universe of On Tyranny.    
 
This edition also includes On Tyranny, the bestselling essay collection that illustrates how various countries and governments have managed to protect against totalitarianism throughout history despite ever-present threats from many factions. Snyder cautions that unless we learn from these disruptive and disturbing occurrences, they will continue. This important call to arms and roadmap for resistance provides invaluable ideas for how we can preserve our freedoms in the uncertain years to come.

“Timothy Snyder reasons with unparalleled clarity, throwing the past and future into sharp relief. He has written the rare kind of book that can be read in one sitting but will keep you coming back to help regain your bearings.”—Masha Gessen, about On Tyranny

Ratings and reviews

This is a greatly expanded edition of the original text with quite extensive commentary on the history of Ukraine and Russia and especially the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. This expansion does greatly help to illustrate the original points in the rather short original text, but its greatest strength is the background it gives to Western audiences on the history of Ukraine and Russia, and the nature of Vladimir Putin's invasion. Putin has a sort of fascist ideology which many Ukrainians are calling рашизм, "ruscism"—a sort of Russian fascism, which Timothy Snyder analyzes extensively. This is essential audio "reading" for understanding the Russian war on Ukraine.

Today is the day to begin listening and not practice anticipatory obedience. Let's stop killing our fellow humans. Peace.

very informative

About the author

Timothy Snyder is the Richard C. Levin Professor of History and Global Affairs at Yale University and the author of The Road to Unfreedom, On Tyranny, Black Earth, and Bloodlands. His work has received the Hannah Arendt Prize, the Leipzig Book Prize for European Understanding, and an award in literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He lives in New Haven, Connecticut.