About this audiobook
This is the full text of Ambrose Bierce’s An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge (1890), read aloud word for word in about 23 minutes. The video highlights each word as it is spoken, so you can follow the original wording, and adds a who’s-who, five hard words and a short recap after each of 4 parts. The narration is a synthetic voice (Kokoro text-to-speech). The text comes from the public-domain Project Gutenberg edition, ebook 375, and nothing is cut.
Who is who
Peyton Farquhar: A planter in Alabama during the Civil War, and strongly for the Southern side. His wife: She waits at home with their children. The soldier at the gate: A visitor in gray who asks for water and talks about the bridge.
Five hard words
- Sentinel: A guard.
- Picket: A small post of soldiers watching an area.
- Secessionist: A supporter of the Southern states leaving the Union.
- Diminuendo: A sound that grows gradually softer.
- Apprise: To inform someone.
What happens: The bridge
A man stands on a railroad bridge in northern Alabama, his hands tied and a rope around his neck, with soldiers all around. He is a civilian, about thirty-five, and he looks like a planter. He thinks of his wife and children, and of freeing his hands and diving into the stream. Then the captain nods and the sergeant steps aside.
What happens: Peyton Farquhar
The man is Peyton Farquhar, a rich planter who fully supports the South. One evening a soldier in gray stops at his gate for water and says the Union army is repairing the railroads. He adds that a civilian caught interfering with them will be hanged. Farquhar asks about the Owl Creek bridge, and the soldier mentions a pile of dry driftwood against one pier. The soldier turns out to be a Federal scout.
What happens: In the water
Farquhar falls through the bridge, blacks out, and then finds himself in the river with his hands free. He swims for his life while the soldiers fire at him. He dives to dodge a volley, then a cannon shot, and then reaches the bank and runs into the forest.
What happens: The road home
Farquhar walks all day and into the night, thinking of his wife and children. At last he sees his own gate, and his wife coming to greet him. As he reaches for her, he feels a blow on the back of his neck. The last line says that Peyton Farquhar was dead, hanging beneath the bridge.
A note on the story
The last line is the point of the story, so we kept the recaps honest about it. Our reading, which is an opinion, is that it is worth a second read once you know it.
