Audiobook Review — Bambi: The Story of Life in the Forest by Felix Salten

With a preface read by John Chancer.

Most of us think we know the story of Bambi - but do we? The Original Bambi is an all-new translation of a literary classic that presents the story as it was meant to be told. For decades, audiences’ images of Bambi have been shaped by the 1942 Walt Disney film - an idealized look at a fawn who represents nature’s innocence - which was based on a 1928 English translation of a novel by the Austrian Jewish writer Felix Salten. This masterful new translation gives contemporary audiences a fresh perspective on this moving allegorical tale and provides important details about its creator.

Originally published in 1923, Salten’s story is more somber than the adaptations that followed it. Life in the forest is dangerous and precarious, and Bambi learns important lessons about survival as he grows to become a strong, heroic stag. Jack Zipes’ introduction traces the history of the book’s reception and explores the tensions that Salten experienced in his own life - as a hunter who also loved animals, and as an Austrian Jew who sought acceptance in Viennese society even as he faced persecution.

Published in German in 1923, this coming-of-age story of a roebuck deer would soon become known around the world. Bambi is often seen as the first work of environmental literature, written by an author with a deep love for animals. Yet Felix Salten was also an Austro-Hungarian Jewish man in Vienna, striving for acceptance by the cultural elite. Just as Bambi must learn to survive alone in the forest, men lurking in the shadows, Salten had to navigate and endure the very real threats of antisemitism and fascism.

Salten’s bestseller was eclipsed by Disney’s 1942 animated classic, which warped the book’s thematic intentions and watered down its literary power. However, Jack Zipes’s new translation (Princeton University Press, 2023) – published one hundred years after Salten wrote the original – brings Bambi back to life. By leaning into the author’s anthropomorphism, Zipes helps makes it clear: this “animal story” is equally an allegory for the violence and suffering of humankind. And yet, as we also see here, it is possible for outsiders of all species to find transcendence in a cruel but beautiful world.

GENRE: Classic / Literary Fiction

PURCHASE LINK: Audrey

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Felix Salten (born Sept. 6, 1869, Budapest—died Oct. 8, 1945, Zürich) was an Austrian novelist and journalist, author of the children’s classic and adult allegory Bambi, a sensitively told subjective story of the life of a wild deer.

As a self-taught young writer he was befriended by Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Arthur Schnitzler, and Hermann Bahr. A journalist at 18, he became an influential theatre critic. He lived in Vienna until, as a Jew, he was forced to flee in 1939; he then settled in Switzerland.

Bambi (1923), the book that brought him international fame, is a realistic, although anthropomorphized, account of a deer from his birth to his final role as a wise and tough old denizen of the forest, struggling with dignity to survive against his chief enemy, man the hunter. The close parallel between the fawn becoming a stag and a human child becoming an adult gives the book its moral overtone. In 1934 Salten published another popular children’s book, Florian, the Emperor’s Stallion, the tale of a proud Lipizzaner horse who is reduced to pulling a cab after World War I.

Review

I've mentioned before, in my review of Camille by Alexandre Dumas fils, that I've always struggled with classics. I did, however, find that consuming classics via audio was the way to go, so I gave another one a try — and this time it's Bambi via Audrey, an audiobook app.

I'm not going to lie: to me, the book had a very National Geographic feel in audio, especially with Peter Marinker's narration and the notes, guides and additional material provided by Audrey. I enjoyed it a lot more because of the supplements, actually, so I'm going to have to give a shoutout to the Audrey team too for the fantastic add-ons. Highly recommended!

Anyway, the story is much darker than the Disney version, which doesn't really come as a surprise. Neither nature nor life in the forest is romanticized, although there are heartwarming and humorous moments too. Humans aren't spared by the narrative either, but I think we all knew that coming in. And sure, we're following a deer, but the parallels of a human coming-of-age story are there as well. This book definitely got me reflecting about life and our place in nature.

My Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

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About Audrey

Audrey is an audiobook app where a curated library of classic novels, novellas and short stories are paired with an expert guide and an illustrator. The guide, in this case, Shauna Laurel Jones, offers insightful multi-media notes on the book after each chapter, including historical context, author info, personal reflections, discussion questions, photos, a Spotify playlist and more. All books on Audrey come with chapter recaps and character descriptions too.

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Hi! I'm Marie, a Filipino SFFH author and book reviewer currently based in the UK. I’m the co-author of The Prophecies of Ragnarok, a Norse myth new adult urban fantasy trilogy, and I also have several short stories published in anthologies and literary journals.

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If you fancy a short read, I have a cozy reimagining of the Norse myths about Hel, but it's just under 70 pages and can be read in one sitting. ✨

All things end, and all must die.

But death is not always the end.

When Geiravor Lokisdottir was stripped of her name and cast out of Asgard, torn from her family and the life she had known, she thought she’d lost it all. But in the shadows of Niflheim she discovers the path to her destiny, and what it truly means to be queen.

This is a prequel short story to THE PROPHECIES OF RAGNAROK trilogy by Meri Benson and Marie Sinadjan, and a retelling of the myths involving Hel, the Norse goddess of death and the queen of the underworld.