Try free for 30 days

  • If You Should Fail

  • A Book of Solace
  • By: Joe Moran
  • Narrated by: Ned Porteous
  • Length: 5 hrs and 28 mins
  • 4.3 out of 5 stars (4 ratings)

1 credit a month to use on any title, yours to keep (you’ll use your first credit on this title).
Stream or download thousands of included titles.
Access to exclusive deals and discounts.
$16.45 a month after 30 day trial. Cancel anytime.
If You Should Fail cover art

If You Should Fail

By: Joe Moran
Narrated by: Ned Porteous
Try for $0.00

$16.45 per month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for $21.99

Buy Now for $21.99

Pay using voucher balance (if applicable) then card ending in
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions Of Use and Privacy Notice and authorise Audible to charge your designated credit card or another available credit card on file.

Publisher's Summary

Brought to you by Penguin. 

Do you ever feel like a failure? 

Enter widely acclaimed observer of daily life Professor Joe Moran, not to tell you that everything will be all right in the end, but to reassure you that failure is an occupational hazard of being human. It's the small print in life's terms and conditions. 

Covering everything from examination dreams to fourth-placed Olympians, If You Should Fail is about how modern life, in a world of self-advertised success, makes us feel like failures, frauds and imposters. We need more narratives of failure and to see that not every failure can be made into a success - and that's OK.

As Moran shows, even the supremely gifted Leonardo da Vinci could be seen as a failure. Most artists, writers, sports stars and business people face failure. We all will and can learn how to live with it. To echo Virginia Woolf, beauty 'is only got by the failure to get it [...] by facing what must be humiliation - the things one can't do'.

Combining philosophy, psychology, history and literature, Moran's ultimately upbeat reflections on being human and his critique of how we live now offer comfort, hope - and solace.

©2020 Joe Moran (P)2020 Penguin Audio

Critic Reviews

"Joe Moran is the most perceptive and original observer of British life that we have." (Matthew Engel)

More from the same

What listeners say about If You Should Fail

Average Customer Ratings
Overall
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    3
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    1
  • 1 Stars
    0
Performance
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    3
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    1
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    3
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    1
  • 1 Stars
    0

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

In the spirit of reconciliation, Audible acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.