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Jefferson
I love listening to or reading books--especially fantasy, science fiction, children's, classics, & historical.
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More"“Oh, Ford, Ford Ford, I Wish I Had ..."
Brave New World is a bitterly funny and humorously tragic dystopian novel in which Aldous Huxley satirizes modern civilization’s obsession with consumerism, sensual pleasure, popular culture entertainment, mass production, and eugenics. His far future world limits individual freedom in exchange for communal happiness via mass culture arts like “feelies” (movies with sensual immersion), the state-produced feel-good drug soma, sex-hormone gum, popular sports like “obstacle golf,” and the assembly line chemical manipulation of ova and fetuses so as to decant from their bottles babies perfectly suited for their destined castes and jobs, babies who are then mentally conditioned to become satisfied workers and consumers who believe that everyone belongs to everyone. In a way it’s more horrible than the more obviously brutal and violent repression of individuals by totalitarian systems in dystopias like George Orwell’s 1984, because Huxley’s novel implies that people are happy being mindless cogs in the wheels of economic production as long as they get their entertainments and new goods.
Michael York does a great job reading the novel, his voice oozing satire for the long opening tour of the Hatchery and Conditioning Centre, and then modifying in timbre and dialect for the various characters, among them the self-centered brooder Bernard Marx, the budding intellectual poet Helmholtz Howard, the sexy, sensitive, and increasingly confused Lenina Crowne, the spookily understanding Resident World Controller of Western Europe Mustapha Mond, and especially the good-natured, sad, and conflicted Shakespearean quoting “savage” John.
I had never read this classic of dystopian science fiction, so I’m glad to have listened to this excellent audiobook, because it is entertaining and devastating in its depiction of human nature and modern civilization, especially timely in our own brave new Facebook world. -
More"What's a Lonely Creature to Do?"
The three readers are well-suited to their roles. Simon Templeman is sensitive and vigorous as the frame-narrator, the idealistic and lonely explorer Walton, Anthony Heald is fragile and feverish as the self-pitying, obsessed, and played-out Frankenstein, and Stefan Rudnicki is baritone and bare as the rational, wronged, and vengeful Creature.
And what a fascinating, nightmarish, sublime, melodramatic, elegant, and surprising novel it is! Told by letters and interviews and by narratives inside narratives, glossing over the science and diving into the morality of the creation of artificial life, exploring the glories and dangers of the heroic (and tragic) quests for knowledge and discovery, expressing the best and worst of human nature, laying bare the sadness of loss and alienation. If, at times, I feel like slapping Frankenstein out of his self-centered wallows in guilty misery, the Creature's autobiography is compelling, and the scenes on the Arctic ice are terrific. And Mary Shelley often effectively builds up and then thwarts or shocks reader expectations. The novel has little in common with most movie adaptations of it, but it is well worth listening to so as to experience the source of so much popular culture Frankenstein material, as well as a representative example of the Romantic era. -
More"Passionate, Poetic, Bloody, Heroic,..."
The Story of the Volsungs is a classic Icelandic saga, written in the 13th century from much older oral fragments of songs. Eirikr Magnusson and William Morris’ 1888 translation of the saga is fast-paced, coherent, heroic, tragic, and darkly beautiful. It is mostly prose, but includes many passages of poetry or songs. It influenced H. Rider Haggard’s The Saga of Eric Brighteyes, J. R. R. Tolkien’s oeuvre (especially the Silmarillion), and Poul Anderson’s The Broken Sword. If you like such tragic fantastic adventure fiction, if you are interested in Norsemen (Vikings!), or if you enjoy reading epics for their insights into human nature and their windows into different cultures, you should listen to this audiobook.
It begins with a useful 48-minute introduction by H. Halliday Sparling about the historical, religious, political, and cultural context of the Norsemen and of their sagas, which is followed by an 8-minute preface by Magnusson and Morris about their translation.
The saga depicts the interrelated fates of two great Norse families, the Volsungs and the Guikings. From the opening sequence, in which Sigi, grandfather of Volsung, kills a thrall who outperforms him in hunting and then hides his body in a snowdrift, the people in the saga are prey to overwhelming ambition, pride, envy, love, and hate. So there are plenty of battles, with kings killing kings and heroes dealing death till their arms are “red with blood, even to the shoulders,” and murders, brothers killing brothers, sons fathers, and mothers children, with poison, sword, or fire. The Norns have already decided the people’s dooms.
There are also fantastic elements aplenty: men change into wolves, nightmares reveal disastrous futures, magic potions make men forget, magical swords are re-forged, Odin interferes with advice, boon, or doom, and so on. There are many great scenes, like Sigurd talking with a dragon about its cursed treasure or finding the sleep-spelled shield-maiden, Brynhild, “clad in a byrny as closely set on her as though it had grown to her flesh.” The characters are compelling because they’re so heroic and flawed. Any character might be loathsome one moment and admirable the next, or vice versa.
The saga is not an easy listen, because many characters’ names sound similar and because of the archaic Malory-esque language used by Morris to evoke a timeless and heroic age (so the free online text might be helpful). But there is a dark, spare, grand, and beautiful poetry in his translation, and reader Antony Ferguson treats the text with restraint and fluency, subtly highlighting its terse turns and beautiful flights and rich alliteration, as in the following excerpt:
"So Regin makes a sword, and gives it into Sigurd’s hands. He took the sword, and said—'Behold thy smithying, Regin!' and therewith smote it into the anvil, and the sword brake; so he cast down the brand, and bade him forge a better."
I am very glad to have listened to this saga.
A Peek at Joseph R's Bookshelf
ESK
There are books of the same chemical composition as dynamite. The only difference is that a piece of dynamite explodes once, whereas a book explodes a thousand times. ― Yevgeny Zamyatin
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More"The Anthology of 'Music-Makers'"
6 of 6 helpful votesPoetic delight. Lyric ecstasy. Personally, it's the best collection of poems ever. Should you have any doubts about that, look at the list of poems and the narrators.
(Part I/Disc I)
1. Autumn from 4 Seasons/Capella Istropiltana - Stephen Gunzenhauser (conductor)
2. Shakespeare, Seven Ages from As You Like It, Act II Scene VII - Sir Ian McKellen
3. A Fancy - The Rose Consort Of Viols
4. Shakespeare, From All the world's a stage: Infant (excerpt) - Sir Ian McKellen
5. Thom Gunn, Baby Song - Catherine McCormack
6. Ann Stevenson, The Victory - Richard Jackson
7. Emily Dickinson, Surgeons - Gayle Hunnicutt
8. Shakespeare, Fancy from Merchant of Venice, Act III Scene 2 - Mark Rylance
9. Ogden Nash, Guppy - Prunella Scales
10. Edward Lear, Quangle Wangle's Hat - Connie Booth
11. Thomas Hood, I Remember, I Remember - Ralph Fiennes
12. William Allingham, The Fairies - Juliet Stevenson
13. Thomas Hood, A Parental Ode - Ralph Fiennes
14. Robert L. Stevenson, My Shadow - Stella Gonet
15. Edward Lear, The Owl and the Pussy Cat - John Cleese
16. A. A. Milne, Sneezles - Andrew Sachs
17. Lewis Carroll, The Walrus and the Carpenter - Joss Ackland w/ Peter Bayliss
18. Ted Hughes, Jellyfish - Leo Sayer
19. G.K. Chesterton, The Donkey - Emma Fielding
20. Anonymous (or Christopher Isherwood?), The Common Cormorant - Andrew Sachs
21. R.L. Stevenson, Where Go the Boats - Stella Gonet
22. Ted Hughes, Crab - Leo Sayer
23. A.A. Milne, The End - Catherine McCormack
24. Midsummer Nights Dream (Uphill Down Dale) - Barry Wordsworth (conductor)
25. Shakespeare, From All the world's a stage: School - Sir Ian McKellen
26. R.L. Stevenson, To Any Reader - John Sessions
27. Dylan Thomas, Under Milk Wood - Ioan Gruffudd
28. Vernon Watkins, The Collier - Ioan Gruffudd
29. Shel Silverstein, Sick - Catherine McCormack
30. John Whitworth, Boring - John Cleese
31. John Whittier, From The Barefoot Boy - Jenny Agutter
32. Full Fathom Five from Tempest, Act I Scene 2 - Dame Glenda Jackson
33. Oscar Wilde, Rosa Mystica - Michael Williams
34. Rudyard Kipling, A Smuggler's Song - Michael Caine
35 C. Day Lewis, Walking Away - Timothy West
36 Hilaire Belloc, Tarantella - Terence Stamp
37 T.S. Eliot, Macavity - David Suchet
38 Rudyard Kipling, If - Michael Caine
39 Shakespeare, From Hamlet: This Above All - Michael Maloney
40. M. George Whitehead and His Almand - performed by Rose Consort Of Viols
41. Shakespeare, From All the World's a Stage: Lover - Sir Ian McKellen
42. W.B. Yeats, The Arrow - Art Malisk
43. H.W. Longfellow, The Arrow and the Song - HRH The Duchess Of Kent
44. Rabindranath Tagore, They Who Are Near to Me - Art Malik
45. Christina Rossetti, The First Day - Felicity Kendal
46. T.L. Beddoes, From The Song of Torrismond - Janet Suzman
47. R.S. Bridges, My Delight and Thy Delight - Ralph Fiennes
48. E.B. Browning, Sonnet 43 - Hannah Gordon
49. R. Kipling, The Virginity - Terence Stamp
50. P.B. Shelley, The Longest Journey - Samuel West
51. Anonymous, We Have Known Treasure - Charles Dance
52. Shakespeare, Sonnet 138 - Robert Lindsay
53. C. Rossetti, Echo - Dame Glenda Jackson
54. R. Tagore, Delusions I Did Cherish - Art Malik
55. Shakespeare, Sonnet 18 - Dame Glenda Jackson
56. A. E. Housman, When I Was One-And-Twenty - Pete Postlethwaite
57. W. B. Yeats, The Mermaid - Juliet Stevenson
58. Robert Herrick, Upon the Nipples of Julia's Breast - Terence Stamp
59. Robert Burns, My Love Is Like a Red, Red Rose - John Sessions
60. Shakespeare, Sonnet 116 - Robert Lindsay
61. D. H. Lawrence, New Year's Eve - Michael Maloney
62. D. H. Lawrence, Green - Michael Maloney
63. John Keats, A Thing of Beauty Is a Joy Forever - Mark Rylance
(Part II/Disc II)
1. Stravinsky: A Soldier's Tale - Nicholas Ward (conductor)
2. Shakespeare, From All the world's a stage: Soldier - Sir Ian McKellen
3. Shakespeare, Prologue from King Henry 5 - Mark Rylance
4. Julian Grenfell, Into Battle - Juliet Stevenson
5. W. B. Yeats, An Irish Airman Foresees His Death - William Houston
6. James Russell Lowell, Once to Every Man and Nation - Dame Judi Dench
7. Seamus Heaney, Whatever You Say, Say Nothing - William Houston
8. John McCrea, In Flanders Fields - Robert Powell
9. Vera Brittain, Perhaps - Dame Judi Dench
10. Wilfred Owen, Anthem for Doomed Youth - Robert Powell
11. Wilfred Owen, Dulce at Decorum Est / Lord Owen
12. Eva Dobell, Pluck - Felicity Kendal
13. W. H. Auden, From In Memory of W.B. Yeats - Art Malik
14. John Jarmain, At a War Grave - Michael Malony
15. John Jarmain, El Alamein - Michael Malony
16. Ruth Fainlight, Handbag - Prunella Scales
17. Elsie Cawser , Salvage Song - Michael Maloney
18. Rudyard Kipling, England - Michael Caine
19. Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach - Michael Williams
20. Dan Pagis, Written With a Pencil in a Sealed Wagon - Janet Suzman
21. John Donne, No Man Is an Island - Ed Bishop
22. Luis de Narvaez: Fantasia - Shirley Rumsey
23. Shakespeare, From All the World's a Stage: Wisdom - Sir Ian McKellen
24. Shakespeare, The Quality of Mercy from Merchant of Venice, Act IV Scene 1 - Ralph Fiennes
25. John Boyle O’Reilly , What Is Good - Dame Judi Dench
26. Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass - Art Malik
27. Anonymous, Addendum to the Ten Commandments - Michael Caine
28. Geoffrey Chaucer, From The Canterbury Tales: A Student - Emma Fielding
29. James Leigh Hunt, Abou Ben Adhem - Robert Powell
30. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Song of Hiawatha (excerpt) - Clarke Peters
31. William Wordsworth, My Heart Leaps Up - Robert Hardy
32. William Blake, Auguries of Innocence - Timothy West
33. William Blake, The Tyger - Timothy West
34. Emily Dickinson, Of All Souls That Stand Create - Gayle Hunnicutt
35. Percy Bysshe Shelley, Chorus of Spirits - Prunella Scales
36. Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Kubla Khan - Pete Postlethwaite
37. Robert Burns, A Man's a Man for A' That - John Sessions
38. Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken - John Cleese
39. Anonymous, The Bleed'n' Sparrer - Michael Caine
40. The King of Denmark's Galiard performed by the Rose Consort of Viols
41. Shakespeare, From All the World's a Stage: Sixth Age - Sir Ian McKellen
42. W. B. Yeats, Politics - Michael Caine
43. Ogden Nash, Peekaboo, I Almost See You - David Suchet
44. Ogden Nash, Samson Agonistes - David Suchet
45. John Masefield , Sea Fever - Terence Stamp
46. Emily Dickinson, Exultation - Gayle Hunnicutt
47. Morris Bishop, We Have Been Here Before - Charles Dance
48. Alfred, Lord Tennyson From The Brook - Janet Suzman
49. William Wordsworth, Upon Westminster Bridge - Robert Hardy
50. J. Wilmot, Earl of Rochester, A Song of a Young Lady to Her Ancient Lover - Janet Suzman
51. Robert Burns, John Anderson, My Jo - Stella Gonet
52. Stanley J. Sharples, In Praise of Cocoa, Cupid's Nightcap - Emma Fielding
53. Rudyard Kipling, The Way Through the Woods - Art Malik
54. Christina Rossetti, From Uphill - HRH The Duchess Of Kent
55. Shakespeare, From All the World's a Stage: Last Scene - Sir Ian McKellen
56. Dylan Thomas, Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night - Ioan Gruffudd
57. Christina Rossetti, Song - Jenny Agutter
58. Leo Marks, Code Poem for the French Resistance - Ralph Fiennes
59. Emily Dickinson, This World Is Not Conclusion - Gayle Hunnicutt
60. Robert Louis Stevenson, Requiem - John Sessions
61. Christina Rossetti, Sleeping at Last - Dame Judi Dench
62. Shakespeare, Fear No More from Cymbeline, Act IV Scene 2 - Sir Ian McKellen
63. John Banister Tabb, Evolution/Autumn from Four Seasons (Reprise) - Mark Rylance
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