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The Essential Dylan Thomas  By  cover art

The Essential Dylan Thomas

By: Dylan Thomas
Narrated by: Dylan Thomas, Richard Bebb, Jason Hughes, Richard Burton
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Publisher's summary

This varied, well-chosen selection brings onto one audiobook the best of Dylan Thomas. Here is the legendary recording of "Under Milk Wood", with Richard Burton and Richard Bebb as narrators; but here also are two radio productions he wrote before that great classic, and though interesting in their own right, they show how "Under Milk Wood" grew gradually in his imagination.

This collection includes "Under Milk Wood", "Return Journey to Swansea", and "And death shall ahve no dominion" and other poems. It also includes "Memories of Christmas", "The Peaches", "The Outing", "The Followers", "Do not go gentle into that good night", and other poems.

Thomas was a charismatic if idiosyncratic performer of his own poetry and stories and here is a representative selection.

Public Domain (P)2005 Naxos AudioBooks Ltd.

Critic reviews

  • 2005 Audie Award Nominee, Audiobook Adapted from Another Medium
2005 Audie Award Nominee, Audiobook Adapted from Another Medium

What listeners say about The Essential Dylan Thomas

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

As the swirling of water over pebbles in a stream

Dylan Thomas's rampant and enthralling wordplay, dancing impishly through the lives and loves of its characters with a roguish wink at their weaknesses, is here read as well as it was written. It swirls like a bubbling stream with an ebb and flow which matches its substance perfectly. With the lilt which only Welsh accents could give it, it is as close to music as poetry can be, glorying in one of the most musical accents in the English-speaking world, and the one in which it was originally given flesh and form. I cannot imagine it performed with more verve, subtlety and expressiveness.

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16 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

no usable chapters!

what an incredible collection, and so well read.

however, there is no way to find a poem you want in the audio without chapter markings! an unfortunate negligence.

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10 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

A Powerful Voice of the Emerald Isle

Dylan Thomas’ verse captures so many essential elements of the Irish Experience: its Streets and Lanes, Characters, Names, Jokes and Beautiful Natural Scenes.

You can hear its peoples’ joys and sorrows of living in this iconic Land. Their spirit shines through in every whisky soaked story. The trees, birds and other native creatures come alive in his Nature poems.

I listened to this book in the Audible Version, hearing in the voices of Thomas, Burton and other Native Celtic speakers, making the experience all the more powerful.

This True Irishman will not go gentle into that good night, but with a lassie under one arm and a glass of Jameson under the other. ME TOO!

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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

Bad table of contents ruins this

A book like this, which is a book of varied writings needs a table of contents that lists the individual pieces. If we want to hear a particular poem or story, we should be able to select that.

This laziness on the part of Audible really ruins the experience.

Dylan Thomas’ work is fabulous.

Dis this.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

to hear Dylan Thomas is sublime

his music winds and winds its way through each poem. it swirls into his amusing prose pieces. Dylan Thomas's work takes you in a voyage of heartache and humor

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