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William Shakespeare: Facts About His Life, Quotes, Poems, and Works in a Nutshell
- Narrated by: Chris Newman
- Length: 1 hr and 54 mins
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William Shakespeare: Facts About His Life, Quotes, Poems, and Works in a Nutshell
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Publisher's summary
William Shakespeare is the celebrated script writer of the most popular plays in the English language. By writing both tragedies, romances, and comedies in the 16th century, he made a name for himself and became successful in the art of drama.
Shakespeare’s life and decisions led to his acclaim, and in this audiobook, we will lay out some of the most significant changes in both his personal choices and his career. Despite of his financial debts, his complex family life, and his background, he was able to entertain his audiences both in his time and for centuries after his death.
I encourage you to use this brief study to become more aware and understanding of the historical challenges and successes in his time, and the value and symbolism in his plays.
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- By John Allred on 12-01-19
-
Wonder Woman Unbound
- The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine
- By: Tim Hanley
- Narrated by: Colby Elliott
- Length: 7 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 369
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 342
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Story4 out of 5 stars 338
This close look at Wonder Woman's history portrays a complicated heroine who is more than just a female Superman with a golden lasso and bullet-deflecting bracelets. The original Wonder Woman was ahead of her time, advocating female superiority and the benefits of matriarchy in the 1940s. At the same time, her creator filled the comics with titillating bondage imagery, and Wonder Woman was tied up as often as she saved the world.
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5 out of 5 stars
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facts about how Wonder Woman has been portrayed
- By Midwestbonsai on 07-25-16
By: Tim Hanley
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A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare
- 1599
- By: James Shapiro
- Narrated by: James Shapiro
- Length: 6 hrs and 28 mins
- Abridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 142
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 89
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 89
1599 was an epochal year for Shakespeare and England. During that year, Shakespeare wrote four of his most famous plays: Henry the Fifth, Julius Caesar, As You Like It, and, most remarkably, Hamlet; Elizabethans sent off an army to crush an Irish rebellion, weathered an Armada threat from Spain, gambled on a fledgling East India Company, and waited to see who would succeed their aging and childless queen.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Note!--Abridged version
- By Scott on 01-05-16
By: James Shapiro
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The Year of Lear
- Shakespeare in 1606
- By: James Shapiro
- Narrated by: Robert Fass
- Length: 11 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 185
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 160
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 156
In the years leading up to 1606, since the death of Queen Elizabeth and the arrival in England of her successor, King James of Scotland, Shakespeare's great productivity had ebbed, and it may have seemed to some that his prolific genius was a thing of the past. But that year, at age 42, he found his footing again, finishing a play he had begun the previous autumn - King Lear - then writing two other great tragedies, Macbeth and Antony and Cleopatra.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Detailed and satisfying
- By Tad Davis on 02-24-16
By: James Shapiro
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Shakespeare and the Resistance
- By: Clare Asquith
- Narrated by: Allan Corduner
- Length: 7 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 24
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 19
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 19
The 1590s were bleak years for England. The queen was old, the succession unclear, and the treasury empty after decades of war. Amid the rising tension, William Shakespeare published a pair of poems dedicated to the young Earl of Southampton: Venus and Adonis in 1593 and The Rape of Lucrece a year later. Although wildly popular during Shakespeare's lifetime, to modern readers both works are almost impenetrable. But in her enthralling new book, the Shakespearean scholar Clare Asquith reveals their hidden contents.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Excellent scholarship unveiling hidden history
- By Anonymous User on 07-03-23
By: Clare Asquith
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Before We Were Trans
- A New History of Gender
- By: Dr. Kit Heyam Ph.D
- Narrated by: Dr. Kit Heyam Ph.D
- Length: 8 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 53
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 48
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Story5 out of 5 stars 48
Before We Were Trans illuminates the stories of people across the globe, from antiquity to the present, whose experiences of gender have defied binary categories. Blending historical analysis with sharp cultural criticism, trans historian and activist Kit Heyam offers a new, radically inclusive trans history, chronicling expressions of trans experience that are often overlooked, like gender-nonconforming fashion and wartime stage performance. Heyam looks to the past to uncover new horizons for possible trans futures.
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5 out of 5 stars
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The history we need right now
- By Daniel Hebert on 04-11-23
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Heroes
- From Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar to Churchill and de Gaulle
- By: Paul Johnson
- Narrated by: James Adams
- Length: 11 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 66
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 43
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 41
In this enlightening and entertaining work, Johnson presents heroism through examples in history. From Alexander to Joan of Arc and George Washington to Marilyn Monroe, here are men and women from every age and corner of the world who have inspired and transformed their cultures and the world itself.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Interesting, but deeply flawed
- By Kennet on 12-27-07
By: Paul Johnson
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Rome and the Mediterranean Vol. 1
- The Histories
- By: Polybius
- Narrated by: Charlton Griffin
- Length: 10 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 172
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 132
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 132
Polybius wrote his Histories "to find out by what means and by what political system the entire world was brought under the domination of Rome." Within the short space of about 50 years Rome went from being a provincial leader of an Italian confederacy to become the Mistress of the Mediterranean. Polybius was one of the first historians to attempt to present history as a sequence of causes and effects, based upon a careful examination of tradition and a keen scrutiny of the facts.
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4 out of 5 stars
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You have to know what your are getting into
- By Dylan on 01-24-10
By: Polybius
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Shakespeare by Another Name
- The Life of Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford, the Man who Was Shakespeare
- By: Mark Anderson
- Narrated by: Simon Prebble
- Length: 10 hrs and 14 mins
- Abridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 148
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 115
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 115
Actor William Shaksper of Stratford had little education, never left England, and apparently owned no books. How could he have written the great plays and poetry attributed to him? Journalist Mark Anderson's biography offers tantalizing proof that Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, courtier, spendthrift, scholar, traveler, soldier, scoundrel, and writer, was the real "Shakespeare".
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5 out of 5 stars
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Brings the period to life
- By Dan on 01-15-06
By: Mark Anderson
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Socrates
- A Man for Our Times
- By: Paul Johnson
- Narrated by: John Curless
- Length: 4 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 161
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 138
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 140
Acclaimed historian and best-selling author Paul Johnson’s books have been translated into dozens of languages. In Socrates: A Man for Our Times, Johnson draws from little-known resources to construct a fascinating account of one of history’s greatest thinkers. Socrates transcended class limitations in Athens during the fifth century B.C. to develop ideas that still shape the way we think about the human body and soul, including the workings of the human mind.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Plat-Soc-Paul
- By Megasaurus on 11-17-12
By: Paul Johnson
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The Ugly Renaissance
- Sex, Greed, Violence, and Depravity in an Age of Beauty
- By: Alexander Lee
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 15 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 119
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 100
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Story4 out of 5 stars 99
Renowned as a period of cultural rebirth and artistic innovation, the Renaissance is cloaked in a unique aura of beauty and brilliance. Its very name conjures up awe-inspiring images of an age of lofty ideals in which life imitated the fantastic artworks for which it has become famous. But behind the vast explosion of new art and culture lurked a seamy, vicious world of power politics, perversity, and corruption that has more in common with the present day than anyone dares to admit.
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1 out of 5 stars
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Author falls into the pit he digs for others
- By Sean on 01-23-16
By: Alexander Lee
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The Western Canon
- The Books and School of the Ages
- By: Harold Bloom
- Narrated by: James Armstrong
- Length: 22 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 230
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 133
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 135
Harold Bloom explores our Western literary tradition by concentrating on the works of twenty-six authors central to the Canon. He argues against ideology in literary criticism; he laments the loss of intellectual and aesthetic standards; he deplores multiculturalism, Marxism, feminism, neoconservatism, Afrocentrism, and the New Historicism. Insisting instead upon "the autonomy of aesthetic," Bloom places Shakespeare at the center of the Western Canon.....
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5 out of 5 stars
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A personal and opinionated book on the Canon
- By Steffen on 07-23-12
By: Harold Bloom
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Constantine the Emperor
- By: David Potter
- Narrated by: Phil Holland
- Length: 11 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 86
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Performance3.5 out of 5 stars 78
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Story4 out of 5 stars 78
This year Christians worldwide will celebrate the 1700th anniversary of Constantine's conversion and victory at the Battle of the Milvian Bridge. No Roman emperor had a greater impact on the modern world than did Constantine. The reason is not simply that he converted to Christianity but that he did so in a way that brought his subjects along after him. Indeed, this major new biography argues that Constantine's conversion is but one feature of a unique administrative style that enabled him to take control of an empire beset by internal rebellions and external threats by Persians and Goths.
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4 out of 5 stars
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In this sign thou shalt conquer!
- By Darwin8u on 06-11-18
By: David Potter
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Les Misérables: Translated by Julie Rose
- By: Victor Hugo, Julie Rose - translator
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 60 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 3,552
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 3,165
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 3,178
One of the great classics of world literature and the inspiration for the most beloved stage musical of all time, Les Misérables is legendary author Victor Hugo’s masterpiece. This extraordinary English version by renowned translator Julie Rose captures all the majesty and brilliance of Hugo’s work. Here is the timeless story of the quintessential hunted man—Jean Valjean—and the injustices, violence, and social inequalities that torment him.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A Book that Made Me a Better Person
- By Jeff Diamond on 03-29-13
By: Victor Hugo, and others
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Confronting the Classics
- Traditions, Adventures and Innovations
- By: Mary Beard
- Narrated by: Lynne Jenson
- Length: 12 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 89
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Performance3.5 out of 5 stars 78
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Story4 out of 5 stars 77
One of the world's leading historians provides a revolutionary tour of the Ancient World, dusting off the classics for the twenty-first century. Mary Beard, drawing on thirty years of teaching and writing about Greek and Roman history, provides a panoramic portrait of the classical world, a book in which we encounter not only Cleopatra and Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar and Hannibal, but also the common people - the millions of inhabitants of the Roman Empire, the slaves, soldiers, and women.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Annoying narrator
- By Chris E on 02-27-15
By: Mary Beard
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The Spartans
- By: Paul Cartledge
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 8 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall3.5 out of 5 stars 250
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 137
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Story4 out of 5 stars 139
The Spartans of ancient Greece were a powerful and unique people, radically different from any civilization before or since. A society of warrior-heroes, they were living exemplars of self-sacrifice, community endeavor, and achievement against all odds, qualities that today signify the ultimate in heroism. Scholars even believe that Thomas More had Sparta specifically in mind when he coined the term "Utopia".
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1 out of 5 stars
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Not a place to go to learn about the Spartans
- By James on 10-22-07
By: Paul Cartledge