Free audiobooks

 

Cairo Trilogy, The: Episode 3

Author : Naguib Mahfouz

Performed By : Full-Cast Production

Publisher : BBC Audiobooks Ltd

Runtime : 1 hour

Categories : General
Dramatizations

Our Price : $7.49

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Omar Sharif leads an all-Egyptian cast in a three-parter recorded entirely in Egypt's capital...

Adapted from Naguib Mahfouz's novels, this is a gripping family saga, with a monstrous father, loving mother and their four children, set in seductive Cairo from 1917 to 1953 against a backdrop of political upheaval." --- The Times

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King Richard III

Author : William Shakespeare

Performed By : Full Cast Production

Publisher : Select Music & Distribution

Runtime : 3 hours 20 minutes

Categories : Shakespeare

Our Price : $15.49

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Kenneth Branagh heads an outstanding cast in playing one of Shakespeare's strongest characters.

The eighth production in the widely admired series of Shakespeare plays presented by Naxos AudioBooks in association with Cambridge University Press.

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Classic American Short Stories

Author : Various

Performed By : William Roberts

Publisher : Select Music & Distribution

Runtime : 2 hours 35 minutes

Categories : Short Stories
Classic Literature
Classics

Our Price : $11.99

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Five great American short story writers, dating from the turn of the 19th/20th centuries, are represented here. Different in atmosphere and writing style, they nevertheless caught the mood and concerns of the day in a way that was distinctly American. Bierce's 'An Occurrence...' leaves echoes in the imagination; the stories by Crane and London recall the themes of the Civil War and the Klondike for which they are well known. Twain's humour is to the fore in The Notorious Jumping Frog.... And O. Henry's sharp observation makes his neat tales a joy to listen to. An attractive and accessible collection.

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King Lear

Author : William Shakespeare

Performed By : Full Cast Production

Publisher : BBC Audiobooks Ltd

Runtime : 2 hours 40 minutes

Categories : Dramatizations
Classic Literature
Shakespeare
Audio Theater

Our Price : $18.49

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Colin Redgrave stars as Lear with Geraldine James as Goneril in Shakespeare's bitter tragedyof loyalty, power and politics.

BBC radio has a unique heritage when it comes to Shakespeare. Since 1923, when the newly formed company broadcast its first full-length play, generations of actors and producers have honed and perfected the craft of making Shakespeare to be heard.

Some of the most stirring scenes Shakespeare ever wrote vibrate with powerful resonance in this grippingly dramatic radio production. Tortured madness, pure evil and the fatal struggle for power grip the listener until the final, shockingly tragic conclusion.

The play is introduced by Richard Eyre, former Director of the Royal National Theatre, and the accompanying booklet includes a scene-by-scene synopsis, full character analysis, brief biographies of the leading actors and of Shakespeare himself, as well as an essay from the producer on their interpretation of the play.

Revitalised, original and comprehensive, this is Shakespeare for the new millennium.

Written By
William Shakespeare

FIRST KNOWN PERFORMANCE
1606

FIRST BBC RADIO BROADCAST
2LO
11 September 1928

FIRST BROADCAST OF THIS PRODUCTION
BBC Radio 3
16 September 2001

RECORDED AT
On location at the Chapel at Lincoln's Inn Fields and at BBC Maida Vale London W9

Fabulous

Daniel from London - 18 May 2007

Just a stunning performance. Corin Redgrave vulnerable, old and mad and at times tender - always utterly convincing. Kika Markham genuinely scary as Regan and Geraldine James almost her equal. All actors always wonderfully clear and sound effects and music only add - never intrusive. Overall a stunning performance.

Audio book

 

Antietam: The Lost Command

Author : Not Known

Performed By : Full Cast Production

Publisher : Sound Mind Theater

Runtime : 50 minutes

Categories : Dramatizations
American
Pre 1900

Our Price : $4.95

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Full-cast adventure tale set against the bloodiest single-day battle in American history. Three escaped Confederate prisoners learn of a plot to ambush Stonewall Jackson and race against time to warn the Rebel forces.

heavy on drama...light on historical facts

Jim from Texas - 01 Mar 2005

I give this one two stars mostly for effort. Since I am a stickler for historical correctness, I have difficulty with an entertainment program that strays too far from the facts of subject. I do give them kudas for making an interesting drama, but if you like your history mixed with facts, try the many history programs available from the Colonial Radio Theatre. They have figured out how to do this really well.

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King Lear

Author : William Shakespeare

Performed By : Full Cast Production

Publisher : Select Music & Distribution

Runtime : 3 hours 55 minutes

Categories : Shakespeare

Our Price : $15.49

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King Lear, perhaps Shakespeare's most profoundly searching and disturbing tragedy, is the story of a foolish and self-indulgent king who learns, late in life and after terrible suffering, the value of self-knowledge. The play asks the ancient questions about God and the meaning of pain with uncompromising directness, but provides no reassuring answers...

King Lear, probably dating from 1605, was first printed in a quarto version in 1608 and in a different form in the First Folio of 1623. It is the third In Shakespeare's great sequence of four tragedies: Hamlet (1600-01) and Othello (1602-1604) precede it, and Macbeth (1606) follows. It possesses the widest emotional and thematic reach of them all, occupying a space which achieves an almost abstract, symbolic quality while at the same time offering a painful concreteness of experience: it is both intensely personal and impressively universal, tackling the great questions of suffering and morality ('is there any cause in nature that makes these hard hearts?') within the context of a social conscience CO! I have ta'en too little care of this') and an anguished questioning of God (or the gods, who, it seems, 'kill us for their sport').

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John Bull's Other Island

Author : George Bernard Shaw

Performed By : Christopher Benjamin, Patrick Duggan and cast

Publisher : Harper Collins UK

Runtime : 3 hours

Categories : Classic Literature
Classics

Our Price : $12.75

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When Thomas Broadbent, an Englishman, visits Ireland for the first time, he is accompanied by his friend Larry Doyle, an Irishman who is returning to his homeland after being away for many years.

Through the two men's differing responses to the country and also the Irish people's reactions to their two visitors, Shaw is able to explore the misunderstandings and misconceptions that have characterised relations between England and Ireland for centuries.

According to Shaw, 'John Bull's Other Island' was written in 1904 at the request of W.B.Yeats 'as a patriotic contribution to the repertory of the Irish Literary Theatre', but when Mr Yeats read the script he rejected it, claiming that it was beyond the resources of the Abbey Theatre.

In fact, for Yeats, a play which was 'uncongenial to the whole spirit of the neo-Gaelic movement' must have made uncomfortable reading, and for us today, in the light of all that has happened in the intervening years, the issues raised by the play have lost none of their urgency.

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Killist, The

Author : Emmett Loverde

Performed By : Full Cast Production

Publisher : One Act Audio Theatre

Runtime : 30 minutes

Categories : Dramatizations
Humor

Our Price : $9.99 $1.98

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Full Cast Recording. Written by Los Angeles playwright Emmett Loverde, "The Killist" tells the story of the meanest, toughest, orneryest outlaw in the Old West and his improbable farcical comeuppance at the hands of the bizarre denizens of Bone Dry, Arizona, the purtiest little town you ever did see (on audio CD).

Audiobooks

 

Case of the Abducted Asphalt: Monday

Author : Not Known

Performed By : Full Cast Production

Publisher : One Act Audio Theatre

Runtime : 2 minutes

Categories : Dramatizations
Humor

Our Price : Free

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Installment #1 of the Case. Stanley Park races to save Vancouver's famous Grand Prix.

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Kidnapped

Author : Robert Louis Stevenson

Performed By : Colonial Radio Theatre

Publisher : Colonial Radio Theatre On The Air

Runtime : 2 hours 23 minutes

Categories : Audio Theater
Drama
Dramatizations
Classics
Action & Adventure

Our Price : $12.99

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David Balfour: a young man cheated out of his inheritance. Alan Breck Stewart: a Jacobite returning to his native land. Together they embark on a perilous adventure across the highlands of Scotland, falsely accused of murder. The Colonial Radio Theatre's epic production of Robert Louis Stevenson's magnificent adventure is possibly the grandest audio theatre presentation of this classic tale ever produced.
Starring
Jerry Robbins
Deniz Cordell
Joseph Zamparelli Jr
Jeffrey Gage

Executive producer Mark Vander Berg
Dramatized, Produced and Directed by Jerry Robbins.
Music By Jeffrey Gage.

Audiobook

 

Captain Blood - Episode 05: The Rebel-Convicts

Author : Rafael Sabatini

Performed By : Colonial Radio Theatre

Publisher : Colonial Radio Theatre On The Air

Runtime : 29 minutes

Categories : Audio Theater
Drama
Dramatizations
Action & Adventure
Historical

Our Price : $1.50

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The Greatest Pirate Adventure Of Them All!

The Colonial Radio Theatre on the Air is proud to present Rafael Sabatini's adventure classic, "Captain Blood," fully dramatized for the first time. Dr. Peter Blood is arrested and sentenced to hang for treating a wounded rebel. Instead of death, he is sent to Barbados as a slave. When the Spanish attack the port city of Bridgetown, he and his fellow slaves capture the Spanish ship and set out to sea, where he becomes the notorious Pirate, Captain Blood. Battles on Sea and on Land, daring escapes, sword duels to the death, a touch of romance, and a magnificent score by Jeffrey Gage, �??Captain Blood�?� is a swashbuckling adventure on a very grand scale! Presented in 17 episodes.

The Colonial Radio Theatre on the Air presents Rafael Sabatini's Captain Blood.
Starring Jerry Robbins, Amy Strack, Deniz Cordell, J.T. Turner, Joseph Zamparelli Jr, Hugh Metzler, Aaron Smith, Tom Berry, James Turner, Leigh Berry and the Colonial Radio Players.

Executive Producer Mark Vander Berg.
Music by Jeffrey Gage.
Dramatized for Audio, Produced and Directed by Jerry Robbins
�? 2006 Colonial Radio Theatre.

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Kafka's Dick

Author : Alan Bennett

Performed By : Alan Bennett

Publisher : BBC Audiobooks Ltd

Runtime : 1 hour 30 minutes

Categories : Dramatizations
Humor

Our Price : $13.49

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Alison Steadman, Richard Griffiths and Nigel Anthony star in this BBC radio 4 version of Alan Bennett's acclaimed comedy drama

'Pure joy' Gillian Reynolds, Daily Telegraph

On his deathbed, Franz Kafka makes his faithful friend Max Brod promise to destroy his writings, so that future biographers can never pick over the secrets of his life. Flash forward to the present day, where Kafka aficionado Sydney Cunliffe is writing an article on the great man, and events begin to take a distinctly Kafkaesque turn. First a mysterious stranger appears on Sydney's doorstep, claiming to be Max Brod (who has been dead since 1968). Then the Cunliffes' tortoise metamorphoses into Kafka himself.

Max is desperate to prevent his old friend from discovering that he didn't burn all his books, for it soon becomes clear that all Kafka ever wanted was anonymity, and to get his own back on his bullying father But when Kafka Senior turns up, he insists that his son buries the hatchet. If not, he will reveal Kafka's secret - the real truth about him and his 'old man'...
Set in Prague, 27 Batcliffe Drive and Heaven, Bennett's brilliantly clever, fast-moving comedy not only examines the relationship between life and art, but also asks a rather more fundamental question: what exactly was Kafka's embarrassing little problem!

Audiobooks

 

History of Theatre, The

Author : David Timson

Performed By : Full Cast Production

Publisher : Select Music & Distribution

Runtime : 5 hours 10 minutes

Categories : Social & Economic
Dramatizations

Our Price : $18.75

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Here is the diverse and fascinating story of the Theatre, from the first tragedies and comedies of Ancient Greece to the high-tech mega-musicals of the late 20th century. It is an absorbing tale, encompassing ancient tales, medieval theatre, Commedia dell'Arte, the great dramas of the Elizabethan age, the foppish 18th century, the European developments in France, Germany and Spain with Russia making its main impact in the 19th century. As the 20th century progressed, the theatre moved in different experimental directions, particularly in America and Europe.

Interwoven within the story are the playwrights, the actors, the designers and theorists who have kept this performing art flourishing for 2,500 years.
All this is illustrated by more than 50 excerpts from plays and contemporary accounts, ranging from the controversial and innovative to sheer entertainment.

Here is the rich variety of experience that is the Theatre.

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Just a Little Fiddle

Author : Dennis Rookard

Performed By : Full Cast Production

Publisher : Hosiprog

Runtime : 30 minutes

Categories : Humor
Comedy
Dramatizations

Our Price : $1.00

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Ever since that long gone age of railways - Whenever that was - Stations have needed porters. That special breed of men who during those long periods between trains, can find endless tasks to perform along the platforms.

Yet can, with the appearance of a train and it's passengers, vanish. Only reappearing if the smell of a large tip is in the air.

Burt Pride is just such a man, and Burt, a long time servant of the railway, knows that every job has it's little fiddles and is not above making them work to his advantage.

Cast List:
Burt Pride... Peter Seaman
Jim Prentice... John Lawrence
Sarah... Angela Neville
Nigel Bridger... Peter Mayn
Fred... Keith Flack
Gary Stranks... Scott Peters
Claire... Rose Butcher
Rev Linda Cartwright... Rita Mayn
Policeman... Tony Hine

Produced & Directed by John Glasscock
Audio Direction and Realisation by Dennis Rookard

With grateful thanks to First Great Eastern for location facilities, Brentwood Talking Newspaper for studio use, and to John Glasscock for additional dialogue.