AuthorHenry James
NarratorTerry Diab
Duration13h 25m
CategoriesAdult Fiction, Classics
PublisherInhouse
VersionUnabridged
After her parents' bitter divorce, young Maisie Farange finds herself shuttled between her selfish mother and vain father, who value her only as a means for provoking each other. And when both take lovers and remarry, Maisie - solitary, observant and wise beyond her years - is drawn into an increasingly entangled adult world of intrigue and sexual betrayal, until she is finally compelled to choose her own future. Published in 1897 when Henry James was becoming increasingly experimental with narrative technique and fascinated by the idea of the child's-eye view, What Maisie Knew is a subtle, intricate yet devastating portrayal of an innocent adrift in a corrupt society.
This book was recorded as part of the Listening Books Sound Learning programme.
Author: Charles Dickens
Author Charles Dickens
Narrator Simon Vance
Duration 31h 21m
The most gorgeously theatrical of all Dickens's novels, Nicholas Nickleby follows the delightful adventures of a hearty young hero in nineteenth-century England. Nicholas, a gentleman's son fallen upon hard times, must set out to make his way in the world. His journey is accompanied by some of the most swaggering scoundrels and unforgettable eccent...
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Author: Jonathan Swift
Author Jonathan Swift
Narrator Jasper Britton
Duration 35h 15m
Lemuel Gulliver, a slightly staid ship's doctor, relates the tales of his astonishing travels. He encounters the tiny, warring Lilliputians; the giant, sceptical Brobdingnagians; the ludicrously intellectual Laputans; and the idealistic - if rather stolid - Houyhnhnms and their bestial servants, the Yahoos. An immediate best-seller when it was firs...
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Author: Henry James
Author Henry James
Narrator William Roberts
Duration 2h 23m
The young and innocent Isabel Archer has a choice to make when she comes to England from America: dignity and duty or her happiness? A familiar theme in James' writing is the meeting of Europe and America. Isabel Archer is determined to make the most of her new-found freedom when she arrives in England, but other expatriate Americans manipulate he...
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Author: Henry James
Author Henry James
Narrator Samuel West
Duration 1h 35m
A BBC Radio 4 "Book at Bedtime" recording of Samuel West reading from the novella The Aspern Papers by Henry James, set against the decaying grandeur of Venice. Originally broadcast 26 April - 4 May 2010. Henry James took as inspiration for his tale The Aspern Papers the story of a mistress of Byron's who outlived the poet into lonely old age. H...
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Author: Charlotte Bronte
Author Charlotte Bronte
Narrator Charlotte Ritchie
Duration 21h 29m
Brought to you by Penguin. This Penguin Classic is performed by Charlotte Ritchie, best known for her roles as Oregon in Channel 4's Fresh Meat, Hannah in the BBC Three comedy Siblings, and as Barbara Gilbert in BBC drama Call the Midwife. With neither friends nor family, Lucy Snowe sets sail from England to find employment in a girls' boarding sch...
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Author: Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Author Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Narrator Various
Duration 1h 32m
Brought to you by Penguin. This Penguin Classic is performed by Jessica Brown Findlay, Jamael Westman and Sheila Atim. 'The color is hideous enough, and unreliable enough, and infuriating enough, but the pattern is torturing' Written with barely controlled fury after she was confined to her room for 'nerves' and forbidden to write, Gilman's pioneer...
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Author: Jerome K Jerome
Author Jerome K Jerome
Narrator Blake Morrison
Duration 7h 33m
Brought to you by Penguin. This Penguin Classic is performed by Blake Harrison, star of The Inbetweeners, also known for his role on screen in A Very English Scandal and Todd Margaret, as well as on London's West End in Waitress. This definitive recording includes an Introduction by David Carroll. Martyrs to hypochondria and general seediness, J. a...
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Author: Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Author Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Narrator Richard E. Grant
Duration 2h 12m
He is the Little Prince, the mysterious, innocent and beautiful boy who appears to a pilot stranded in the desert and makes an extraordinary request. He has captured the hearts of millions of readers around the world since his story first appeared in 1943, written down by an aristocratic French aviator who soon after disappeared during a flight acr...
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Author: Henry James
Author Henry James
Narrator Wanda Mccaddon
Duration 22h 49m
The Portrait of a Lady tells the compelling and ultimately tragic tale of a beautiful young American woman's encounter with European sophistication. Set principally in England and Italy, we follow Isabel Archer's fortunes as a variety of admirers vie for her hand. Her choice will be crucial, and she is not wanting for advice, whether from the gener...
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Author: Henry James
Author Henry James
Narrator Penelope Rawlins
Duration 4h 51m
Perhaps the most brilliantly successful ghost story ever written, The Turn of the Screw creates a terrifyingly believable impression of innocent children so corrupted by evil that they remain deceptive pictures of innocent beauty. Their governess must struggle alone to confront and exorcise the demons which she believes possess their souls...
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