Audio books Weblog

Why not listen to this full cast production. The Tempest by William Shakespeare. 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.

Raging storms and rich, beautiful music combine to magical effect in this radio production of Shakespeare’s allegorical last play, where mystical forces work to restore harmony and order to an estranged community.

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

An Anthology Of Shakespearian Speches Performed By The World’s Leading Actors

BBC Radio Collection - All The World’s A Stage

Romeo & Juliet - Act I, Scene III
“O Romeo, Romeo - wherefore art thou Romeo”. This impassioned speech is beautifully spoken by Fay Compton in this BBC Sound archives recording.

Hamlet - Act III, Scene I
‘To be or not to be - that is the question….’ In this BBC Sound Archive recording, Michael Redgrave stars as Shakespeare’s troubled Prince of Denmark.

Henry V - Act IV, Scene III
‘This day is called the feast of Crispian….’ In one of the most famous and inspirational of Shakespeare’s speeches, Richard Burton’s rich and resonant voice delivers Henry V’s address to his army on the eve of Agincourt!

King Lear - Act II, Scene IV
‘I prithee, daughter, do not make me mad…’ Alec Guinness’s performance as King Lear stirs the listener in this recording from the BBC Sound Archives.

Macbeth - Act I, Scene VII
‘If it were done when ’tis done…’ From the BBC Sound Archives, one of Shakespeare’s most famous and memorable speeches, with Paul Scofield and Peggy Ashcroft as Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, bringing these ominous words vividly to life.

Macbeth - Act II, Scene II
‘Is this a dagger which I see before me…..’ With Denis Quilley as Macbeth, this recording from the BBC Sound Archives brings Shakespeare’s memorable words to life..

Richard III - Act I, Scene I
‘Now is the winter of our discontent….’ Ian Holm delivers King Richard IIIs soliloquy, bringing Shakespeare’s wonderful lines, full of pyschological insight, vividly to life.

The Merchant Of Venice - Act IV, Scene I
‘The quality of mercy is not strained….’ In this recording from the BBC Sound Archives, Hannah Gordon is Shakespeare’s wise Portia.

Download and listen to William Shakespeare’s most famous speeches now

Romeo and Juliet is the play which, in English literature at least, effectively invented the modern love story. Its charm and its power derive from the romantic setting (Verona, an Italian Renaissance city), the youthful innocence and ardour of the lovers, and (perhaps crucially) the excitement and drama created by the opposition which they have to contend with, an opposition which does not simply stem from the older generation but which is starkly present in the feud between their two families and which seems to be supported by the malignity of Fate. The richly realized context of their love is additionally enhanced by (for example) the superbly concrete character of Juliet’s old Nurse, who fondly encourages the pair until the ‘better’ offer of Paris’s love comes along. The Nurse’s sentimentality and materialism are all too convincing, and are symptomatic of the way in which Shakespeare suggests that none of the other characters can match the lovers for sincerity and steadfastness, especially once the brilliant and impulsive Mercutio has gone. Youthful as they are, we see that they are the people who grow and mature as the play progresses: Romeo, as sensitive and intelligent as the later Hamlet, realises that his ‘love’ for Rosaline is no such thing but merely infatuation: however instant the development of his love for Juliet may be, it is ‘the real thing’, as is Juliet’s for him. The imagery of light and religion which Shakespeare consistently bestows upon the lovers is suggestive of the truth and value of their feelings: at the masked ball where they first meet, Romeo’s immediate reaction to Juliet is that ’she doth teach the torches to burn bright’, and their first words to each other are all built on the conceit that he is a ‘pilgrim’ and she a ’saint’.

If You are interested what this is all about

An intimate history of Shakespeare, following him through a single year that changed not only his fortunes but the course of literature.

How did Shakespeare go from being a talented poet and playwright to become one of the greatest writers who ever lived? In this one exhilarating year we follow what he reads and writes, what he sees, and who he works with as he invests in the new Globe Theatre and creates four of his most famous plays—Henry V, Julius Caesar, As You Like It, and, most remarkably, Hamlet.

James Shapiro illuminates both Shakespeare’s staggering achievement and what Elizabethans experienced in the course of 1599: sending off an army to crush an Irish rebellion, weathering an Armada threat from Spain, gambling on a fledgling East India Company, and waiting to see who will succeed their aging and childless Queen.

This book brings the news and intrigue of the times together with a wonderful evocation of how Shakespeare worked as an actor, businessman, and playwright. The result is an exceptionally immediate and gripping account of an inspiring moment in history.

This audio includes a selection of scenes from Henry V, Julius Caesar, As You Like It, and Hamlet featuring performances by Vanessa Redgrave, Paul Scofield, Ian Holm, and many more.

James Sharpiro, a professor at Columbia University in New York, is the author of Rival Playwrights, Shakespeare and the Jews, and Oherammergau: The Troubling Story of the World’s Most Famous Passion Play.

Listen to A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare 1599

Tags:audio books,William Shakespeare,arts & Drama,Biographical

Julius Caesar - William Shakespeare Arts & Drama / Shakespeare

In Julius Caesar, there are no heroes, only heroic words spoken by men of ambition, arrogance, and jealousy. Yet Julius Caesar is also one of Shakespeare’s most popular and polished works, a seamless blend of highly-stylized oratory and penetrating soliloquies that lays bare the innermost workings of the human mind. Here is Shakespeare in his prime, taking the story of history’s most notorious assassination and fashioning from it a brilliant and at times chilling indictment of politics by violence and of how even the strongest and noblest of minds can be corrupted by flattery and the lure of power.

Allen Ginsberg Audio Collection - Allen Ginsberg Arts & Drama / Poetry

Upon the release of his first published work, Howl and Other Poems, in 1956, Allen Ginsberg became the unlikely force of a movement that would change a generation. Literature, art, sex, love, family, politics; nothing would ever be the same. The Beat Generation was born through Ginsberg and his friends.

This collection of more than two dozen poems in verse and song is the best of the best, celebrating someone who was of his time, ahead of his time, and whose legacy will transcend time.

Included are:
Howl, Kaddish, Pull My Daisy, A Strange New Cottage in Berkeley, A Supermarket in California, Sunflower Sutra, America, Many Loves, To Aunt Rose, I am a Victim of Telephone, Krai Majales, Who Be Kind To, City Midnight Junk Strains, On Neal’s Ashes, September on Jessore Road, Mind Breaths, Jahweh and Allah Battle, Lay down Your Mountain, Don’t Grow Old, Father Death Blues, Plutonian Ode, White Shroud, Sphincter, Personals Ad, Hum Bomb, After Lalon, Put Down Your Cigarette Don’t Smoke, Charnal Ground, C’mon Pigs of Western Civilization, New Stanzas for Amazing Grace.

Arts & Drama 3 hours 30 minutes mp3 audio from BBC Audiobooks Ltd, Hamlet - William Shakespeare
Michael Sheen stars as Hamlet with Kenneth Cranham as Claudius, Juliet Stevenson as Gertrude and Ellie Beaven as Ophelia in the best-known and most powerful tragedy of modern times

Downloadable Audio Book - Hamlet

An anthology of Shakespearian speeches performed by the world’s leading actors.

 Romeo & Juliet - Act I, Scene III
“O Romeo, Romeo - wherefore art thou Romeo”. This impassioned speech is beautifully spoken by Fay Compton in this BBC Sound archives recording. 

Hamlet - Act III, Scene I
‘To be or not to be - that is the question….’ In this BBC Sound Archive recording, Michael Redgrave stars as Shakespeare’s troubled Prince of Denmark.

Henry V - Act IV, Scene III
‘This day is called the feast of Crispian….’ In one of the most famous and inspirational of Shakespeare’s speeches, Richard Burton’s rich and resonant voice delivers Henry V’s address to his army on the eve of Agincourt!

King Lear - Act II, Scene IV
‘I prithee, daughter, do not make me mad…’ Alec Guinness’s performance as King Lear stirs the listener in this recording from the BBC Sound Archives.

Macbeth - Act I, Scene VII
‘If it were done when ’tis done…’ From the BBC Sound Archives, one of Shakespeare’s most famous and memorable speeches, with Paul Scofield and Peggy Ashcroft as Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, bringing these ominous words vividly to life.

Macbeth - Act II, Scene II
‘Is this a dagger which I see before me…..’ With Denis Quilley as Macbeth, this recording from the BBC Sound Archives brings Shakespeare’s memorable words to life..

Richard III - Act I, Scene I
‘Now is the winter of our discontent….’ Ian Holm delivers King Richard IIIs soliloquy, bringing Shakespeare’s wonderful lines, full of pyschological insight, vividly to life.

The Merchant Of Venice - Act IV, Scene I
‘The quality of mercy is not strained….’ In this recording from the BBC Sound Archives, Hannah Gordon is Shakespeare’s wise Portia.

Now you can listen to all the world’s a stage: Shakespeare’s Speeches

When we think of great events in the history of the world, we tend to think of war, revolution, political upheaval or natural catastrophe. But throughout history there have been moments of vital importance that have taken place not on the battlefield, or in the palaces of power, or even in the violence of nature, but between the pages of a book.

In our digitised age of instant information it is easy to underestimate the power of the printed word. In his fascinating new book accompanying the ITV series, Melvyn Bragg presents a vivid reminder of the book as agent of social, political and personal revolution.

Twelve Books that Changed the World presents a rich variety of human endeavour and a great diversity of characters.

There are also surprises. Here are famous books by Darwin, Newton and Shakespeare – but we also discover the stories behind some less well-known works, such as Marie Stopes’ Married Love, the original radical feminist Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman – and even the rules to an obscure ball game that became the most popular sport in the world . . .