検索キーワード： ナレーター "Denis Daly" すべてのカテゴリー

Initially published in 1914, Papa was the first major dramatic work by playwright and poet Zoë Akins (1886-1958). A subtle but quietly savage comedy of manners, the play was not a commercial success but has since come to be regarded as a masterpiece. As a skillfully drawn portrait of genteel corruption, it ranks with the works of masters of dramatic satire like Moliere and Oscar Wilde.

As a vivid portrait of alienation and despair few narratives have surpassed Henry Lawson’s depiction of the grinding poverty endured by many settlers in the Australian outback. In the simple and direct language of his stoic narrator, Joe Wilson, he delivers an unforgettable depiction of a pioneering way of life, but one completely stripped of glamour or glory. Generally considered to be one of the finest Australian short stories ever written, Water Them Geraniums is read by Australian narrator, Denis Daly.

The Raven Edition of the works of Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) presents his complete literary output in five volumes. In addition to The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, Poe's longest work, Volume 3 contains six stories, which feature Poe's characteristic interest in death, dissolution, and twisted relationships.

The best and most engaging portraits of the Romans as living people are to be found in the works like those of the four poets featured in this recording. In Howard Felperin’s lively translations, these pieces become verbal postcards of the era, revealing in exquisite detail the passion and the grief, the joy and the pain experienced by the people of Rome as they deal with the inevitable fascination of love as it permeates their daily lives.

Making his way to a tryst with his "dark lady" near the royal palace the young playwright William Shakespeare encounters a mysterious woman in a cloak. Mistaking her for his lady friend, he accosts her in a familiar fashion, only to discover, to his dismay, that she is in fact the queen. He overcomes his initial discomfort, and takes advantage of the situation to make a petition for royal support to establish a national theatre.

In Oedipus at Colonus, the banished king, after years of wandering, accompanied by his faithful daughter Antigone, finds himself in Athens. Receiving a warm if guarded welcome from Theseus, King of Athens, he prepares to settle himself to spend his last days in peace. However, unwelcome visitors from his tortured past continue to haunt him until the very end.

Norman Lindsay’s classic tale about an anthropomorphic pudding and its band of protectors was written in 1917, in response to an argument between Lindsay and the critic and anthologist Bertram Stevens about the types of stories that would appeal most to children. In retrospect it appears that Lindsay clearly won the argument. The book has never been out of print in Australia and has been adapted for presentation as a film, a stage play, and an opera. It has been described by eminent children’s author Philip Pullman as "the funniest children's book ever written."

Among New Thought authors, Henry Thomas Hamblin particularly emphasized in his writings the power and necessity of dynamic and judicious thought. Since his death in 1958, his work has been continued by The Hamblin Trust, whose mission is described as "enriching people's lives through Right Thinking".

Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse (aka PG Wodehouse) wrote in excess of 90 books, 40 plays, and 200 short stories between 1902 and 1974 and is widely regarded as one of the greatest humorists of the 20th century. Right Ho, Jeeves! is his second in a series of books written about a luckless young British millionaire named Bertram Wooster and his sharp valet, Jeeves.

From Poverty to Power was published in two parts, the first dealing with the road to prosperity and the second the state of peace that ensues when it has been realized. In the foreword, the author described his aim as follows: "I dreamed of writing a book which should help men and women, whether rich or poor, learned or unlearned, worldly or unworldly, to find within themselves the source of all success, all happiness, all accomplishment, all truth".

In the introduction, anthologist Douglas Sladen stated that the purpose of this collection was "to lay before the English public a selection of poems inspired by life and scenery in Australia". He further comments, "This volume is essentially the work of people who have meditated in the open air and not under the lamp; and if its contents oftentimes want the polish that comes only with much midnight oil, they are mostly a transcript from earth and sea and sky, and not from books."

Unlike many of his contemporaries, the English poet Francis Thompson (1859-1907) was a true mystic. While more celebrated poets, like Wordsworth, Tennyson, and Arnold, were content to express their religious leanings in traditional devotional formulae, Thompson strove to portray the divine directly, in all its terrifying majesty. In this way he is more akin to earlier masters, like Henry Vaughan and George Herbert, than to the poets of his own day.

Northanger Abbey is one of Jane Austen’s first novels, though it was not published until after her death, and contains some of her most biting satire. Catherine Morland, the novel’s naive and provincial heroine, has formed her idea of the world from Gothic novels, full of gloomy Italian castles, long-kept secrets, and dastardly villains. However, when she travels to the city of Bath and encounters a wider society, she will discover that all her reading has ill-prepared her for the real world.

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam is a poetic marvel, a work that has survived translation into many languages, while losing little of its force and its wry character. As a source of literary imagery and memorable quotations it ranks with the Bible and the works of Shakespeare. While Edward Fitzgerald was neither the first nor the most scholarly of the English translators of the Rubaiyat, his translation has been largely responsible for the world-wide popularity of this monument of classic Persian poetry.

For James Allen, philosopher and pioneer of the New Thought movement, the highest expression of personal realization was to be "in the world" but not "of the world." As Allen says, "The turmoil of the world we cannot avoid, but the disturbances of mind we can overcome." In this collection of short essays he discusses the attitudes and actions required for the attainment of that abiding inner peace "where the Heavenly Silence reigns."

Better known in the English-speaking world simply as Rúmi, Jalálu'd-Din Muḥammad Balkhi (1207-1273) was a Persian scholar, theologian, and poet. After Omar Khayyam he is probably the most celebrated classical Persian poet and his luminously spiritual verse has been the subject of many notable English translations.

This collection of bush ballads, published in 1895, contains some of the most iconic pieces of Australian poetry and has served as the source material for many paintings, films, and stage presentations.

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky is best known as the cofounder of theosophy, which is essentially a selective conflation of Hindu and Buddhist ideas combined with Blavatsky's idiosyncratic system of cosmology. The Voice of the Silence, first published in 1889, is described by the author as "chosen fragments from the Book of the Golden Precepts, for the daily use of disciples".

A Book for Kids, first published in 1921, may be regarded as the Australian equivalent of Robert Louis Stevenson’s A Child’s Garden of Verses. The collection contains 55 short poems on a wide variety of subjects, and two stories, "The Little Red House" and "The Boy Who Rode into the Sunset".

Oedipus the King is the story of a man whose life is destroyed by his own good intentions. When a terrible secret from his past is brought to the light of day, the consequences are chilling - and ineluctable.