24 Best Literary, History Books
Literary, History is a popular category for many book lovers. Our team at Speechify has curated a list of the top Literary, History audiobooks everyone must read.
See the top 24 Literary, History audiobooks below.
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Defying Hitler
- By: Sebastian Haffner
- Narrator: Simon Vance
- Length: 8 hours 18 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2005
- Language: English
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4.31(1965 ratings)
4.31(1965 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0016.95 USDWhen the famous German author Sebastian Haffner died at age ninety-one in 1999, a manuscript was discovered among his unpublished papers that offers a compelling eyewitness account of the rise of Hitler and Nazism. He describes the country’sWhen the famous German author Sebastian Haffner died at age ninety-one in 1999, a manuscript was discovered among his unpublished papers that offers a compelling eyewitness account of the rise of Hitler and Nazism. He describes the country’s inflation and the political climate that contributed to Hitler’s rise to power and also examines the pervasive influence of such groups as the Free Corps and the Hitler Youth movement that swept the nation. He elucidates how the average educated German grappled with a rapidly changing society, while chronicling day-to-day changes in attitudes, beliefs, politics, and prejudices.
A major bestseller in Germany, Defying Hitler is an illuminating portrait of a time, a place, and a people.
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My Young Life
- By: Frederic Tuten
- Narrator: Donald Corren
- Length: 9 hours 15 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2019
- Language: English
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4.3(37 ratings)
4.3(37 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0019.95 USDNovelist, essayist, and critic Frederic Tuten recalls his personal and artistic coming-of-age in 1950s New York, a defining period that would set him on the course to becoming a writer. Born in the Bronx to a Sicilian mother and Southern father,Novelist, essayist, and critic Frederic Tuten recalls his personal and artistic coming-of-age in 1950s New York, a defining period that would set him on the course to becoming a writer.
Born in the Bronx to a Sicilian mother and Southern father, Frederic Tuten always dreamed of being an artist. Determined to trade his neighborhood streets for the romantic avenues of Paris, he learned to paint and draw, falling in love with the process of putting a brush to canvas and the feeling it gave him. At fifteen, he decided to leave high school and pursue the bohemian life he’d read about in books, a life of salons and cafes and “worldly women” from whom he could learn and grow. But, before he could, he would receive an extraordinary education, right in his own backyard.
My Young Life is the story of those early formative years where, in the halls of Christopher Columbus High School and later the City College of New York, Frederic would discover the kind of life he wanted to lead. As Tuten travels downtown for classes at the Art Students League, spends afternoons reading in Union Square, and discovers the vibrant scenes of downtown galleries and Lower East Side bars, he finds himself a member of a new community of artists, gathering friends, influences–and many girlfriends–along the way.
Frederic Tuten has had a remarkable life, writing books, traveling around the world, acting in and creating films, and even conducting summer workshops with Paul Bowles in Tangiers. Spanning two decades and bringing us from his family’s kitchen table in the Bronx and the cafes of Greenwich Village and back again, My Young Life is an intimate and enchanting portrait of an artist’s coming-of-age, set against one of the most exciting creative periods of our time.
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Freak Kingdom
- By: Timothy Denevi
- Narrator: Mark Boyett
- Length: 10 hours 4 minutes
- Publisher: Hachette Audio
- Publish date: October 30, 2018
- Language: English
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4.22(339 ratings)
4.22(339 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0025.98 USDThe story of Hunter S. Thompson’s crusade against Richard Nixon and the threat of fascism in America–and the devastating price he paid for it Hunter S. Thompson is often misremembered as a wise-cracking, drug-addled cartoon character.The story of Hunter S. Thompson’s crusade against Richard Nixon and the threat of fascism in America–and the devastating price he paid for it
Hunter S. Thompson is often misremembered as a wise-cracking, drug-addled cartoon character. This book reclaims him for what he truly was: a fearless opponent of corruption and fascism, one who sacrificed his future well-being to fight against it, rewriting the rules of journalism and political satire in the process. This skillfully told and dramatic story shows how Thompson saw through Richard Nixon’s treacherous populism and embarked on a life-defining campaign to stop it. In his fevered effort to expose institutional injustice, Thompson pushed himself far beyond his natural limits, sustained by drugs, mania, and little else. For ten years, he cast aside his old ambitions, troubled his family, and likely hastened his own decline, along the way producing some of the best political writing in our history.
This timely biography recalls a period of anger and derangement in American politics, and one writer with the guts to tell the truth.
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The Dab of Dickens, The Touch of Twain, and The Shade of Shakespeare
- By: Elliot Engel
- Narrator: Elliot Engel
- Length: 6 hours 31 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2011
- Language: English
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4.21(51 ratings)
4.21(51 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0013.95 USDThey are icons of the literary world whose soaring works have been discussed and analyzed in countless classrooms, homes, and pubs. Yet for most readers, the living, breathing human beings behind the classics have remained unknown—until now.They are icons of the literary world whose soaring works have been discussed and analyzed in countless classrooms, homes, and pubs. Yet for most readers, the living, breathing human beings behind the classics have remained unknown—until now. In this utterly captivating book, Dr. Elliot Engel, a leading authority on the lives of great authors, illuminates the fascinating and flawed members of literature’s elite. In lieu of stuffy biographical sketches, Engel provides fascinating anecdotes.
You’ll never look at these literary giants the same way again.
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Man in Profile
- By: Thomas Kunkel
- Narrator: Joe Barrett
- Length: 11 hours 22 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2015
- Language: English
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4.16(211 ratings)
4.16(211 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0022.95 USDThis fascinating biography reveals the untold story of the legendary New Yorker profile writer–author of Joe Gould’s Secret and Up in the Old Hotel–and unravels the mystery behind one of literary history’s greatestThis fascinating biography reveals the untold story of the legendary New Yorker profile writer–author of Joe Gould’s Secret and Up in the Old Hotel–and unravels the mystery behind one of literary history’s greatest disappearing acts.
Born and raised in North Carolina, Joseph Mitchell was Southern to the core. But from the 1930s to the 1960s, he was the voice of New York City. Readers of the New Yorker cherished his intimate sketches of the people who made the city tick–from Mohawk steelworkers to Staten Island oystermen, from homeless intellectual Joe Gould to Old John McSorley, founder of the city’s– most famous saloon. Mitchell’s literary sensibility combined with a journalistic eye for detail produced a writing style that would inspire New Journalism luminaries such as Gay Talese, Tom Wolfe, and Joan Didion.
Then, all of a sudden, his stories stopped appearing. For thirty years, Mitchell showed up for work at the New Yorker–but produced nothing. Did he have something new and exciting in store? Was he working on a major project? Or was he bedeviled by an epic case of writer’s block?
The first full-length biography of Joseph Mitchell, based on the thousands of archival pages he left behind and dozens of interviews, Man in Profile pieces together the life of this beloved and enigmatic literary legend and answers the question that has plagued readers and critics for decades: What was Joe Mitchell doing all those years?
By the time of his death in 1996, Mitchell was less well known for his elegant writing than for his J. D. Salinger-like retreat from the public eye. For thirty years, Mitchell had wandered the streets of New York, chronicling the lives of everyday people and publishing them in the most prestigious publication in town. But by the 1970s, crime, homelessness, and a crumbling infrastructure had transformed the city Mitchell understood so well and spoke for so articulately. He could barely recognize it. As he said to a friend late in life, “I’m living in a state of confusion.”
Fifty years after his last story appeared and almost two decades after his death, Joseph Mitchell still has legions of fans, and his story–especially the mystery of his “disappearance”–continues to fascinate. With a colorful cast of characters that includes Harold Ross, A. J. Liebling, Tina Brown, James Thurber, and William Shawn, Man in Profile goes a long way to solving that mystery–and bringing this lion of American journalism out of the shadows that once threatened to swallow him.
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The Caped Crusade
- By: Glen Weldon
- Narrator: Glen Weldon
- Length: 9 hours 25 minutes
- Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
- Publish date: January 01, 2016
- Language: English
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4.13(2072 ratings)
4.13(2072 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0023.99 USD“A roaring getaway car of guilty pleasures” (The New York Times Book Review), Glen Weldon’s The Caped Crusade is a fascinating, critically acclaimed chronicle of the rises and falls of one of the world’s most iconic“A roaring getaway car of guilty pleasures” (The New York Times Book Review), Glen Weldon’s The Caped Crusade is a fascinating, critically acclaimed chronicle of the rises and falls of one of the world’s most iconic superheroes and the fans who love him–now with a new afterword.
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Since his debut in Detective Comics #27, Batman has been many things: a two-fisted detective; a planet-hopping gadabout; a campy Pop Art sensation; a pointy-eared master spy; and a grim ninja of the urban night. Yet, despite these endless transformations, he remains one of our most revered cultural icons. In this “smart, witty, and engrossing” (The Wall Street Journal) cultural critique, NPR contributor and book critic Glen Weldon provides “a sharp, deeply knowledgeable, and often funny look at the cultural history of Batman and his fandom” (Chicago Tribune) to discover why it is that we can’t get enough of the Dark Knight.
For nearly a century, Batman has cycled through eras of dark melodrama and light comedy and back again. How we perceive his character, whether he’s delivering dire threats in a raspy Christian Bale growl or trading blithely homoerotic double entendres with Robin the Boy Wonder, speaks to who we are and how we wish to be seen by the world. It’s this endless adaptability that has made him so lasting, and ultimately human.
But it’s also Batman’s fundamental nerdiness that uniquely resonates with his fans and makes them fiercely protective of him. As Weldon charts the evolution of Gotham’s Guardian from Bob Kane and Bill Finger’s hyphenated hero to Christopher Nolan’s post-9/11 Dark Knight, he reveals how this symbol of justice has made us who we are today and why his legacy remains so strong. The result is “possibly the most erudite and well-researched fanboy manifesto ever” (Booklist). Well-researched, insightful, and engaging, The Caped Crusade, with a new afterword by the author, has something for everyone: “If you’re a Bat-neophyte, this is an accessible introduction; if you’re a dyed-in-the-Latex Bat-nerd, this is a colorfully rendered magical history tour redolent with nostalgia” (The Washington Post). -
John Bunyan
- By: John Brown
- Narrator: Wanda McCaddon
- Length: 8 hours 20 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2008
- Language: English
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4.1(5 ratings)
4.1(5 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0016.95 USDA traveling tinker, John Bunyan accepted long imprisonment rather than give up preaching the Gospel. He explained the life of the Spirit in language the common people could understand and in pictures that stuck in the mind. When he wrote TheA traveling tinker, John Bunyan accepted long imprisonment rather than give up preaching the Gospel. He explained the life of the Spirit in language the common people could understand and in pictures that stuck in the mind. When he wrote The Pilgrim’s Progress, his fame spread rapidly, and within fifty years of his death, the book was reputed to be in most English homes.
John Brown’s biography of John Bunyan remains the standard, despite the lapse of over a hundred years since it was first published. The author was one of Bunyan’s successors as minister of the church in Bedford. He shows that many of the scenes familiar to readers of The Pilgrim’s Progress reflect local places and events and personal experience in the trials and joys of the Christian life.
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Mark Twain
- By: Ron Powers
- Narrator: Ron Powers
- Length: 10 hours 55 minutes
- Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
- Publish date: January 01, 2005
- Language: English
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4.06(1415 ratings)
4.06(1415 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0021.95 USDRon Powers’s tour de force has been widely acclaimed as the best life and times, filled with Mark Twain’s voice, and as a great American story.Samuel Clemens, the man known as Mark Twain, invented the American voice and became one of ourRon Powers’s tour de force has been widely acclaimed as the best life and times, filled with Mark Twain’s voice, and as a great American story.
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Samuel Clemens, the man known as Mark Twain, invented the American voice and became one of our greatest celebrities. His life mirrored his country’s, as he grew from a Mississippi River boyhood in the days of the frontier, to a Wild-West journalist during the Gold Rush, to become the king of the eastern establishment and a global celebrity as America became an international power. Along the way, Mark Twain keenly observed the characters and voices that filled the growing country, and left us our first authentically American literature. Ron Powers’s magnificent biography offers the definitive life of the founding father of our culture. -
Spoon River Anthology
- By: Edgar Lee Masters
- Narrator: Patrick Fraley
- Length: 4 hours 23 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2002
- Language: English
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4.05(19 ratings)
4.05(19 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0019.95 USDDeemed “essential” in the canon of American literature, this audiobook masterpiece performed in its entirety by a full cast of fifty makes the classic accessible to everyone. From a cemetery in a fictional mid-American town, the deadDeemed “essential” in the canon of American literature, this audiobook masterpiece performed in its entirety by a full cast of fifty makes the classic accessible to everyone.
From a cemetery in a fictional mid-American town, the dead speak the truths about their lives. Some speak of hardships and sordid affairs, while others speak of their simple, honest, happy lives. Some are elderly and others are youthful or children, but mortality has claimed them all. Their voices reach us deeply–alternately plaintive, anguished, enigmatic, angry, contemptuous, and comedic, evoking themes of love, hope, disappointment, despair, and abiding faith. As the Spoon River residents examine their lives, they invite us to do the same.
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The Club
- By: Leo Damrosch
- Narrator: Simon Vance
- Length: 15 hours 1 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2019
- Language: English
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3.93(892 ratings)
3.93(892 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0024.95 USDPrize-winning biographer Leo Damrosch tells the story of “the Club,” a group of extraordinary writers, artists, and thinkers who gathered weekly at a London tavern In 1763, the painter Joshua Reynolds proposed to his friend SamuelPrize-winning biographer Leo Damrosch tells the story of “the Club,” a group of extraordinary writers, artists, and thinkers who gathered weekly at a London tavern
In 1763, the painter Joshua Reynolds proposed to his friend Samuel Johnson that they invite a few friends to join them every Friday at the Turk’s Head Tavern in London to dine, drink, and talk until midnight. Eventually the group came to include among its members Edmund Burke, Adam Smith, Edward Gibbon, and James Boswell. It was known simply as “the Club.”
In this captivating book, Leo Damrosch brings alive a brilliant, competitive, and eccentric cast of characters. With the friendship of the “odd couple” Samuel Johnson and James Boswell at the heart of his narrative, Damrosch conjures up the precarious, exciting, and often brutal world of late eighteenth-century Britain. This is the story of an extraordinary group of people whose ideas helped to shape their age–and our own.
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Population: 485
- By: Michael Perry
- Narrator: Michael Perry
- Length: 7 hours 0 minutes
- Publisher: HarperAudio
- Publish date: June 30, 2005
- Language: English
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3.93(4418 ratings)
3.93(4418 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0021.99 USDMike Perry’s extraordinary and thoughtful account of meeting the people of his small hometown by joining the fire and rescue team was a breakout hit that “swells with unadorned heroism” (USA Today) Welcome to New Auburn, WisconsinMike Perry’s extraordinary and thoughtful account of meeting the people of his small hometown by joining the fire and rescue team was a breakout hit that “swells with unadorned heroism” (USA Today)
Welcome to New Auburn, Wisconsin (population: 485) where the local vigilante is a farmer’s wife armed with a pistol and a Bible, the most senior member of the volunteer fire department is a cross-eyed butcher with one kidney and two ex-wives (both of whom work at the only gas station in town), and the back roads are haunted by the ghosts of children and farmers. Michael Perry loves this place. He grew up here, and now-after a decade away-he has returned.
Unable to polka or repair his own pickup, his farm-boy hands gone soft after years of writing, Mike figures the best way to regain his credibility is to join the volunteer fire department. Against a backdrop of fires and tangled wrecks, bar fights and smelt feeds, he tells a frequently comic tale leavened with moments of heartbreaking delicacy and searing tragedy.
Tracing his calls on a map in the little firehouse, he sees “a dense, benevolent web, spun one frantic zigzag at a time” from which the story of a tiny town emerges.
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Superman
- By: Glen Weldon
- Narrator: George Newbern
- Length: 12 hours 40 minutes
- Publisher: Dreamscape Media
- Publish date: August 11, 2020
- Language: English
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3.9(886 ratings)
3.9(886 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0017.99 USDHow has the Big Blue Boy Scout stayed so popular for so long? How has he changed with the times, and what essential aspects of him have remained constant? This fascinating biography examines Superman as a cultural phenomenon through seventy-fiveHow has the Big Blue Boy Scout stayed so popular for so long? How has he changed with the times, and what essential aspects of him have remained constant? This fascinating biography examines Superman as a cultural phenomenon through seventy-five years of action-packed adventures, from his early years as a social activist in circus tights to his growth into the internationally renowned demigod he is today.
Written by NPR book critic, blogger, and resident comic-book expert Glen Weldon, this biography chronicles the ever-evolving Man of Steel and his world–not just the men and women behind the comics, movies, and shows, but his continually shifting origin story, burgeoning powers, and the colorful cast of trusted friends and deadly villains that surround him.
Superman places every iteration of the Man of Steel into the character’s greater, decades-long story: from Bud Collyer to Henry Cavill, World War II propagandist to peanut-butter pitchman, Super Pup to Super Friends, comic strip to Broadway musical, Lori Lemaris to Lois & Clark, it’s all here.
Affectionate and in-depth, this biography contains analyses of the hero’s most beloved adventures, in and out of the comics–his most iconic Golden Age tales, goofiest Silver Age exploits, and the contemporary film, television, and comics stories that keep him alive today.
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Roughing It
- By: Mark Twain
- Narrator: Mark Twain
- Length: 15 hours 18 minutes
- Publisher: Recorded Books, Inc.
- Publish date: March 25, 2002
- Language: English
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3.88(6805 ratings)
3.88(6805 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0029.99 USDTwo American originals, Mark Twain and the West, come together in this documentary of the author’s seven-year “pleasure trip” to the silver mines of Nevada. Twain had originally planned the trip to be a three-monthTwo American originals, Mark Twain and the West, come together in this documentary of the author’s seven-year “pleasure trip” to the silver mines of Nevada. Twain had originally planned the trip to be a three-month “vacation;” not surprisingly for someone of Twain’s temperament, the trip lasted seven years. His journey, like his book, has a way of taking ever-unexpected turns.
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Life on the Mississippi
- By: Mark Twain
- Narrator: Grover Gardner
- Length: 13 hours 37 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2010
- Language: English
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3.87(11041 ratings)
3.87(11041 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0022.95 USDThe Mississippi River, known as “America’s river,” and Mark Twain are practically synonymous in American culture. The popularity of Twain’s steamboat and steamboat pilot on the ever-changing Mississippi has endured for over aThe Mississippi River, known as “America’s river,” and Mark Twain are practically synonymous in American culture. The popularity of Twain’s steamboat and steamboat pilot on the ever-changing Mississippi has endured for over a century.
A brilliant amalgam of remembrance and reportage, by turns satiric, celebratory, nostalgic, and melancholy, Life on the Mississippi evokes the great river that Mark Twain knew as a boy and young man and the one he revisited as a mature and successful author. Written between the publication of his two greatest novels, Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, Twain’s rich portrait of the Mississippi marks a distinctive transition in the life of the river and the nation, from the boom years preceding the Civil War to the sober times that followed it.
Samuel Clemens became a licensed river pilot at the age of twenty-four under the apprenticeship of Horace Bixby, pilot of the Paul Jones. His name, Mark Twain, was derived from the river pilot term describing safe navigating conditions, or “mark two fathoms.” This term was shortened to “mark twain” by the leadsmen whose job it was to monitor the water’s depth and report it to the pilot.
Although Mark Twain used his childhood experiences growing up along the Mississippi in numerous works, nowhere is the river and the pilot’s life more thoroughly described than in Life on the Mississippi.
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The Professor and The Madman
- By: Simon Winchester
- Narrator: Simon Winchester
- Length: 7 hours 20 minutes
- Publisher: HarperAudio
- Publish date: January 13, 2004
- Language: English
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3.84(103544 ratings)
3.84(103544 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0019.99 USDA New York Times Notable Book The Professor and the Madman is an extraordinary tale of madness, genius, and the incredible obsessions of two remarkable men that led to the making of the Oxford English Dictionary–and literary history. TheA New York Times Notable Book
The Professor and the Madman is an extraordinary tale of madness, genius, and the incredible obsessions of two remarkable men that led to the making of the Oxford English Dictionary–and literary history.
The making of the OED was one of the most ambitious projects ever undertaken. As definitions were collected, the overseeing committee, led by Professor James Murray, was stunned to discover that one man, Dr. W. C. Minor, had submitted more than ten thousand. But their surprise would pale in comparison to what they were about to discover when the committee insisted on honoring him. For Dr. Minor, an American Civil War veteran, was also an inmate at an asylum for the criminally insane.
Masterfully researched and eloquently written, The Professor and the Madman “is the linguistic detective story of the decade.” (William Safire, New York Times Magazine)
This P.S. edition features an extra 16 pages of insights into the book, including author interviews, recommended reading, and more.
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The Decameron
- By: Giovanni Boccaccio
- Narrator: Frederick Davidson
- Length: 29 hours 58 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2009
- Language: English
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3.8(57 ratings)
3.8(57 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0038.95 USDIn 1348, the year of the Black Death, seven ladies and three gentlemen escape the dying, corrupt city of Florence to pass ten days in the hills of Fiesole telling each other stories. Reveling in their enchanted dreamworld of beauty and luxury, theyIn 1348, the year of the Black Death, seven ladies and three gentlemen escape the dying, corrupt city of Florence to pass ten days in the hills of Fiesole telling each other stories. Reveling in their enchanted dreamworld of beauty and luxury, they take turns playing king or queen for the day, with the designated ruler naming the stipulations for that day’s story. In contrast to their idyllic, gentile environment, the stories they tell are marked by an intense, cynical realism and feature ordinary people of less privileged classes. Boccaccio brings these stories alive with the authentic language of the different social classes and a frank, realistic handling of character. His satire often bites deep, yet he embraces evil and holiness alike with sympathy and tolerance, leaving guilty characters to condemn themselves.
Like Dante’s Divine Comedy, The Decameron is a monumental work of medieval pre-Renaissance literature.
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On Nineteen Eighty-Four
- By: D. J. Taylor
- Narrator: Charles Armstrong
- Length: 5 hours 4 minutes
- Publisher: Dreamscape Media
- Publish date: October 15, 2019
- Language: English
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3.74(89 ratings)
3.74(89 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0017.99 USDSince its publication nearly seventy years ago, George Orwell’s 1984 has been regarded as one of the most influential novels of the modern age. Politicians have testified to its influence on their intellectual identities, rock musicians haveSince its publication nearly seventy years ago, George Orwell’s 1984 has been regarded as one of the most influential novels of the modern age. Politicians have testified to its influence on their intellectual identities, rock musicians have made records about it, TV viewers watch a reality show named for it, and a White House spokesperson tells of “alternative facts.” The world we live in is often described as an Orwellian one, awash in inescapable surveillance and invasions of privacy. On 1984 dives deep into Orwell’s life to chart his earlier writings and key moments in his youth, such as his years at a boarding school that’s strict and charismatic headmaster shaped the idea of Big Brother. Taylor tells the story of the writing of the book, taking listeners to the Scottish island of Jura, where Orwell, newly famous thanks to Animal Farm but coping with personal tragedy and rapidly declining health, struggled to finish 1984. Published during the cold war–a term Orwell coined–Taylor elucidates the environmental influences on the book. Then he examines 1984’s post-publication life, including its role as a tool to understand our language, politics, and government.
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A Whiff of Wilde, a Pinch of Poe, and a Frisson of Frost
- By: Elliot Engel
- Narrator: Elliot Engel
- Length: 6 hours 46 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2015
- Language: English
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3.73(49 ratings)
3.73(49 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0016.95 USDThey are icons of the literary world whose soaring works have been discussed and analyzed in countless classrooms, homes, and pubs. Yet for most readers, the living, breathing human beings behind the classics have remained unknown—until now.They are icons of the literary world whose soaring works have been discussed and analyzed in countless classrooms, homes, and pubs. Yet for most readers, the living, breathing human beings behind the classics have remained unknown—until now. In this utterly captivating book, Dr. Elliot Engel, a leading authority on the lives of great authors, illuminates the fascinating and flawed members of literature’s elite. In lieu of stuffy biographical sketches, Engel provides fascinating anecdotes.
You’ll never look at these literary giants the same way again.
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Dante
- By: John Took
- Length: 26 hours 30 minutes
- Publisher: Recorded Books, Inc.
- Publish date: March 03, 2020
- Language: English
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3.7(10 ratings)
3.7(10 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0034.99 USDFor all that has been written about the author of the Divine Comedy, Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) remains the best guide to his own life and work. Dante’s writings are therefore never far away in this authoritative and comprehensiveFor all that has been written about the author of the Divine Comedy, Dante Alighieri
(1265-1321) remains the best guide to his own life and work. Dante’s writings are
therefore never far away in this authoritative and comprehensive intellectual biography,
which offers a fresh account of the medieval Florentine poet’s life and thought before
and after his exile in 1302.Beginning with the often violent circumstances of Dante’s life, the book examines
his successive works as testimony to the course of his passionate humanity: his lyric
poetry through to the Vita nova as the great work of his first period; the Convivio
, De
vulgari eloquentia and the poems of his early years in exile; and the Monarchia and the
Commedia as the product of his maturity. Describing as it does a journey of the mind,
the book confirms the nature of Dante’s undertaking as an exploration of what he
himself speaks of as “maturity in the flame of love.”The result is an original synthesis of Dante’s life and work.
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Death in the Afternoon
- By: Ernest Hemingway
- Narrator: Boyd Gaines
- Length: 9 hours 43 minutes
- Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
- Publish date: January 01, 2007
- Language: English
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3.69(6911 ratings)
3.69(6911 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0023.95 USDErnest Hemingway’s classic exploration of the history and pageantry of bullfighting, and the deeper themes of cowardice, bravery, sport and tragedy that it inspires.Still considered one of the best books ever written about bullfighting, DeathErnest Hemingway’s classic exploration of the history and pageantry of bullfighting, and the deeper themes of cowardice, bravery, sport and tragedy that it inspires.
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Still considered one of the best books ever written about bullfighting, Death in the Afternoon reflects Hemingway’s belief that bullfighting was more than mere sport. Here he describes and explains the technical aspects of this dangerous ritual, and “the emotional and spiritual intensity and pure classic beauty that can be produced by a man, an animal, and a piece of scarlet serge draped on a stick.” Seen through his eyes, bullfighting becomes an art, a richly choreographed ballet, with performers who range from awkward amateurs to masters of great grace and cunning.
A fascinating look at the history and grandeur of bullfighting, Death in the Afternoon is also a deeper contemplation on the nature of cowardice and bravery, sport and tragedy, and is enlivened throughout by Hemingway’s pungent commentary on life and literature. -
The Real Lolita
- By: Sarah Weinman
- Narrator: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 7 hours 26 minutes
- Publisher: HarperAudio
- Publish date: September 11, 2018
- Language: English
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3.41(4171 ratings)
3.41(4171 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.005.99 USD“The Real Lolita is a tour de force of literary detective work. Not only does it shed new light on the terrifying true saga that influenced Nabokov’s masterpiece, it restores the forgotten victim to our consciousness.” –David“The Real Lolita is a tour de force of literary detective work. Not only does it shed new light on the terrifying true saga that influenced Nabokov’s masterpiece, it restores the forgotten victim to our consciousness.” –David Grann, author of Killers of the Flower Moon
Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita is one of the most beloved and notorious novels of all time. And yet, very few of its readers know that the subject of the novel was inspired by a real-life case: the 1948 abduction of eleven-year-old Sally Horner.
Weaving together suspenseful crime narrative, cultural and social history, and literary investigation, The Real Lolita tells Sally Horner’s full story for the very first time. Drawing upon extensive investigations, legal documents, public records, and interviews with remaining relatives, Sarah Weinman uncovers how much Nabokov knew of the Sally Horner case and the efforts he took to disguise that knowledge during the process of writing and publishing Lolita.
Sally Horner’s story echoes the stories of countless girls and women who never had the chance to speak for themselves. By diving deeper in the publication history of Lolita and restoring Sally to her rightful place in the lore of the novel’s creation, The Real Lolita casts a new light on the dark inspiration for a modern classic.
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Nanjing Requiem
- By: Ha Jin
- Narrator: Ha Jin
- Length: 11 hours 55 minutes
- Publisher: Recorded Books, Inc.
- Publish date: November 18, 2011
- Language: English
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3.26(1120 ratings)
3.26(1120 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0024.99 USDAuthor Ha Jin’s celebrated works have claimed several top literary awards, including three Pushcart Prizes. In Nanjing Requiem, the Japanese are poised to invade Nanjing. The dean of Jinling Women’s College, Minnie Vautrin mistakenlyAuthor Ha Jin’s celebrated works have claimed several top literary awards, including three Pushcart Prizes. In Nanjing Requiem, the Japanese are poised to invade Nanjing. The dean of Jinling Women’s College, Minnie Vautrin mistakenly believes her American citizenship will protect the school. But Vautrin’s life becomes a daily struggle as the school becomes a refugee camp-and the slaughter of refugees begins. “Jin paints a convincing, harrowing portrait of heroism in the face of brutality.”-Publishers Weekly
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Stalin’s Scribe
- By: Brian J. Boeck
- Narrator: Stefan Rudnicki
- Length: 13 hours 26 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2019
- Language: English
Regular Price:Try for $0.0022.95 USDA masterful and definitive biography of one of the most misunderstood and controversial writers in Russian literature Mikhail Sholokhov is arguably one of the most contentious recipients of the Nobel Prize in Literature. As a young man,A masterful and definitive biography of one of the most misunderstood and controversial writers in Russian literature
Mikhail Sholokhov is arguably one of the most contentious recipients of the Nobel Prize in Literature. As a young man, Sholokhov’s epic novel, Quiet Don, became an unprecedented overnight success.
Stalin’s Scribe is the first biography of a man who was once one of the Soviet Union’s most prominent political figures. Thanks to the opening of Russia’s archives, Brian Boeck discovers that Sholokhov’s official Soviet biography is actually a tangled web of legends, half-truths, and contradictions. Boeck examines the complex connection between an author and a dictator, revealing how a Stalinist courtier became an ideological acrobat and consummate politician in order to stay in favor and remain relevant after the dictator’s death.
Stalin’s Scribe is remarkable biography that both reinforces and clashes with our understanding of the Soviet system. It reveals a Sholokhov who is bold, uncompromising, and sympathetic–and reconciles him with the vindictive and mean-spirited man described in so many accounts of late Soviet history.
Shockingly, at the height of the terror, which claimed over a million lives, Sholokhov became a member of the most minuscule subset of the Soviet Union’s population–the handful of individuals whom Stalin personally intervened to save.
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A Bit of Brontes, a Dollop of Dickinson, an Offering of Austen
- By: Elliot Engel
- Narrator: various narrators
- Length: 6 hours 15 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2014
- Language: English
Regular Price:Try for $0.0016.95 USDThey are icons of the literary world whose soaring works have been discussed and analyzed in countless classrooms, homes, and pubs. Yet for most readers, the living, breathing human beings behind the classics have remained unknown–until now.They are icons of the literary world whose soaring works have been discussed and analyzed in countless classrooms, homes, and pubs. Yet for most readers, the living, breathing human beings behind the classics have remained unknown–until now. In this utterly captivating book, Dr. Elliot Engel, a leading authority on the lives of great authors, illuminates the fascinating and flawed members of literature’s elite. In lieu of stuffy biographical sketches, Engel provides fascinating anecdotes.
You’ll never look at these literary giants the same way again.
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Cliff Weitzman
Cliff Weitzman is a dyslexia advocate and the CEO and founder of Speechify, the #1 text-to-speech app in the world, totaling over 100,000 5-star reviews and ranking first place in the App Store for the News & Magazines category. In 2017, Weitzman was named to the Forbes 30 under 30 list for his work making the internet more accessible to people with learning disabilities. Cliff Weitzman has been featured in EdSurge, Inc., PC Mag, Entrepreneur, Mashable, among other leading outlets.
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