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  The Fireside Poets - A...

  Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

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  This group of 19th Century American poets was the first to rival their British counterparts in popularity. 
   
  Gathered around their New England roots they were also known as the Schoolroom or Household poets,  and comprised of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, William Cullen Bryant, John Greenleaf Whittier, James Russell Lowell and Olivier Wendell Holmes Senior. Occasionally Ralph Waldo Emerson was included although his poetic philosophy differed in some key aspects.   
   
  Each of these poets lived long and productive lives ensuring the longevity of the movement into the early 20th century. Their activities in the academic world, newspapers, the diplomatic service and lecture tours ensured they were constantly in the public eye.   
   
  Their essential discipline was focused on domestic themes and morality. At the time one of the primary sources of entertainment for the family was to be gathered around the fireplace whilst poems were read. 
   
  The Fireside Poets did not write for the sake of other poets or critics or for posterity. Instead they wrote for a contemporary audience of general readers.  They were mass communicators. Today the Fireside Poets, along with the equivalent British poets of Victorian times, is still regarded as essential verse.

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  Troilus and Cressida

  Geoffrey Chaucer

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  Considered one of Chaucer's finest poems, second only to The Canterbury Tales in richness and depth, Troilus and Cressida is a tragic love story set against the background of the siege of Troy by the Greeks. Written in the 1380s, it presents Troilus, son of Priam and younger brother of Hector, as a Trojan warrior of renown who sees, and falls deeply in love with, the beautiful Cressida. Cressida is the daughter of Calchas, a Trojan priest and seer who, having divined the eventual fall of Troy, has deserted to Agamemnon's camp, leaving his daughter in the besieged city. With the help of Pander, friend to Troilus and uncle to Cressida, the young couple meet and merge - but with unhappy consequences. Chaucer's long poem is cast in seven-line rhymed stanzas and is eased out of Middle English to be presented here in a lively modern verse translation by George Philip Krapp, who has retained not only the structure but its spirit. Emotions run high, the love is intense, the story unfolds with a dramatic urgency that draws the listener ever onwards; yet Chaucer is Chaucer, and there are times when a deft line, a light insinuation, suggests the smile, the benevolence and the immediacy of the author of The Canterbury Tales. Troilus and Cressida, though often overshadowed by the Tales and time (and even Shakespeare, who took up the story) is a monument in its own right in the canon of English literature. Once listened to it will never be forgotten.

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  She Stoops to Conquer

  Oliver Goldsmith

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  In this classic comedy of manners, two young men set out to woo the alluring and upper-crust Kate and Constance. But is anybody in this rural estate ruly who they seem? Bawdy hijinks and popped pretensions are the hallmarks of this romping frolic that’s kept audiences laughing for over two centuries.An L.A. Theatre Works full-cast performance featuring:Rosalind Ayres as Mrs. HardcastleAdam Godley as Tony LumpkinJulian Holloway as Elder Marlow and StingoJames Marsters as Charles MarlowChristopher Neame as RogerPaula Jane Newman as Bet Bouncer and PimpleIan Ogilvy as Mr. HardcastleMoira Quirk as Constance NevilleDarren Richardson as Diggory and JeremyJoanne Whalley as Kate HardcastleMatthew Wolf as George HastingsDirected by  Martin Jarvis. Recorded before a live audience at the Skirball Cultural Center, Los Angeles.

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  The Supine Cobbler

  Jill Connell

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  A contemporary clinical abortion in the spirit of a Western.
  
   
  The Doctor introduces the gang: The Supine Cobbler (wanted), her estranged sister (dead by hanging), her former best friend (missing, presumed dead) and her apprentice (a turncoat). Together they negotiate integrity in a lawless world. The Supine Cobbler is an unsentimental legend and a true story. It is a hero myth for girls.
  
   
  Praisefor the productions of The Supine Cobbler:
  
   
  ‘The show is like nothing you’ve ever seen before.’
  
   
  – Theatre Reader
  
   
  ‘Jill Connell … is consistently one of the most innovative playwrights in the country.’
  
   
  – Vue Weekly
  
   
  ‘The Supine Cobbler is brilliant, subversive and deeply hilarious. The play is about an abortion – but also: waiting, haunting, cheating, hurting, daring and the private cultivation of one’s humanity. It is singular and surprising and epic and lean as Bowie. You cannot help but talk about this play. It is the work of a lover and a rebel. To miss it, would be to miss a master in her early bloom.’
  
   
  – Claudia Dey, author of Trout Stanley and Stunt
  
   
  ‘I love this absolutely idiosyncratic play. It’s very funny, moving and sharp, and the only work of art about abortion I can think of that doesn’t sentimentalize or simplify the experience, but gets the strangeness and banality of it exactly right.’
  
   
  – Sheila Heti, author of How Should a Person Be?

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  Typhoon

  Joseph Conrad

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  This is the novel Typhoon. Written fir you by Joseph Conrad, and read by Jim Edmark.

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  Christmas Short Works Collection...

  Various

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  LibriVox’s 2007 Christmas Short Works Colletion containing public domain short stories, essays, poems, and scripture passages recorded by a variety of LibriVox members.Section 09:  A Cornish Christmas Play, a mummers' play, was read by gathered members of the UK LibriVox chapter (Sarah O'Connor, Graham Redman, Cori Samuel and Peter Yearsley.)

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