Literary Classics

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Lives of Houses

By Unknown AuthorNarrated by Hermione Lee, Kate Kennedy, Phyllida Nash, Richard Pryal, Lisa Coleman

Length9h 21m

About this audiobook

This audiobook narrated by Kate Kennedy and Hermione Lee celebrates our fascination with the houses of famous literary figures, artists, composers, and politicians of the past With additional narration by Lisa Coleman, Phyllida Nash, and Richard Pryal Features contributions by notable writers such as UK poet laureate Simon Armitage, Julian Barnes, Margaret MacMillan, and Jenny Uglow What can a house tell us about the person who lives there? Do we shape the buildings we live in, or are we formed by the places we call home? And why are we especially fascinated by the houses of the famous and often long-dead? In Lives of Houses, a group of notable biographers, historians, critics, and poets explores these questions and more through fascinating essays on the houses of great writers, artists, composers, and politicians of the past. Editors Kate Kennedy and Hermione Lee are joined by wide-ranging contributors, including Simon Armitage, Julian Barnes, David Cannadine, Roy Foster, Alexandra Harris, Daisy Hay, Margaret MacMillan, Alexander Masters, and Jenny Uglow. We encounter W. H. Auden, living in joyful squalor in New York's St. Mark's Place, and W. B. Yeats in his flood-prone tower in the windswept West of Ireland. We meet Benjamin Disraeli, struggling to keep up appearances, and track the lost houses of Virginia Woolf and Elizabeth Bowen. We visit Benjamin Britten in Aldeburgh, England, and Jean Sibelius at Ainola, Finland. But Lives of Houses also considers those who are unhoused, unwilling or unable to establish a home—from the bewildered poet John Clare wandering the byways of England to the exiled Zimbabwean writer Dambudzo Marechera living on the streets of London. Lives of Houses illuminates what houses mean to us and how we use them to connect to and think about the past. The result is a fresh and engaging look at house and home. Featuring Alexandra Harris on moving house ● Susan Walker on Morocco's ancient Roman House of Venus ● Hermione Lee on biographical quests for writers' houses ● Margaret Macmillan on her mother's Toronto house ● a poem by Maura Dooley, "Visiting Orchard House, Concord, Massachusetts"—the house in which Louisa May Alcott wrote and set her novel Little Women ● Felicity James on William and Dorothy Wordsworth's Dove Cottage ● Robert Douglas-Fairhurst at home with Tennyson ● David Cannadine on Winston Churchill's dream house, Chartwell ● Jenny Uglow on Edward Lear at San Remo's Villa Emily ● Lucy Walker on Benjamin Britten at Aldeburgh, England ● Seamus Perry on W. H. Auden at 77 St. Mark's Place, New York City ● Rebecca Bullard on Samuel Johnson's houses ● a poem by Simon Armitage, "The Manor" ● Daisy Hay at home with the Disraelis ● Laura Marcus on H. G. Wells at Uppark ● Alexander Masters on the fear of houses ● Elleke Boehmer on sites associated with Zimbabwean writer Dambudzo Marechera ● Kate Kennedy on the mental asylums where World War I poet Ivor Gurney spent the last years of his life ● a poem by Bernard O'Donoghue, "Safe Houses" ● Roy Foster on W. B. Yeats and Thoor Ballylee ● Sandra Mayer on W. H. Auden's Austrian home ● Gillian Darley on John Soane and the autobiography of houses ● Julian Barnes on Sibelius and Ainola

Audiobook details

GenreLiterary Classics

Length9 hrs 21 mins

Narrated byHermione Lee, Kate Kennedy, Phyllida Nash, Richard Pryal, Lisa Coleman

FormatAudiobook

Publish dateMar 24, 2020

LanguageEnglish

1Opening Anno, Preface by Hermione Lee

14House-Proud, Chapter 13 - The Manor, Simon Armitage

2Houses Lost and Found, Chapter 1 - Moving House, Alexandra Harris

15Chapter 14 - At Home with the Disraelis, Daisy Hay

3Chapter 2 - Built on Memory, Susan Walker

16Chapter 15 - H. G. Wells at Uppark, Laura Marcus

4Chapter 3 - A House of Air, Hermione Lee

17Unhoused, Chapter 16 - The Fear of Houses, Alexander Masters

5Family Houses, Chapter 4 - My Mother's House, Margaret Macmillan

18Chapter 17 - When There Is No House to Visit, Elleke Boehmer

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6Chapter 5 - At Orchard House, Maura Dooley

19Chapter 18 - "A Place One Can Go Mad In," Kate Kennedy

7Chapter 6 - Romantic Home, Felicity James

20Chapter 19 - Safe Houses, Bernard O'Donoghue

8Dream Houses, Chapter 7 - At Home with Tennyson, Robert Douglas-Fairhurst

21The Afterlives of Houses, Chapter 20 - "When All Is Ruin Once Again," Roy Foster

9Chapter 8 - Chartwell: Winston Churchill's Dream House, David Cannadine

22Chapter 21 - W. H. Auden in Austria, Sandra Mayer

10Creative Houses, Chapter 9 - The Quangle Wangle's Hat, Jenny Uglow

23Chapter 22 - John Soane and House Autobiography, Gillian Darley

11Chapter 10 - Benjamin Britten in Aldeburgh, Lucy Walker

24Chapter 23 - Ainola: Music and Silence, Julian Barnes

12Chapter 11 - 77 St. Mark's Place, Seamus Perry

25List of Contributors, Closing Anno

13Chapter 12 - Samuel Johnson's Houses, Rebecca Bullard

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Unknown Author

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