Audio only
Length11h 30m
About this audiobook
Histories of the book often move straight from the codex to the digital screen. Left out of that familiar account is nearly 150 years of audio recordings. Recounting the fascinating history of audio-recorded literature, Matthew Rubery traces the path of innovation from Edison’s recitation of “Mary Had a Little Lamb” for his tinfoil phonograph in 1877, to the first novel-length talking books made for blinded World War I veterans, to today’s billion-dollar audiobook industry.
The Untold Story of the Talking Book focuses on the social impact of audiobooks, not just the technological history, in telling a story of surprising and impassioned conflicts: from controversies over which books the Library of Congress selected to become talking books―yes to Kipling, no to Flaubert―to debates about what defines a reader. Delving into the vexed relationship between spoken and printed texts, Rubery argues that storytelling can be just as engaging with the ears as with the eyes, and that audiobooks deserve to be taken seriously. They are not mere derivatives of printed books but their own form of entertainment.
We have come a long way from the era of sound recorded on wax cylinders, when people imagined one day hearing entire novels on mini-phonographs tucked inside their hats. Rubery tells the untold story of this incredible evolution and, in doing so, breaks from convention by treating audiobooks as a distinctively modern art form that has profoundly influenced the way we read.
Audiobook details
GenreLiterary Classics, Psychology
Length11 hrs 30 mins
Narrated byJim Denison
FormatAudiobook
Publish dateNov 14, 2016
LanguageEnglish
The Gulag Archipelago Volume 3Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn21h 56m$46 · $0.00
Charles Dickens: Complete WorksCharles Dickens814h 50m$2 · $0.00
Sherlock Holmes: The Ultimate CollectionArthur Conan Doyle59h 49m$5 · $0.00
The Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky: Novels, Short Stories and Autobiographical WritingsFyodor Dostoyevsky270h 59m$2 · $0.00
The Complete Works: Charlotte, Emily, Anne, Patrick & Branwell BrontëCharlotte Brontë, Anne Brontë, Emily Brontë138h 12m$1 · $0.00
L. M. Montgomery – Premium Collection: Novels, Short Stories, Poetry & MemoirsLucy Maud Montgomery155h 1m$2 · $0.00
MARK TWAIN: 12 Novels, 195 Short Stories, Autobiography, 10 Travel Books, 160+ Essays & Speeches (Illustrated)Mark Twain415h 9m5 (2)$2 · $0.00
The Great Gatsby: Original 1925 Edition (An F. Scott Fitzgerald Classic NovelFrancis Scott Fitzgerald4h 45m$18 · $0.00
The Brontë Sisters: The Complete Novels (Unabridged) (Annotated)Charlotte Brontë, Emily Brontë, Anne Brontë120h 3m$2 · $0.00
The Complete Works of TolstoyLeo Tolstoy412h 44m$1 · $0.00
Louisa May Alcott: 16 Novels in One Volume (Illustrated Edition)Louisa May Alcott141h 35m$2 · $0.00
The Fire Next TimeJames Baldwin2h 25m$15
The Complete Works of Oscar WildeOscar Wilde80h 38m$1 · $0.00
The Count of Monte Cristo (With Original Illustrations)Alexandre Dumas54h$1 · $0.00
The Complete Books of F. Scott Fitzgerald (all his 5 novels + all 4 short story collections published during his lifetime)F. Scott Fitzgerald87h 43m$1 · $0.00
Braving the TruthRachel Held Evans11h 31m$29 · $0.00
Richard Wagamese SelectedRichard Wagamese3h 14m$15
Henry V (The Play, Historical Background and Analysis of the Character in the Play)William Shakespeare, William Hazlitt8h 40m$1 · $0.00
Pathways to LightPrakash Amte7h 6m$8
The Holy BibleKing James99h 50m$12 · $0.00
Invisible StormJason Kander6h 48m$24 · $0.00
I've Been to the MountaintopMartin Luther King48m5 (1)$11 · $0.00
AretéBrian Johnson19h 57m$35
Ullathin KuralPrem Rawat8h 17m$18 · $0.00
Vax FactsPaul Thomas MD, Deedee Hoover10h 26m$25
I Am The StormJanice Dean9h$8 · $0.00
On Democracies and Death CultsDouglas Murray10h 38m$29 · $0.00
TerraformPropaganda5h 39m$24 · $0.00
Hour of the HeartIrvin D. Yalom, Benjamin Yalom8h 19m5 (1)$26 · $0.00
The Thomas Sowell ReaderThomas Sowell14h 51m$25
So You Want to Talk about RaceIjeoma Oluo7h 41m$17
Braving the TruthRachel Held Evans11h 31m$29 · $0.00
Level UpRob Dial7h 42m$26 · $0.00
As a JewSarah Hurwitz8h 36m$26 · $0.00
Burn the HaystackJennie Young, PhD9h 30m$29 · $0.00
Woman and the New Race (Annotated)Margaret Sanger6h 30m$2 · $0.00
Good InsideBecky Kennedy9h 55m$29 · $0.00
Du Bois: EssaysW.E.B. Du Bois6h 22m$1 · $0.00
The North American Indian (Illustrated Edition)Edward S. Curtis, Frederick Webb Hodge5h 59m$2 · $0.00
Valley of the BirdtailAndrew Stobo Sniderman, Douglas Sanderson10h 1m$29 · $0.00
You may also like
Science of LogicGeorg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel17h 39m$1 · $0.00
The Restoration of ManMichael D. Aeschliman4h 49m$15 · $0.00
Groundwork of the Metaphysics of MoralsImmanuel Kant4h 47m$2 · $0.00
A Discourse on Method, Meditations on the First Philosophy, and Principles of PhilosophyRené Descartes8h 8m$17
Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of MoralsImmanuel Kant3h 20m$2.30
The FieldLynne McTaggart10h 13m$29 · $0.00
Kant's Prolegomena to Any Future MetaphysicsImmanuel Kant4h 21m$1 · $0.00
On Mr. Spencer's Data of EthicsMalcolm Guthrie3h 53m$2 · $0.00
On the Philosophy of Discovery, Chapters Historical and CriticalWilliam Whewell21h 23m$1 · $0.00
The Distinction between Mind and Its ObjectsBernard Bosanquet2h 4m$2 · $0.00
The Mystique of Enlightenment (Summarized Edition)U. G. Krishnamurti3h 11m$2
Rules for the Direction of the MindRené Descartes1h 15m$1 · $0.00
Children Want to WriteThomas Newkirk, Penny Kittle8h 14m$23
Talk to MeDean Nelson10h 9m$29 · $0.00
EthicsImmanuel Kant23h 17m$2 · $0.00
Duality of VoiceEmil Sutro6h 2m$2 · $0.00
The Essential Works of U. G. KrishnamurtiU. G. Krishnamurti37h 7m$2 · $0.00
LSDRichard Alpert, PhD, a.k.a. Ram Dass, Sidney Cohen MD, Lawrence Schiller5h 22m$17 · $0.00
The Game of LogicLewis Carroll2h 54m$1 · $0.00
Mind and Motion and MonismGeorge John Romanes3h 15m$2 · $0.00