When I think about individuals and their uniqueness, I tend to think beyond their physical appearances and the way they dress. I find their voices to be more revealing of who and what they are. This is especially true in the case of authors or readers who do audiobooks.
True, there is the way words appear on pages and how we read, interpret, and process them silently which is usually the first way we encounter literary works. But nothing brings the author or work closer to the reader than the voice of the author or a skilled reader with a suitable voice to bring alive a work. The auditory process becomes more intimate and nuanced with the listener often discovering new or other details, meanings, and interpretations.
The following examples of readings from my own audiobook collection are excellent examples of entertaining, thoughtful, and stimulating auditory experiences.
The De Profundis voice of Dylan Thomas.
The Irish lilt of Cyril Cusack adding a playfulness to Greene’s priest protagonist.
The ironic tones of Jeremy Irons doing justice to Eliot’s work.
The ebullience of Michael York rendering Huxley’s satire.
Huxley, himself, a dry old stick, musing candidly and reflectively.
The dignified Sir Ralph bringing “The Eve of St. Agnes” to life bigtime.
The charmingly smooth tones of James Mason narrating Browning’s dramatic monologues.
The half-argumentative tobacco-voiced Auden sharing his relationship and nature poems.
The emotionally-open voice of Julie Harris; she who also brought Dickinson’s work to life.
The firm passionate Welsh tones of one of the greatest voices ever.
The civilized voice of Claire Bloom as Virginia Woolf.
The delicate voice of Juliet Stevenson bringing Woolf’s great novel alive.
Canada has had its share of great voices; here, W.O. Mitchell: a craggy-voiced storyteller and the melodramatic recitations of Robert Service.
Bradbury’s totally confident, matter-of-fact narration of his classic.
The spooky voices of Price and Rathbone; the former also reading Shelley, the latter reading Sherlock Holmes.
The sadder, but always wiser and thoughtful Arthur Miller.
The quiet, half-amused Southern drawl of Tennessee.
The harsh tell-it-like-it-is voice of Hemingway.
The classic ‘old man poet’.
The wild and crazy exclamatory Beat poet who gave us “Howl” and “Kaddish”.