Except by the most dedicated scholars, much of James Joyce's masterpiece has been unreadable, in large part because it has been unhearable. But Irish actor Donal Donnelly and the people of Recorded Books have brought Ulysses to those of us who are only dimly able to hear Joyce's magnificent language through silent reading. Oral interpretation has rarely achieved such heights. In an almost maniacal homage to human consciousness as it interprets itself through the most inventive and poetic language imaginable, Joyce delivers us into the minds of the novel's often-comic hero, Leopold Bloom; his earthy wife, Molly; and intellectual son-surrogate, Stephen Daedalus, as all three experience a day of interaction with one another and with their rich Dublin world--June 16, 1904, to be exact (now known throughout the literary world as Bloomsday). It's obvious that Donnelly and the production and research staff of Recorded Books care about every word and sentence. Whether speaking Latin, French, Spanish, Greek, German, Hebrew, Italian, Gaelic, or biblical English, Donnelly maintains linguistic integrity without losing meaning. Miriam Healy-Louie, a lovely voiced Irish actress, performs with natural ease the traditionally daunting and famously obscene 45-page (and eight-sentence!), sleepy Molly Bloom soliloquy, which ends the novel. The pacing is perfect for literature of this density, with plenty of pauses to allow the wonderful language to do its work. Donnelly tirelessly performs dialects of all types; conveys the humor and satire so easily missed in relatively toneless silent reading; pushes through some of the most outrageously convoluted, elaborate and erudite sentences in the English language; breaks into all manner of song; and, all in all, celebrates with Joyce the joy of language. This oral interpretation opens up the inaccessible.
Pub Date: Jan. 22, 1995
Duration: 42 hrs, 30 mins
Publisher: Recorded Books Inc.
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Narrator Lisa Flanagan has a wonderful vocal personality--lithe with a broad palette of pitch patterns and a range of believable emotional tones. Her friendly voice works well with this lighthearted overview of how dramatically the Internet has changed the world in the past 30 years. Though being digitally connected has improved life in many ways, the author says we've lost many of the interpersonal experiences that used to sustain us. We have less privacy, don't need all those reference books, and have largely forgotten how to have vocal conversations with other people. The audiobook is entertaining nostalgia for anyone who feels incompetent navigating the World Wide Web, and a soothing reminder that those of us who miss the simplicity of the pre-Internet era are not alone.
Pub Date: Oct. 26, 2021
Duration: 5 hrs, 30 mins
DD ISBN: 9780593418055
Publisher: Random House Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Craig Brown tickled our ear with 99 GLIMPSES OF PRINCESS MARGARET, a brisk, irreverent assembly of tiny chapters that ran a satisfactory 12+ hours. For the Beatles, he adds 51 more glimpses and another eight hours, with a proportionally diluted effect. Brown himself, Kate Robbins, and Mark McGann share the narration, which is interesting, insightful, well performed, and packed with some new and a lot of old information. All of it is shaped by Brown's propensity for "easing sense into nonsense." The self-mocking Beatles are harder to deflate than a pretentious princess, but Brown's accounts of touring Beatles sites in Liverpool and his histories of Beatles contemporaries swept up--and aside--by their spectacular rise will amaze and beguile listeners.
Pub Date: Oct. 13, 2020
Duration: 20 hrs, 30 mins
DD ISBN: 9781250770127
Publisher: Macmillan Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
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