Showing results by author "ciesse" in All Categories

The experiences in public school, Sandhurst and military life in India of Major George Cotter together with his adventures in the dream world he discovers and frequents. (Summary by Liam Neely)

In American Notes, Rudyard Kipling, the Nobel Prize-winning author of the Jungle Book, visits the USA. As the travel-diary of an Anglo-Indian Imperialist visiting the USA, these American Notes offer an interesting view of America in the 1880s.Kipling affects a wide-eyed innocence, and expresses astonishment at features of American life that differ from his own, not least the freedom (and attraction) of American women. However, he scorns the political machines that made a mockery of American democracy, and while exhibiting the racist attitudes that made him controversial in the 20th century ...

LibriVox volunteers bring you 12 recordings of The Derelict by Rudyard Kipling .This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for March 10, 2024. ------Joseph Rudyard Kipling was an English novelist, short-story writer, poet, and journalist. He was born in British India, which inspired much of his work. In 1907, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, as the first English-language writer to receive the prize, and at 41, its youngest recipient to date. He was also sounded out for the British Poet Laureateship and several times for a knighthood, but declined both. (Summary by Wikipedia)

LibriVox volunteers bring you 11 recordings of Before Edgehill Fight by Rudyard Kipling.This was the Weekly Poetry project for April 7, 2019. ------A real and down to earth poem about a the Battle of Edgehill. - Summary by Campbell Schelp

A tale of the revenge of the earth, in this case, specifically, Mother Gunga, Goddess of the River Ganga, against the men who confine her power, The Bridge Builders is also a tale of the death of the Gods as their place in the earth is taken by the things of science. A close description of the building of a bridge across the River Ganges, the tale also tells of a vision of the Gods in an opium dream like a dream in the mind of Brahma; and when Brahma wakes, the Gods die. Or do they? ( Tony Addison)

Another Pinero play from the early 1900s. With a social message about the effects of stardom on the star as well as those that love them. "I’m afraid there’s one thing finer than winning the woman you love and, when you’ve won her, being prepared to go through fire and water for her." "What’s that?" "Having the courage to give her up"- Summary by ToddHWCast list:Viscount Farncombe: Tomas PeterColonel the Hon. Arthur Stidulph: alanmapstoneBaron von Rettenmayer: NemoCaptain Nicholas Jeyes: Campbell SchelpLionel Roper: HamletSam de Castro: Aaron WhiteHerbert Fulkerson: Frédéric ...

In “The Just Men of Cordova (1917)”, European financiers are dying conveniently from London to Cordova, victims of a mysterious poison that the police have failed to identify. In his earlier book, Edgar Wallace’s Four Just Men (1905) traveled the globe meting out vigilante justice. Renowned for their cunning, tenacity, lock breaking skills, and mastery of disguise, they operate outside the law, where their lethal brand of justice strikes fear into the hearts of their prey. But just who are they and who is assisting them?From the golden age of detective fiction, Edgar Wallace was a ...

Tish Carberry reluctantly takes her two best friends, Aggie and Lizzie, on a camping trip into the hills of their Midwestern American town, only to fall in with outlaws on the lam from a train robbery! Comic adventure ensues. - Summary by Matt Pierard

"Men in pajamas sitting abaft the funnel and swapping lies of the purple seas." Thirty one early short stories by the master story teller Kipling. (Summary by David Wales and title page)

The girlfriends are coming to visit the chaps at college, but of course they can't stay unless there is a proper chaperone. So what could be more reasonable that getting a friend from the Drama Club to dress up and pretend to be Charley's Aunt? Simple and sure to work! What could go wrong? Howsabout the real aunt arriving? This play has been revived and adapted numerous times including as films, a Broadway musical, and even an opera. (NOTE: the script contains an almost overwhelming number of stage directions by the author telling each actor what emotion to show, where to move, and even how to...

This book (eleven short stories) was also published under the title of “The Old Home House”. Joseph Crosby Lincoln (1870 – 1944) was an American author of novels, poems, and short stories, many set in a fictionalized Cape Cod. Lincoln's work frequently appeared in popular magazines such as the Saturday Evening Post and The Delineator.... Lincoln claimed that he was satisfied "spinning yarns" that made readers feel good about themselves and their neighbors. Two of his stories have been adapted to film. Lincoln's literary career celebrating "old Cape Cod" can partly be seen as an attempt ...

While hunting, the boy Anchises stumbles upon Venus's forest retreat and is so kindly entertained by the goddess that he becomes the proud father of Aeneas, the hero of Vergil's Aeneid. The poem is an epyllion like Marlowe's "Hero and Leander" and Shakespeare's "Venus and Adonis," a short erotic poem with a mythological subject. The style is Spenserian, the stanzas rhyming ababbccc.When Brittain's Ida was published in 1628, the publisher ascribed it to Edmund Spenser. However, in 1926 Ethel Seaton discovered and published Fletcher's original manuscript, whose opening stanzas make clear that ...

Imagining a holiday postcard message penned by the author …My Dear ListenersEnded up having a great 10 days up here on the Norfolk Broads, even after everyone in the original party called off at the last minute!Met up with Mr Bradley, a splendid chap (who is also an East End London policeman and is thus the ‘Bobby’ of this tale) who joined me on ‘The Shamrock’, a small lug-sail boat that I’d hired to cruise around the Broads.Pleased to report that my friend Bunce rolled up the following evening whilst the ‘Bobby’ & I were in the middle of a boozy singsong session with the ...

The wild and raw adventures of Catherine Hayes, who was burned for murder at Tyburn in 1742 - Summary by Mark Leder

Young, self conscious, timid stenographer for a New York businessman with a beautiful daughter (the flapper). He emulates stronger types, but alas.....is not them. He grows up in this humorous volume from 1913. - Summary by joseph tabler

A collection containing a parody on Problem Plays, as well as humorous anecdotes from Canadian humourist Stephen Leacock. (Summary by TriciaG)Cast for Section 1:Narrator/Stage Directions – Tricia GSir John – Algy PugLady Cecily – Liberty StumpValet – Bob GonzalezMr. Harding – John HoerrFrench Maid – Annabelle LiPostal Messenger & “A Man” – David LawrenceMrs. Harding – Bev J. StevensAudio edited by Tricia G

A melodramatic folksy Christmas story, a little like Dickens - with a Tiny Tim, but also with some romance. Tarkington's writings are very much set in his early 1900s American culture. We are meant to sympathize with the crippled child but not even notice the slights to the black servants. Still, Tarkington promotes kindness and uses a milder style of humor than many authors of his day. (Arnold Banner)

The Bab Ballads are a collection of light verse by W. S. Gilbert, illustrated with his own comic drawings. Gilbert wrote the Ballads before he became famous for his comic opera librettos with Arthur Sullivan. In writing the Bab Ballads, Gilbert developed his unique "topsy-turvy" style, where the humour was derived by setting up a ridiculous premise and working out its logical consequences, however absurd. The Ballads also reveal Gilbert's cynical and satirical approach to humour. They became famous on their own, as well as being a source for plot elements, characters and songs that Gilbert ...

Bealby is the comical story of the escapade of a thirteen-year-old boy when he rebels against his placement as a steward's-room boy in the great house of an estate named Shonts (his stepfather, Mr. Darling, is a gardener there) and flees—not, however, before thoroughly upsetting a weekend party where the nouveau riche couple renting Shonts is entertaining the Lord Chancellor. - Summary by Wikipedia

Another delightful example of an English writer poking fun at his countrymen, or maybe all races' reactions to someone from a different background.A series of adventures of a well educated foreigner in London which originally appeared weekly in Punch, sometimes with illustrations, dealing with the difficulties of fully understanding a different culture.The hero's perfect English reminds one of a quote from "My Fair Lady" ..."His English is too good, he said, "that clearly indicates that he is Foreign. Whereas other people are instructed in their native language English people aren't." (Summary...