Showing results by narrator "Mark Shaw" in All Categories

One of the BBC's most acclaimed programmes, Great Lives has been a regular Radio 4 fixture for 20 years, presented by Joan Bakewell, Humphrey Carpenter, Francine Stock and Matthew Parris. Every week, a famous name is invited into the studio to nominate a figure from the past who has inspired them, and discuss their subject with the presenter and a guest expert.

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was born on 29th January 1860 in Taganrog, on the south coast of Russia. His family life was difficult; his father was strict and overbearing, but his mother was a passionate story-teller, a subject Chekhov warmed to. As he later said; ‘our talents we got from our father, but our soul from our mother’. Chekhov wrote over 500 short stories which included many, many classics including ‘The Kiss’ and ‘The Lady with a Dog’. His collection ‘At Dusk’ won him the coveted Pushkin Prize when was only 26.

Guy de Maupassant is justly revered as one of the strongest proponents of the short story. The miniature gems he created are woven from the many worlds and strata of society that surrounded him. From feuds and revenge to tales of avarice and friendship de Maupassant is the master of all and second to none.

Hector Hugh Munro, more familiarly known by his pen-name ‘Saki’, was born in what was then Akyab in British Burma on 18th December 1870. His father was an Inspector General for the Indian Imperial Police, and his mother the daughter of a Rear Admiral. After a stint working in Burma with the Indian Imperial Police, Saki decided to move to London to make a living as a writer. Initially he wrote as a journalist for a number of newspapers and magazines before attempting an historical study, ‘The Rise of the Russian Empire’, whose real value lay in directing him to writing short stories instead.

This six-chapter audiobook focuses on the years of Adolf Hitler's political career, from its dark beginnings to the Nazi leader's last days in the bunker. It recounts the most significant events of his life and chronologically follows World War II. This gives the listener a more accurate picture of the personality of the dictator and those who surrounded him. The most revealing anecdotes uncover the myths created to keep Hitler in power and the lies spread by his brutal regime

From Rebecca Shaw and Ben Kronengold, the youngest comedy writers ever for The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and masterminds behind the viral 2018 Yale graduation speech, comes a hilarious collection of short stories taking on coming-of-age, memes, sex, politics, relationships, and Goop, with satire, self-deprecation, and utter irreverence.

Richard Thomas Gallienne was born in Liverpool on 20th January, 1866. His first job was in an accountant's office, but this was quickly abandoned to pursue his first love as a professional writer. His first work, My Ladies’ Sonnets, was published in 1887. In 1889 he became, for a brief time, literary secretary to Wilson Barrett the manager, actor, and playwright. Barrett enjoyed immense success with the staging of melodramas, which would later reach a peak with the historical tragedy The Sign of the Cross (1895).

Montague Rhodes James is cited as perhaps the greatest English writer of ghost stories, an opinion few would disagree with. Many of his elegant yet terrifying tales were created by discarding the prevailing gothic clichés and placing his characters and narrative in a realistic setting. Thereby the stories gained atmosphere and menace on a grand scale and he was famed as the originator of the antiquarian ghost story. Although story-telling and writing these 30 or so tales was a hobby, when published their effect transformed the genre and still chill the bones in our more modern times.

Sir Anthony Hope Hawkins was born on 9th February 1863 in Clapton, London. He was educated at St John's School, Leatherhead, Marlborough College and Balliol College, Oxford. Hope trained as a lawyer and barrister and was called to the Bar by the Middle Temple in 1887. Despite what was thought to be a promising legal career, he had literary ambitions and wrote in his spare time. His early works appeared in various periodicals of the day but for his first book, ‘A Man of Mark’ (1890), with no publisher interested, he published with his own resources.