Darkness
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5 minutes, 19 seconds
Unabridged Narrative Poem
1816
In which our hero, the most Romantic of all the Romantic poets, takes on the end of the world.
Written in Geneva, Switzerland in the summer of 1816, when Byron, Mary Shelley, Percy Shelley, and John Polidori spent their evenings telling each other ghost stories. The resulting tales included Shelley's Frankenstein, Polidori's creation of the vampire/vampyre genre (based on a novel fragment of Byron's), and this gloomy, speculative verse.
Read by Alex Wilson.
Posted by alex at 11:02 AM
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6 minutes, 24 seconds
Unabridged Short Story
1895
A short story about a woman believing and hoping (and manipulating) that she may have both her security in marriage and passions outside of it. Read by Alex Wilson.
Posted by alex at 11:04 AM
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8 minutes, 52 seconds
Unabridged Essay
1786
American essaysist and humorist Benjamin Franklin on the game of chess, and its application to life.
Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "The Morals of Chess"
Posted by alex at 8:42 AM
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13 minutes, 37 seconds
Unabridged NIMH Informational Brochure
1999
Full text (including printable and redistributable brochures) available at the NIMH website.
Continue reading "NIMH: Social Phobia"
Posted by alex at 12:30 PM
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13 minutes, 19 seconds
Unabridged Short SF Story
2000
When the fuel went, Mara's town turned to windpower. They struggled on as the lights left, as the cities fell fallow, and plastic became a memory. Their only link to the outside world is the Zephyr, and now it too has not shown up. Originally published in Jackhammer. Narrated by Mary Robinette Kowal of the Willamette Radio Workshop.
Continue reading "Waiting for the Zephyr"
Posted by alex at 10:19 AM
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2 minutes, 5 seconds
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1920
The classic war poem written by a British soldier during World War I. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "Dulce et Decorum Est"
Posted by alex at 2:44 PM
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2 minutes, 22 seconds
Unabridged Speech
1863
"Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the propisition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great Civil War..." Given by US President Abraham Lincoln on the battlefield November 19, 1863, after the hard-fought, casualty-ridden, and turning-point Civil War battle near Gettysburg, PA.
This speech is inscribed, along with Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address, in the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "The Gettysburg Address"
Posted by alex at 11:17 AM
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6 minutes, 51 seconds
Unabridged Speech
1775
Patrick Henry's address to the second Virginia Convention in March 23, 1775, where he offered a resolution that put the colony in a state of defense leading up to the American Revolution.
A bestselling Telltale recording (and one of the first), now available free with a Creative Commons License. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death"
Posted by alex at 3:17 PM
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6 minutes, 58 seconds
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1816
Two poems by one of the founders of the Romantic Movement.
Coleridge claimed that "Kubla Khan," one of his most famous works, came to him in an opium-inspired dream. Coleridge's symbolic pleasure-dome of Xanadu in this poem is referenced and even built in Orson Well's classic film, Citizen Kane. The full title of the poem is "Kubla Khan Or, a Vision in a Dream. A Fragment."
"The Pains of Sleep" by contrast is a more conversational and emotional piece, dealing with nightmares instead of utopian fantasies, but it is very likely that this poem, too, was inspired by Coleridge's continued opium use.
Though both poems were first published at the same time in 1816, Coleridge wrote "Kubla Khan" a good 6 years before 1803's "The Pains of Sleep," revealing very different mental reactions to his continued drug use. 1816 was also the year when Coleridge finally sought help for his addiction.
Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "Kubla Khan & The Pains of Sleep"
Posted by alex at 11:46 AM
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15 minutes, 54 seconds
Unabridged Short Story
1914
The adventure and frustration of a first crush.
"Every morning I lay on the floor in the front parlour watching her door. The blind was pulled down to within an inch of the sash so that I could not be seen. When she came out on the doorstep my heart leaped. I ran to the hall, seized my books and followed her. I kept her brown figure always in my eye and, when we came near the point at which our ways diverged, I quickened my pace and passed her. This happened morning after morning. I had never spoken to her, except for a few casual words, and yet her name was like a summons to all my foolish blood."
The third coming-of-age story in James Joyce's collection Dubliners, classic tales dealing thematically with miscommunication, isolation, class differences, and emotional paralysis in Joyce's Ireland. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "Dubliners: Araby"
Posted by alex at 12:00 PM
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15 minutes, 56 seconds
Unabridged NIMH Informational Brochure
2001
A detailed booklet that describes symptoms, causes, and treatments, with information on getting help and coping.
Full text (including a printable and redistributable brochure) available at the NIMH website.
Continue reading "NIMH: Eating Disorders"
Posted by alex at 4:06 PM
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12 minutes, 5 seconds
Unabridged Baseball Poetry
1888, 1907, 1910
Three baseball classics:
- Casey at the bat (Thayer/Phinn)
- Mudville's Fate (Rice)
- Casey's Revenge (Rice)
Ernest L Thayer (writing under the pen name "Phinn") wrote the baseball classic Casey at the Bat: "A Ballad of the Republic, Sung in the Year 1888" for the San Fransisco Examiner. In the century since, the poem has spawned hundreds of sequels, including a handful of updates by sports columnist Grantland Rice.
Just in time for baseball season 2005! Read by Alex Wilson. Sample audio from "Mudville's Fate" below:
Continue reading "Casey at the Bat (and two sequels)"
Posted by alex at 1:13 PM
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11 minutes, 3 seconds
Unabridged Short Story
1921
The narrator meets a refugee on a train, and learns the true meaning (or lack of meaning) of war.
Posted by alex at 3:43 PM
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4 minutes, 28 seconds
Unabridged Short Story/Prose Poem
1921
Prose-poem? Short story? Riddle? A short narrative as told by a mute narrator, free to download to celebrate Telltale Weekly's first anniversary.
Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "The Dumb Man"
Posted by alex at 5:33 PM
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8 minutes, 25 seconds
Two Unabridged Short Ghost Stories
1910
Two short, Civil War era ghost stories by one of the most mysterious authors in American history.
Continue reading "Present at a Hanging & An Arrest"
Posted by alex at 1:59 PM
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4 minutes, 27 seconds
Unabridged Reading of a Historical Document
1789 / 1791
The ten original amendments to the Constitution of the United States of America--passed by Congress September 25,1789 and ratified December 15, 1791. This recording may be freely shared under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial license.
Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "The Bill of Rights"
Posted by alex at 5:27 PM
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15 minutes, 4 seconds
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1961
On January 20, 1961, Kennedy called on Americans to be active in their citizenship. This recording is in the public domain.
Continue reading "Inaugural Address 1961"
Posted by alex at 9:45 AM
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2 minutes, 21 seconds
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1798
A poem by one of the founders of the Romantic Movement.
Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "The Dungeon"
Posted by alex at 9:28 AM
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5 minutes, 30 seconds
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1798
A quiet, conversational poem by one of the founders of the Romantic Movement. The frost is both harsh like reality and comforting like the speaker's imagination, and the poem deals with the juxtaposition of being present and of longing.
The University of Alberta offers an in-depth examination of this poem as a joint project between the Department of Psychology and Department of English. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "Frost at Midnight"
Posted by alex at 9:43 PM
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15 minutes
Unabridged Fairy Tale
1901
"An accomplished wizard once lived on the top floor of a tenement house and passed his time in thoughtful study and studious thought. What he didn't know about wizardry was hardly worth knowing, for he possessed all the books and recipes of all the wizards who had lived before him; and, moreover, he had invented several wizardments himself. "
This humourous story by the author of the Wizard of Oz series, involves a wizard, a glass-blower and a lady of high-society. It was published in 1901 with eleven other fantastical stories in a volume entitled American Fairy Tales. In his introduction to the second publication of these stories in 1908, Baum wrote:
My friends, the children, will find these stories quite as astonishing as if they had been written hundreds of years ago, for ours is the age of astonishing things. They are not too serious in purpose, but aim to amuse and entertain, yet I trust the more thoughtful of my readers will find a wholesome lesson hidden beneath each extravagant notion and humorous incident.This is the unabridged short story, read by J. Winter Collins.
Continue reading "The Glass Dog"
Posted by alex at 9:25 PM
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12 minutes, 35 seconds
Unabridged Historical Document
1776
"When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation..." The United States Declaration of Independence. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "The Declaration of Independence"
Posted by alex at 9:18 PM
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8 minutes, 13 seconds
Unabridged Essay
1849
"The white man's happiness cannot be be purchased by the black man's misery." A prophetic essay first published in his abolitionist newspaper, the North Star. Douglass started adding his initials "F.D." at the end of his writing when it was questioned that such thoughtful, well-reasoned work could come from an ex-slave. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "The Destiny of Colored Americans"
Posted by alex at 9:01 PM
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6 minutes, 6 seconds
Unabridged Essay
1779
Wit and wisdom from the founding father best known for it. An essay on the value of... things. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "The Whistle"
Posted by alex at 8:57 PM
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14 minutes, 24 seconds
Unabridged Short Story
1884
"When a subject was accused of a crime of sufficient importance to interest the king, public notice was given that on an appointed day the fate of the accused person would be decided in the king's arena..."
A short fable about a young hero who angers a ruthless king who forces him to make an ultimate choice. But does the king's semi-barbaric daughter make the choice for him? Read by Max Miller.
Continue reading "The Lady or the Tiger?"
Posted by alex at 8:52 PM
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6 minutes
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1846
Two poems based on the Arthurian legend, written by the founder of trancendentalism. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "Merlin & Merlin II"
Posted by alex at 8:49 PM
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5 minutes, 13 seconds
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1816
A confessional poem by Shelley, written during the summer he spent on the shores of Lake Geneva. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "Hymn to Intellectual Beauty"
Posted by alex at 8:47 PM
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8 minutes, 29 seconds
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1845
The archetype of dark poetry by the master of macabre. Read by Alex Wilson.
Once upon a midnight dreary,
while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious
volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping,
suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping,
rapping at my chamber door.
"'Tis some visitor," I muttered,
"tapping at my chamber door--
Only this, and nothing more..."
Posted by alex at 8:36 PM
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