It might be said of his words such are Legends born. As Shakespeare is to England and Burns to Scotland then WB Yeats is to the Emerald Isle. In this audiobook we not only bring you some of his greatest works read by Cyril Cusack, Siobahn McKenna but also some by the great man himself. He speaks as he would his work to be heard.Words. The building blocks of literature. The ammunition to wrench emotion from brain to lip to life. All languages of the world have a unique capacity to c...

Cyril Cusack and Siobhan Mckenna read from James Joyce's Finnegans Wake.

Brought to you by Penguin.Driven away from his parish by a censorious bishop, Monsignor Quixote sets off across Spain accompanied by a deposed renegade mayor as his own Sancho Panza, and his noble steed Rocinante – a faithful but antiquated SEAT 600. Like Cervantes’s classic, this comic, picaresque fable offers enduring insights into our life and times.NB: This recording was produced in 1989 and therefore the sound quality may vary....

Cyril Cusack reads a selection from Joyce's semi-autobiographical novel

One of the best-known Irish playwrights, John Millington Synge premiered The Playboy of the Western World in 1907. It immediately provoked controversy, eventually resulting in the infamous ‘Playboy’ riots. It has been recorded and adapted many times, but this timeless recording stars the Irish actors who made it a classic, including Siobhan McKenna and Cyril Cusack.

Two of J M Synge’s remarkable plays and an exploration of the man, his work and his life on the Aran IslandsJ M Synge was one of the giants of Irish theatre, and a leading dramatist of the Irish Literary Renaissance. Together with W B Yeats and others, he co-founded Dublin’s famous Abbey Theatre in 1904, and was a director there until his death in 1909. He is best known for his comic masterpiece The Playboy of the Western World, which appears here alongsid...

A collection of some of William Trevor’s most acclaimed works, as heard on BBC RadioWilliam Trevor was an Irish literary legend. In a 40-year career, he published a multiplicity of novels, plays, and short stories, and received numerous awards and honours. He was often compared to Chekhov for his extraordinary insight into the human condition, and in these eleven tales, he delves into the inner lives of ordinary people, with all their passions, secrets, fears and d...

An American Tragedy is the story of Clyde Griffiths, who spends his life in the desperate pursuit of success. On a deeper, more profound level, it is the masterful portrayal of the society whose values both shape Clyde's ambitions and seal his fate; it is an unsurpassed depiction of the harsh realities of American life and of the dark side of the American dream. Extraordinary in scope and power, vivid in its sense of wholesale human waste, unceasing in its rich compassion, An ...

Brought to you by Penguin.Doctor Fischer despises the human race. A millionaire with a taste for sadism, he spends his time and money planning notorious parties, entertainments designed to expose the shallowness and greed of his craven hangers-on. Black comedy and painful satire combine in a totally compelling novel.‘Manages to say more about love, hate, happiness, grief, immortality, greed and the disgustingly rich than most contemporary English novels thr...

**Brought to you by Penguin.A gripping tragicomedy of a bungled kidnapping in a provincial Argentinean town, considered to be one of Greene's finest novels.**In a provincial Argentinian community, Charley Fortnum - a British consul with dubious authority and a notorious fondness for drink - is kidnapped by rebels in a case of mistaken identity. The young but world-weary Doctor Eduardo Plarr, is left to pick up the pieces and secure Fortnum's release, wading through a sea of...

**Brought to you by Penguin.Set in a world that has lost the comfort of national identity and individualism, this is a powerful and unusual love story told by one of the 20th century's greatest writers.**Anthony Farrant is back home after lying and cheating his way through one job after another in the Far East. When his adoring sister Kate sets him up with a role in Stockholm as bodyguard to her boss and lover, megalomaniac financier Krogh, Anthony seems set on a path to re...

Brought to you by Penguin.A leak is traced to a small sub-section of the secret service, sparking off the inevitable security checks, tensions and suspicions. The sort of atmosphere, perhaps, where mistakes could be made? For Maurice Castle, it is the end of the line anyway, and time for him to retire to live peacefully with his wife and child. But no-one escapes so easily from the lonely, isolated, neurotic world of the SIS.‘Graham Greene's beautif...