John Humphrys has 5 audiobooks on Listento.it, narrated by 12 narrators. The most-rated is 28 Acts in 28 Minutes: A BBC Radio 4 Stand-Up Comedy Show.
In God We Doubt
Summary
Throughout the ages believers have been persecuted: usually for believing in the "wrong" God. So have non-believers who have denied the existence of God as superstitious rubbish. Today it is the agnostics who are given a hard time. They are scorned by believers for their failure to find faith and by atheists for being hopelessly wishy-washy and weak-minded. But John Humphrys is proud to count himself among their ranks. In this audiobook he takes us along the spiritual road he himself has travelled. He was brought up a Christian and prayed every day of his life, until his growing doubts finally began to overwhelm his faith. As one of the nation's most popular and respected broadcasters, he had the rare opportunity in 2006 of challenging leaders of our three main religions to prove to him that God does exist. The Radio Four interviews, Humphrys In Search of God, provoked the biggest response to anything he has done in half a century of journalism. The interviews and the massive reaction from listeners had a profound effect on him - but not in the way he expected. Doubt is not the easy option. But for the millions who can find no easy answers to the most profound questions, it is the only possible one.
©2007 John Humphrys (P)2007 Hodder and Stoughton Audiobooks
A Day Like Today
Summary
Read by John Humphrys, with extracts from his fiercest on-air interviews. For more than three decades, millions of Britons have woken to the sound of John Humphrys’s voice. As presenter of Radio 4’s Today, the nation’s most popular news programme, he is famed for his tough interviewing, his deep misgivings about authority in its many forms, and his passionate commitment to a variety of causes. A Day Like Today charts John’s journey from the poverty of his post-war childhood in Cardiff, leaving school at 15, to the summits of broadcasting. Humphrys was the BBC’s youngest foreign correspondent, the first reporter at the catastrophe of Aberfan, an experience that marked him for ever; he was in the White House when Richard Nixon became the first American president to resign, in South Africa during the dying years of apartheid, and in war zones around the globe throughout his career. John was also the first journalist to present the Nine O’Clock News on television. Humphrys pulls no punches and now, freed from the restrictions of being a BBC journalist, he reflects on the politicians he has interrogated and the controversies he has reported on and been involved in, including the interview that forced the resignation of his own boss, the director general. In typically candid style, he also weighs in on the role the BBC itself has played in our national life – for good and ill – and the broader health of the political system today. A Day Like Today is both a sharp, shrewd memoir and a backstage account of the great newsworthy moments in recent history – from the voice behind the country’s most authoritative microphone.
©2019 John Humphreys (P)2019 HarperCollins Publishers Limited
Beyond Words
Summary
From the huge response to Lost for Words, it's clear that many of us share John's strong feelings about the use and misuse of the English language. Not because we want to split hairs (or infinitives), but because how we use words reveals so much about the way we see the world. Here John takes a sharp look at phrases and expressions in current use to expose the often hidden attitudes that lie behind them - from the schoolroom to the boardroom, from Westminster to the weather forecast. Questioning our assumptions, puncturing our illusions, and illuminating the way we live now, Beyond Words speaks volumes.
©2006 John Humphrys (P)2006 Barry Johnston for Barn Productions
Blue Skies & Black Olives
Summary
Here is Radio 4's Today presenter and national treasure John Humphrys' funny memoir of building his home in Greece with his son, Christopher. It was a moment of mad impulse when John Humphrys decided to buy a semi-derelict cottage and a building site on a plot of land overlooking the Aegean. A few minutes gazing out over the most glorious bay he had ever seen was all it took to persuade him. After all, his son Christopher was already raising his family there so he would help build the beautiful villa that would soon take shape. What could possibly go wrong? Everything. John was to spend the next three years regretting his moment of madness. Some of it had its comic side. He learned to cope with a drunken peacock falling out of his favourite tree and even a colony of rats invading his bedroom. Some of the humans proved trickier: the old man demanding payment for olive trees in the middle of John's own land; the neighbour who dragged his lovely old fishing boat onto the beach and set fire to it after a row with his wife. And, of course, the builders. Was the plumber who electrocuted him in the shower vengeful or merely incompetent? John learned a lot about Greece in a short time. He grew to love it and loathe it in almost equal measures, but was never for a moment bored by it. And Christopher learned a bit more about John. Their shared experience revived keen memories for him of growing up with a father for whom patience was never the strongest virtue. Here father and son capture the idyll and the odyssey as paradise is found, lost, and regained.
©2009 John Humphrys and Christopher Humphrys (P)2009 Hodder & Stoughton
28 Acts in 28 Minutes: A BBC Radio 4 Stand-Up Comedy Show
Summary
John Humphrys hosts the quick-fire comedy show featuring 28 acts performing for one minute each. 28 Acts in 28 Minutes is a traditional variety show with a difference: the performers have just 60 seconds in which to entertain a live audience. Making the most of their minutes are a plethora of top-class talents, including Adam Buxton, Jason Manford, Nicholas Parsons, Sarah Millican, Richard Herring, Miles Jupp, Frankie Boyle, Isy Suttie, Tim Key, John Bishop, Tim Minchin, Jason Byrne, Stephen K Amos, Shappi Khorsandi, Stewart Lee, Marcus Brigstocke, Phil Cornwell and John Finnemore. Featuring a mix of award-winning comedians and newcomers to the scene, there's something for everyone, from stand-up to sketches, satire, songs and poems - with a few surprises thrown in. And if you don't like any of the acts, well...another will be along in about 55 seconds. Presiding over this comedy maelstrom is John Humphrys (the fierce one from the Today programme), who sits at the side of the stage with a stopwatch, ready to cut the microphone when the time is up. So hurry up and get ready for the fastest show on air, delivered with a frenetic urgency that makes for a truly unique experience. First broadcast on BBC Radio 4, 21st June-5th July 2006 (Series 1), 25th August 2006 (Edinburgh Festival Special), 20th December 2007-3rd January 2008, 27th March 2008 (Series 2).
©2020 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd (P)2020 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd