The Essays category has 117 audiobooks on Listento.it, with an average listener rating of 4.5★ across 702 ratings. The most-rated is What the Dog Saw.
Reflections
Summary
Brought to you by Penguin. Whether reporting from the London cinema, Cotswolds villages, second-hand bookshops, war zones or political trouble spots, Graham Greene's novelistic gifts for detail, drama and compassionate curiosity provide unique and resonant insights into his life and times. To know war on any continent, listen to ‘A Memory of Indo-China’; to glimpse high political chicanery, listen to ‘The Great Spectacular’; to feel the flush and aftermath of revolutionary change, take up his pieces about Cuba. Reflections provides an extraordinary mirror on the 20th century from one of its greatest observers.
©1990 Graham Greene (P)2020 Penguin Audio
The River Always Wins
Summary
A meditation on movement of both society and nature, based on the author’s experiences as an activist. In short, aphoristic chapters, Marquis explores the power of force and collectivity through the metaphor of water. As an activist, David Marquis founded the Oak Cliff Nature Preserve in Dallas, and has consulted with the Texas Conservation Alliance since 2011. He brings an unerring belief in the connective and healing power of nature to The River Always Wins. "The River Always Wins is an arts-based project - book, music, video, stage, audio book, and visual - designed to inspire people to come together to create positive, lasting social change." (David Marquis)
©2020 David Marquis (P)2021 La Reunion Publishing
True Stories & Other Essays
Summary
An irresistible collection of favorite writings from an author celebrated for his bravura style and sheer unpredictability. Francis Spufford’s welcome first volume of collected essays gathers an array of his compelling writings from the 1990s to the present. He makes use of a variety of encounters with particular places, writers, or books to address deeper questions relating to the complicated relationship between storytelling and truth-telling. How must a nonfiction writer imagine facts, vivifying them to bring them to life? How must a novelist create a dependable world of story, within which facts are, in fact, imaginary? And how does a religious faith felt strongly to be true, but not provably so, draw on both kinds of writerly imagination? Ranging freely across topics as diverse as the medieval legends of Cockaigne, the Christian apologetics of C. S. Lewis, and the tomb of Ayatollah Khomeini, Spufford provides both fresh observations and thought-provoking insights. No less does he inspire an irresistible urge to play this audiobook and listen on.
©2017 Francis Spufford (P)2018 Audible, Inc.
Thorns to be Thankful For
Summary
Rediscover the power of perspective with heartfelt stories from people who went through unthinkable circumstances - but came out ahead. This book will motivate you, inspire you, and help you see life from a fresh new lens. Each carefully worded story lets you peer into someone's soul and see how they came out of tough times with their head held high. You're sure to find a story that resonates with you; you owe it to yourself. The complete list of authors includes: Anna George, Anna Jones, Ash Brookway, Cherry-Ann Carew, Dan Klatt, David Lee Martin, Debby Makarius, Debora Humphries, and Deb Lange.
©2014 Rachel Rofe (P)2015 Rachel Rofe
A House of My Own
Summary
From the author of The House on Mango Street, a compilation of true stories and nonfiction pieces that, taken together, form a jigsaw autobiography - an intimate album of a beloved literary legend. From the Chicago neighborhoods where she grew up and set her groundbreaking The House on Mango Street to her abode in Mexico in a region where "my ancestors lived for centuries", the places Sandra Cisneros has lived have provided inspiration for her now-classic works of fiction and poetry. But a house of her own, where she could truly take root, has eluded her. With this collection - spanning three decades and including never-before-published work - Cisneros has come home at last. Ranging from the private (her parents' loving and tempestuous marriage) to the political (a rallying cry for one woman's liberty in Sarajevo) to the literary (a tribute to Marguerite Duras), and written with her trademark lyricism, these signature pieces recall transformative memories as well as reveal her defining artistic and intellectual influences. Poignant, honest, and deeply moving, this is an exuberant celebration of a life in writing lived to the fullest.
©2015 Sandra Cisneros (P)2015 Random House Audio
India Grows at Night
Summary
India's is a tale of private success and public failure. Prosperity is, indeed, spreading across the country even as governance failure pervades public life. But how could a nation become one of the world's fastest-growing economies when it's governed by a weak, ineffective state? And wouldn't it be wonderful if India also grew during the day - in other words, if public policy supported private enterprise? What India needs, Gurcharan Das argues, is a strong liberal state. Such a state would have the authority to take quick, decisive action; it would have the rule of law to ensure those actions are legitimate; and finally, it would be accountable to the people. However, India has always had a weak state and a strong society, says Das, which means that achieving something better will be an uphill struggle.
©2013 Gurcharan Das (P)2019 Random House Audio
Native
Summary
Sayed Kashua has been praised by The New York Times as "a master of subtle nuance in dealing with both Arab and Jewish society". An Arab-Israeli who lived in Jerusalem for most of his life, Kashua started writing with the hope of creating one story that both Palestinians and Israelis could relate to, rather than two that cannot coexist together. He devoted his novels and his satirical weekly column published in Haaretz to telling the Palestinian story and exploring the contradictions of modern Israel while also capturing the nuances of everyday family life in all its tenderness and chaos. With an intimate tone fueled by deep-seated apprehension and razor-sharp ironic wit, Kashua has been documenting his own life as well as that of society at large: He writes about his children's upbringing and encounters with racism, about fatherhood and married life, the Jewish-Arab conflict, his professional ambitions, travels around the world as an author, and - more than anything - his love of books and literature. He brings forth a series of brilliant, caustic, wry, and fearless reflections on social and cultural dynamics as experienced by someone who straddles two societies. Written between 2006 and 2014, Native is like an unrestrained, profoundly thoughtful personal journal.
©2016 Sayed Kashua. Translation 2014 by Haaretz. First published as Ben Haaretz by Keter Publishing House in 2015. Recorded by arrangement with Grove Atlantic, Inc. (P)2016 Audible, Inc.
![Cover art for Sobre el amor [About Love]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61oUDFtjXuL._SL500_.jpg)
Sobre el amor [About Love]
Summary
Ideas que han cambiado el mundo. A lo largo de la historia, algunos libros han cambiado el mundo. Han transformado la manera en que nos vemos a nosotros mismos y a los demás. Han inspirado el debate, la discordia, la guerra y la revolución. Han iluminado, indignado, provocado y consolado. Han enriquecido vidas, y también las han destruido. Taurus publica las obras de los grandes pensadores, pioneros, radicales y visionarios cuyas ideas sacudieron la civilización y nos impulsaron a ser quienes somos. Considerado el más influyente escritor de la literatura en español, Cervantes se revela en estos textos en torno al tema del amor como un autor inusitadamente moderno, que se burla del modelo cortés y se aleja del romanticismo al uso para ofrecer una mirada realista, irónica y profundamente original. Please note: This audiobook is in Spanish.
Public Domain (P)2021 Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial, S.A.U.
Zur Geschichte der Religion und Philosophie in Deutschland
Summary
"Denn das Christentum ist eine Idee und als solche unzerstörbar und unsterblich wie jede Idee. Was ist aber diese Idee? Eben weil man diese Idee noch nicht klar begriffen und Äußerlichkeiten für die Hauptsache gehalten hat, gibt es noch keine Geschichte des Christentums." (Heinrich Heine: Geschichte der Religion und Philosophie in Deutschland) Die hellsichtige Prosa, die unkonventionellen Einsichten des Heinrich Heine in die Grundzüge, die Mentalitäten der abendländisch-christlichen Kultur sind bis heute gültig - und wenig gelesen. Auch das ist ein Movens für diese Volltextausgabe des onomato-Verlags: Sprache und Gedanken des stilistisch "begeisternden" Textes in der Fortführung des Ältesten, der "oral tradition", zu erinnern.
©2005 onomato Verlag (P)2005 onomato Verlag
Slouching Towards Los Angeles
Summary
In The White Album, Joan Didion famously wrote that "a place belongs forever to whoever claims it hardest, remembers it most obsessively...loves it so radically that he remakes it in his image." Cruising in her Daytona yellow Corvette Stingray, taking it all in behind dark glasses, Joan Didion claimed California for all time. Slouching Towards Los Angeles is a multi-faceted portrait of the literary icon who, in turn, belongs to us. This collection of original essays covers the turf that made Didion a sensation - Hollywood and Patty Hearst; Malibu, Manson and the Mojave; the Summer of Love and the Central Park Five - while bringing together some of the finest voices of today's Los Angeles and beyond. Slouching Towards Los Angeles is a love letter and thank you note; personal memoir and social commentary; cultural history and literary critique. Fans of Didion, lovers of California, and fellow writers alike will all find something to dig into, in this rich exploration of the inner and outer landscapes Joan Didion traveled, shaping our own journeys in the process.
©2020 Steffie Nelson (P)2020 HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books
The Writer's Library
Summary
Performed by Nancy Pearl, Jeff Schwager and a multi-cast that includes book contributors Luis Alberto Urrea, Siri Hustvedt, Laurie Frankel, Vendela Vida, and Richard Ford. The Writer’s Library audiobook also features real conversations with Michael Chabon, Ayelet Waldman, and Laila Lalami. With a foreword by Susan Orlean, 23 of today's living literary legends, including Donna Tartt, Viet Thanh Nguyen, Andrew Sean Greer, Laila Lalami, and Michael Chabon, reveal the books that made them think, brought them joy, and changed their lives in this intimate, moving, and insightful collection from "American's Librarian" Nancy Pearl and noted playwright Jeff Schwager that celebrates the power of literature and reading to connect us all. Before Jennifer Egan, Louise Erdrich, Luis Alberto Urrea, and Jonathan Lethem became revered authors, they were readers. In this ebullient book, America’s favorite librarian Nancy Pearl and noted-playwright Jeff Schwager interview a diverse range of America's most notable and influential writers about the books that shaped them and inspired them to leave their own literary mark. The Writer’s Library is a revelatory exploration of the studies, libraries, and bookstores of today’s favorite authors - the creative artists whose imagination and sublime talent make America's literary scene the wonderful, dynamic world it is. A love letter to books and a celebration of wordsmiths, The Writer’s Library is a treasure for anyone who has been moved by the written word. The authors in The Writer’s Library are: Russell Banks, TC Boyle, Michael Chabon, Susan Choi, Jennifer Egan, Dave Eggers, Louise Erdrich, Richard Ford, Laurie Frankel, Andrew Sean Greer, Jane Hirshfield, Siri Hustvedt, Charles Johnson, Laila Lalami, Jonathan Lethem, Donna Tartt, Madeline Miller, Viet Thanh Nguyen, Luis Alberto Urrea, Vendela Vida, Ayelet Waldman, Maaza Mengiste, and Amor Towles.
©2020 Nancy Pearl and Jeff Schwager (P)2020 HarperCollins Publishers
Heart of the City
Summary
The handsome Texas sailor who offers dinner to a runaway in Central Park. The Midwestern college girl who stops a cop in Times Square for restaurant advice. The Brooklyn man on a midnight subway who helps a weary tourist find her way to Chinatown. The Columbia University graduate student who encounters an unexpected object of beauty at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.... A public place in the world’s greatest city. A chance meeting of strangers. A marriage. Heart of the City tells the remarkable true stories of nine ordinary couples—from the 1940s to the present—whose matchmaker was the city of New York. Intrigued by the romance of his own parents, who met in Washington Square Park, award-winning author Ariel Sabar set off on a far-ranging search for other couples who married after first meeting in one of New York City’s iconic public spaces. Sabar conjures their big-city love stories in novel-like detail, drawing us into the hearts of strangers just as their lives are about to change forever. In setting the stage for these surprising, funny, and moving tales, Sabar, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, offers a fascinating look at the role of place in how—and whether—people meet and fall in love.
©2011 Ariel Sabar (P)2011 Blackstone Audio, Inc.
The Perils of Being Moderately Famous
Summary
What is it like to be known as Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi's daughter? Or to have a mother as famous as Sharmila Tagore? Or to be recognized as Saif Ali Khan's sister? Or as Kareena Kapoor's sister-in-law? And where do I stand among them? Actor Soha Ali Khan's debut audiobook is at heart a brilliant collection of personal essays where she recounts with self-deprecating humor what it was like growing up in one of the most illustrious families of the country. The Perils of Being Moderately Famous takes us through some of the most poignant moments of Soha's life - from growing up as a modern-day princess and her days at Balliol College to life as a celebrity in the times of social media culture and finding love in the most unlikely of places - all with refreshing candor and wit.
©2017 Soha Ali Khan (P)2018 Random House Audio
H. P. Lovecraft
Summary
"Howard Phillips Lovecraft constitue un exemple pour tous ceux qui souhaitent apprendre à rater leur vie et, éventuellement, à réussir leur oeuvre. Encore que, sur ce dernier point le résultat ne soit pas garanti." Auteur de L'appel de Cthulhu, de Dagon et des Montagnes hallucinées, H. P. Lovecraft, maître incontesté de l'horreur et du fantastique, reste l'objet d'une fascination toute particulière chez nos contemporains, notamment chez Michel Houellebecq, qui le découvrit à l'âge de seize ans pour ne plus cesser de le lire. Dans ce bref essai, l'auteur retrace un itinéraire hors du commun et nous livre les prémices de cet univers désenchanté qui a fait le succès des Particules élémentaires.
©1991 Editions du Rocher (P)2020 Editions Gallimard
Taking the World in for Repairs
Summary
From Richard Selzer, professor of surgery and writing at Yale and award-winning author, comes 13 insightful essays that guide listeners on a fascinating tour of the world - from the deepest mysteries of faith to the inner workings of a slaughter house. In these sometimes outlandish slices of life from around the globe, Richard Selzer tantalizes listeners with observations that will encourage deep thought and a new understanding of the world around us.
©1986 Richard Selzer (P)1996 Recorded Books, LLC
Homo Irrealis
Summary
This program includes an introduction read by the author. The New York Times best-selling author of Find Me and Call Me by Your Name returns to the essay form with his collection of thoughts on time, the creative mind, and great lives and works. Irrealis moods are the set of verbal moods that indicate that something is not actually the case or a certain situation or action is not known to have happened.... André Aciman returns to the essay form in Homo Irrealis to explore what the present tense means to artists who cannot grasp the here and now. Irrealis is not about the present, or the past, or the future, but about what might have been but never was - but could in theory still happen. From meditations on subway poetry and the temporal resonances of an empty Italian street, to considerations of the lives and work of Sigmund Freud, Constantine Cavafy, W. G. Sebald, John Sloan, Éric Rohmer, Marcel Proust, and Fernando Pessoa, and portraits of cities such as Alexandria and St. Petersburg, Homo Irrealis is a deep reflection of the imagination’s power to shape our memories under time’s seemingly intractable hold. A Macmillan Audio production from Farrar, Straus and Giroux
©2021 André Aciman (P)2021 Macmillan Audio
Take Out Your Earrings Before You Fight
Summary
Public school is a daunting, tedious, occasionally bloody experience shared by millions of students, current and former. Classroom fights, incompetent teachers, sex in bathrooms, rigid social castes - it's shocking most of us graduated able to read. Take Out Your Earrings Before You Fight takes a dry, witty look at all the things you learn - and everything you don't - while slogging through the K-12 system.
©2012 Thought Catalog (P)2014 Audible Inc.
Frische Feigen
Summary
In seinem Essay über das Essen berichtet Walter Benjamin über den Genuss frischer Feigen, Café Creme, Falerner und Stockfisch, Borscht, Pranzo caprese und Maulbeer-Omelette. Regie: Juliua Albert Flach
©gemeinfrei (P)1962 SWR
DC Home, Volume 2
Summary
This collection of DC Home’s second season is the audio version of a man trying to hold back an avalanche with a distraction. After launching DC Home’s first season, I returned for a season filled with more Trump than I could bear. Nobody warned me about the pandemic. And, despite my plots, despite my improvs, despite my rants, COVID-19 took DC Home as it took the United States, painfully unprepared. After losing her bar in Season One and finding herself and her nephew homeless, living in a storage unit down by the shops in Fort Lincoln, Sherry Finn was supposed to have a better year. Her son was supposed to fall in love. So was Old Herbert. There are seeds of these possibilities scattered throughout the season, which paints the stories with a sense of regret common during this pandemic. If Sherry is my Job, it’s only fair that a plague got involved. My name is Ken La Salle and I write the stories of DC Home. I had a front-row seat for the lives of Sherry, Sean, and Old Herbert, as they watched Rush Limbaugh be awarded for his hate, as I explained nuance through Mike Pence’s horrific rape of Donald Trump, as I told my own COVID-19 story, and much more. I look very much forward to having nothing to write about in volume 3.
©2020 Ken La Salle (P)2020 Ken La Salle
A Town Called Dehra
Summary
In this delightful collection, Ruskin Bond introduces us to the Dehradun he knows intimately and loves unreservedly - the town in which he had spent many years of his childhood and youth. A town which, when he knew it, was one of pony-drawn tongas and rickshaws; a town fond of gossip but tolerant of human foibles; a town of lush lichi trees; charming winter gardens and cool streams; a small town; a sleepy town; a town called "Dehra". With classic stories and poems like "Masterji"; "Growing Up with Trees"and "A Song for Lost Friends" and previously unpublished treasures like "Silver Screen"; "Dilaram Bazaar" and "Lily of the Valley"; this anthology is replete with journal entries; extracts from the author’s memoirs; and of course, poetry, nonfiction, and stories set in or inspired by Dehra. Evocative, wistful, and witty as only Ruskin Bond can be, A Town Called Dehra is a celebration of a dearly loved town as well as an elegy for a way of life gone extinct.
©2008 Ruskin Bond (P)2018 Random House Audio