Showing results by narrator "Leanne Yau" in All Categories

Exiles is the only play written by James Joyce. It draws material from "The Dead", the final story in his famous short stories collection, Dubliners. It centers around four individuals - Richard, Robert, Bertha, and Beatrice - and the complex romantic entanglements between them as tensions rise and relationships are tested.

A collection of one-acts by the Pulitzer-winning playwright, including Close the Book, Suppressed Desires, Tickless Time, Woman's Honor, The People, and Trifles.

Set in Vienna at the turn of the 19th century, the romantic entanglements of four young individuals, Fritz, Theodor, Christine, and Mizi, offer a sharp social commentary and insight on the influence of personal and social morals on relationships.

A single kiss on a dark night at a lonely inn changed Prudence’s life forever...and not for the better. Deemed “the Baggage” by the ladies of Nettlefold, Prudence Baggington held secrets they could never know. She thought to marry an earl. Instead, she married a monster. Fearful for her life, she runs, seeking safe haven at a convent. As a married woman she cannot join the convent, nor can she marry again. How could love ever be in her future? Her only hope is for peace and simple friendship with the Abbess’ nephew, the Baron Halthaven.

As a homeless orphan, shunned for having the gift, Rachael knows how to survive. The visions of people dying are only hers to see. The shadows are her safety. When Cephy comes into her life, having a friend who is as feared by the villagers as Rachael seems too good to be true. After a fiery incident, the villagers call on the White Guard to execute Rachael and Cephy. Together, they flee into a world they know nothing about.

Rachael is a formidable crime boss in the underworld of an unnamed city. Beautiful but deadly, her one rule for her right-hand man is: Don't get too close. Then she hires Mikey, a tough ex-soldier who is eager to please, especially given that one of his duties is to "service" his highly sexed boss. Every day, Mikey edges ever closer to breaking that rule as he unashamedly wears his heart on his sleeve.

Sylvie and Bruno was the last novel completed by Lewis Carroll and was published in two parts. The second volume, which is the subject of this recording, appeared in 1893. This book deals with the resolution of the conflicts described in the first volume. Arthur and Muriel are finally united after a traumatic separation and Sylvie and Bruno are reconciled with their wayward uncle, who has shown a strong ambition to take over the kingdom temporarily vacated by his brother.

Hero and Leander is a Greek myth concerning the tragic story of two lovers. One was a priestess of Aphrodite who lived in a tower in Sestos, and the other a young man from Abydos on the opposite side of the strait. Leander fell in love with Hero and would swim every night across the Hellespont to spend time with her, with Hero's lamp at the top of her tower as his guiding light, and they shared a warm summer of love.

Anatol, one of Arthur Schnitzler's earliest works, concerns the life of a shallow and immature playboy, who has multiple dalliances with various women but suffers from a crippling fear of commitment underneath his womanising facade. The play offers sharp social commentary on the themes of toxic masculinity and fidelity, and has been adapted in English to two different musicals: The Game of Love and The Gay Life.

A House of Pomegranates is a collection of four long stories, which was first was published in 1891: "The Young King"; "The Birthday of the Infanta"; "The Fisherman and His Soul"; and "The Star-Child".

Benjamin Lease Crozer Griffith (1869-1900) was a American comic playwright. The pieces in this recording come from a collection entitled Plays and Monologues which was published in 1901.

Sylvie and Bruno was the last novel completed by Lewis Carroll and was published in two parts. The first volume, which is the subject of this recording, appeared in 1889. The story is presented by an unnamed narrator, who oscillates between two worlds: a fantasy fairyland, populated by characters similar to those in Alice in Wonderland, and the real world environs of a small village by the sea, in which the narrator has taken up temporary residence for health reasons.

Alice Gerstenberg (1885-1972) was an American playwright, actress, and activist. She is best known for her many feminist plays, which often feature female lead characters and all-female casts (a rare occurrence at the time). This is a collection of ten one-act plays, which cover a wide range of topics -highlights include a lighthearted farce involving gossiping women, a satire about dinner parties, and a comedy about the pretensions of conventional theater, but some plays also touch on more serious themes such as death, war, and the effects of an unhappy marriage.

King Claudius, when a young man, wrote a five-act tragedy which was damned, and all reference to it forbidden under penalty of death. The King has a son - Hamlet - whose tendency to soliloquize has so alarmed his mother, Queen Gertrude, that she has sent for Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to devise some Court revels for his entertainment. Rosencrantz is a former lover of Ophelia, to whom Hamlet is betrothed, and they lay their heads together to devise a plan by which Hamlet may be put out of the way. Some Court theatricals are in preparation.

Ten years after a tragic incident on the lake, an AA meeting in a small, religious town in the deep south of the USA descends into bitterness and chaos when a flood hits. Trapped within the local church, tempers escalate and well-buried secrets begin to emerge. Personalities clash, reputations are dissected and questioned, and everybody's demons are laid bare.

Cutting Room is set in the "Town Welfare Department" of a town in the Midlands, Burtonwood, during public sector cuts. Four characters (David, Lucy, Ian, and an intern, Anne) have to take calls from members of the public complaining about the loss of public services, with the boss Harry coming in occasionally to offer cheerful but often useless encouragement. As the cuts continue, tensions run high, with Ian in particular taking his anger and frustration out on the secretary, Tilly. At the play's conclusion there is a surprising twist.

Floyd Dell has been called "one of the most flamboyant, versatile, and influential American Men of Letters of the first third of the 20th century". Though he was primarily a newspaper and magazine editor, most prominently of the radical left-wing magazine The Masses, he also published many best-selling feminist works. As a staunch advocate of feminism, socialism, psychoanalysis, and progressive education, his writing greatly shocked the American bourgeoisie at the time, to the point where it became so controversial, he was put on trial twice for his subversive literature.

Cole, an old sea captain, lives on a ship with his daughter and her immigrant husband. The trio prepares for a deluge, while Cole meets Daphne, a mermaid who seduces and tempts him. As tensions rise with the rolling tides, Cole must make a difficult choice: take a leap into the unknown, or stay on the safe side. This is a story about connection and separation, about tolerance and the decision to cut ties.

These six plays are Japanese classics from the 14th century and are presented in the order of a traditional Nō programme. Nō, the Japanese word for "skill", is a form of Japanese musical drama that originated in the eighth century, and is the oldest major theatre art that still survives today. Alongside Nō plays were kyōgen plays, which were short works typically inserted as a comedic interlude of sorts between the more classical Nō performances.

The Yin Chih Wen, or Tract of the Quiet Way, is a religio-ethical tract which was very popular in the Middle Kingdom, but never attained the celebrity of similar texts, such as the Tao Te Ching. This recording is of the first known English translation, which was made by the eminent Buddhist scholars, D. T. Suzuki and Paul Carus.