Shakespeare AudioBooks Download
Shakespeare AudioBooks Download: We offer specially selected quality audiobooks with the works of William Shakespeare.
William Shakespeare (1564 to 1616 - also known as "The Bard") was an English poet and playwright. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer of the English language, and one of the world's preeminent dramatist and playwright.
William Shakespeare wrote nearly 40 plays and 154 sonnets, he also wrote many poems. See the list of his works: Shakespeare Tragedies, Shakespeare Comedies.
Scholars to this day have not resolved all the misteries about his plays, as they were only published after his death and mistakes when transcribing his works seem to have happened over the years.
Modern critics classify his plays as 'problem plays' or 'tragi-comedies', because they can not easily be categorized. Some say that Shakespeare broke generic conventions on purpose. Some of his later comedies are also classified as 'romances'. In one point all critics agree, though: William Shakespeare is an exceptional writer!
The selection of Shakeaspeare audio book downloads offered below is a reflection of the different versions of his plays and speeches. Different editors have chosen the version they prefered, which makes it interesting and allows the listener to explore the works of William Shakespeare.
Shakespeare Speeches
The one line out of one of these famous speeches, that probably most people know, is "To be or not to be..." out of 'Hamlet'.
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An anthology of Shakespearian speeches performed by the world's leading actors.
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To be or not to be... Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow... O for a Muse of Fire... The quality of mercy is not strained... This sceptred isle... Once more unto the breach dear...
The audio files below are short (a few minutes each) and represent some of the most impressive renditions of the key parts in Shakespeare's plays, performed by actors who themselves are legends and put all their talent and personality into their performance.
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'To be or not to be - that is the question!'
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Richard Burton's rich and resonant voice delivers Henry V's address to his army on the eve of Agincourt!
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Alec Guinness's performance as King Lear stirs the listener in this recording from the BBC Sound Archives.
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From the BBC Sound Archives, one of Shakespeare's most famous and memorable speeches, with Paul Scofield and Peggy Ashcroft as Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, bringing these ominous words vividly to life.
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With Denis Quilley as Macbeth, this recording from the BBC Sound Archives brings Shakespeare's memorable words to life.
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Ian Holm delivers King Richard IIIs soliloquy, bringing Shakespeare's wonderful lines, full of pyschological insight, vividly to life.
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This impassioned speech is beautifully spoken by Fay Compton in this BBC Sound archives recording.
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In this recording from the BBC Sound Archives, Hannah Gordon is Shakespeare's wise Portia.
Shakespeare Plays
William Shakespeare is one of the very few playwrights who have succeded to write both tragedies and comedies. His plays always had popular appeal but also contain complex characterisations and a poetic grandeur. Shakespeare managed also to give his plays philosophical depth, without making them dull, heavy and boring.
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Sian Phillips, Emma Fielding and Miriam Margolyes star in Shakespeare's comedy of men behaving badly and women doing it for themselves. BBC radio has a unique heritage when it comes to Shakespeare.
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Frances Barber and David Harewood star in Shakespeare's towering tale of great love, political intrigue and tragedy. BBC radio has a unique heritage when it comes to Shakespeare. Since 1923,...
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A quintessential Shakespearean comedy, complete with a loquacious clown. (Harper Collins US)
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Helena Bonham Carter stars as Rosalind with David Morrissey as Orlando and Natasha Little as Celia in Shakespeare's festive comedy. BBC radio has a unique heritage when it comes to Shakespeare. (BBC Audiobooks)
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Samuel West and Susannah York star in Shakespeare's great tragedy of power and pride.
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This is the first new, full-scale edition of Cymbeline in 37 years. One of Shakespeare's final works, Cymbeline uses virtuoso theatrical and poetic means to dramatize a story of marriage imperiled...
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Shakespeare's most famous sonnet, in which he tries, and fails, to find an apt comparison in nature, read by Bill Wallis..
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Michael Sheen, Kenneth Cranham and Juliet Stevenson star in the best-known and most powerful tragedy of modern times. BBC radio has a unique heritage when it comes to Shakespeare.
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The first in Shakespeare's great series of four tragedies. (NAXOS)
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Shakespeare's classic as dramatized by renowned vocal actor David I. Davies. (One Voice Recordings)
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Father and son Julian and Jamie Glover star as King Henry and Prince Hal in Shakespeare's stirring history.
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Father and son Julian and Jamie Glover star as King Henry and his son, Hal, in this powerful production, which also stars Timothy West and Prunella Scales...
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Julius Caesar is one of Shakespeare's most popular and polished works.
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Shakespeare's bitter tragedy of loyalty, power and politics.
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The story of a foolish and self-indulgent king who learns the value of self-knowledge.
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Kenneth Branagh heads an outstanding cast in playing one of Shakespeare's strongest characters. The eighth production in the widely admired series of Shakespeare plays presented by Naxos AudioBooks...
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Richard Eyre directs Ken Stott as Macbeth and Phyllis Logan as Lady Macbeth in Shakespeare's drama of greed and destiny. (BBC audiobook)
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By the time Shakespeare came to write Macbeth - almost certainly in 1605/1606 - he had already completed three of the great tragedies with which modern audiences are so familiar: Hamlet (1601)(NAXOS)
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"...All our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death." - Macbeth Macbeth is among the most powerful of Shakespeare's tragedies (Harper Collins US)
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Shakespeare's dramatic and complex comedy.
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A Midsummer Night's Dream must be one of the most enduringly popular of Shakespeare's plays, and it is not difficult to see why: the work blends several kinds of comedy with a powerful atmosphere... (NAXOS)
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"The course of true love never did run smooth" - Lysander A Midsummer Night's Dream is one of Shakespeare's best early works, an airy, romantic romp in the woods among bumbling rustics... (Harper Collins US)
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Sylvestra Le Touzel, Sam West and David Threlfall star in Shakespeare's delightful comic fantasy. (BBC Audiobooks)
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David Tennant stars as Benedick with Samantha Spiro as Beatrice in Shakespeare's merry comedy of wit, words and romance.
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A full-cast performance of one of the greatest verbal sparring matches in all of literature.
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The second in Shakespeare's greate sequence of four tragedies.
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Samuel West stars as Richard II with Joss Ackland as John of Gaunt in Shakespeare's lyrically tragic history. BBC radio has a unique heritage when it comes to Shakespeare. Since 1923, when...
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Douglas Henshall, Sophie Dahl and Susannah York star in Shakespeare's passionate story of doomed love. BBC Radio has a unique heritage when it comes to Shakespeare. Since 1923, when the newly...
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Shakespeare's play is filled with wit, tenderness, dramatic variety and poetic beauty.
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"Our revels now are ended... this rough magic I here abjure..." In Shakespeare hinting at the end of his own magnificent career in these and others lines spoken by the great magician,...
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Shakespeare's magical, other-wordly final play.
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Ian McKellen, as Prospero, heads a strong cast in Shakespeare's last great play. The wronged Duke raises a tempest to shipwreck his old opponents on his island so that he can ensure justice...
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Twelfth Night, nowadays one of Shakespeare's best-loved and most-admired comedies, was not always so regarded: Samuel Pepys saw the play three times in the 1660s and judged it 'silly'. Modem...
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The Winter's Tale was one of the very last plays Shakespeare wrote, a moving romance whose themes are sin, forgiveness, death, rebirth, and the power of Time and Nature to heal all wounds. Based on...
Shakespeare Sonnets
The Shakespeare Sonnets are a collection of 154 poems about love, beauty, and mortality. They first appeared in 1609 in a book entitled 'Shakespeare's Sonnets'.
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All 154 of the Shakespeare's sonnets are beautifully read.
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Every bit as dazzling as the best of his dramas and comedies, Shakespeare's sonnets represent one of the finest bodies of poetry ever penned. And because they are love poems of an extraordinarily...
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Everyone knows something of Shakespeare's sonnets, even if only in memorable fragments like 'the darling buds of May', or 'remembrance of things past',or 'the marriage of true minds'. For centuries...
Plays of other Famous Playwrights
This audiobook provides an overview over some of the most popular and famous plays that have been written over the period of the centuries.
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Here in one volume are seven great plays: Medea, The Tempest, The Imaginary Invalid,Camille, An Enemy of the People, Arms and the Man and Uncle Vanya; all under the direction of veteran producer Yuri Rasovsky.
William Shakespeare Audiobook Download
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