Publisher Description
This is a SoundCraft Audiobooks production featuring digitally enhanced performances of some of history's greatest speeches - all presented as they might have originally been heard. The immersive audio experience presented here - complete with sound effects, music and atmospherics - allows the listener to feel as if they were in attendance when these speeches were first delivered. The orations are performed by a select group of amazing actors who uniquely capture the essence, power and complexity of these magnificent addresses, universally acknowledged as some of the greatest speeches in world history. Volume II features such disparate historical characters as Alexander the Great, the Prophet Muhammad, Abraham Lincoln and Susan B. Anthony, among others. This collection is part one of a series. Search for "History's Greatest Speeches" to discover more from SoundCraft and Fort Raphael Publishing.
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About the Authors
Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) was the sixteenth president of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He led the US through its greatest constitutional, military, and moral crises—the American Civil War—preserving the Union, abolishing slavery, strengthening the national government, and modernizing the economy. Reared in a poor family in rural Indiana, he was a self-educated man. In the 1830s he became a country lawyer, a Whig Party leader, and Illinois state legislator. He later served as a one-term member of the House of Representatives during the 1840s.
William Edward Burghardt Du Bois (1868–1963) was a sociologist, historian, novelist, activist, and one of the greatest African American intellectuals. His astounding career spanned the nation’s history from Reconstruction to the civil rights movement. Born in Massachusetts and educated at Fisk, Harvard, and the University of Berlin, he penned his epochal masterpiece, The Souls of Black Folk, in 1903. It remains his most studied and popular work; its insights into black life at the turn of the century still ring true.
Hans Christian Andersen (1805–1875) was born in Odense, Denmark, the son of a poor shoemaker and a washerwoman. As a young teenager, he became quite well known in Odense as a reciter of drama and as a singer. When he was fourteen, he set off for the capital, Copenhagen, determined to become a national success on the stage. He failed miserably, but made some influential friends in the capital who got him into school to remedy his lack of proper education. In 1829 his first book was published. After that, books came out at regular intervals. His stories began to be translated into English as early as 1846. Since then, numerous editions, and more recently Hollywood songs and Disney cartoons, have helped to ensure the continuing popularity of the stories in the English-speaking world.
About the Narrators
Siiri Scott is the head of acting and directing in the Department of Film, Television and Theatre at the University of Notre Dame, where she coordinates classes, directs and prepares actors for graduate training and professional careers. She received her MFA in Acting from the Theatre School at DePaul University and has directed, performed and taught in regional theaters in Chicago, Milwaukee, Los Angeles and Seattle.
James Langton, an Earphones Award–winning narrator, trained as an actor at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama and later as a musician at the Guildhall School in London. He has worked in radio, film, and television, also appearing in theater in England and on Broadway. He is also a professional musician who led the internationally renowned Pasadena Roof Orchestra from 1996 to 2002.