Showing results by author "Audiobooks Librivox" in All Categories

The Gambler is a short novel by Fyodor Dostoevsky about a young tutor in the employment of a formerly wealthy Russian general. The novella reflects Dostoevsky's own addiction to roulette, which was in more ways than one the inspiration for the book: Dostoevsky completed the novella under a strict deadline so he could pay off gambling debts. (Summary from Wikipedia)

Camões (1524-1580) é o maior poeta da nossa língua, e Os Lusíadas a sua obra maior. Publicada em 1572, é poema épico em dez cantos, narrando os feitos dos Portugueses em suas guerras e descobertas marítimas, em uma visão maravilhosa e exaltada, grandiosa e de comovente patriotismo. Apesar das barreiras que se põem ao leitor moderno, as referências mitológicas às vezes recônditas, as menções a episódios e personagens históricos menos conhecidos, a sua modernidade é surpreendente e a pessoa do poeta se impõe admirável, concreta e única em sua genialidade. A força da ...

Ampliamente reconocido como el mejor dramaturgo y poeta español del siglo XX, Federico García Lorca (1898-1936), fue escritor popular y al mismo tiempo un pionero a la hora de introducir imágenes surrealistas en la literatura. Asesinado por el bando Nacional durante la Guerra Civil Española, su trabajo estuvo censurado durante la dictadura de Francisco Franco. La obra de García Lorca no pudo ser tratada abiertamente en España hasta la llegada de la democracia. La poesia de esta colección tiene matices mágicos y anticipa su trabajo posterior en "Romancero Gitano". No encontraremos ...

Noches blancas es una novela corta escrita por el autor ruso Fiódor Dostoyevski. Fue publicada en 1848, al inicio de la carrera del escritor, bajo el subtítulo Novela sentimental: De las memorias de un soñador.Como muchas de las historias de Dostoyevski, Noches blancas está contada en primera persona por un narrador sin nombre. El narrador es un joven residente en San Petersburgo que sufre de soledad. Conoce a una joven y se enamora de ella, y a partir de ello el autor construye una historia de un triangulo amoroso. El narrador es equisciente o bien llamado narrador personaje. El cuento es...

The Lusiads (Os Lusíadas) is a Portuguese epic poem, written in the 16th century by Luis Vaz de Camões. The poem tells the tale of the Portuguese discoveries in the 15th and 16th centuries, specially the voyage to India by Vasco da Gama. Modelled after the classic epic tradition, Camões' Lusiads are considered not only the first literary text in Modern Portuguese, but also a national epic of the same level as Vergil's Aeneid. In the 19th century, Sir Richard Francis Burton translated Camões' Lusiads, in what he considered "the most pleasing literary labour of his life". (Summary by Leni)

In der Strafkolonie ist eine Erzählung von Franz Kafka, die im Oktober 1914 entstand und 1919 veröffentlicht wurde. Einem Forschungsreisenden wird das Rechtssystem einer Strafkolonie vorgeführt. Es besteht darin, dass jeder Angeklagte unabhängig von seiner Schuld von einem Apparat in minutiösem Ablauf stundenlang gefoltert und dann getötet wird. Den Apparat beschreibt Kafka als überdimensionalen Parlograph in der Funktionsweise eines Phonographen mit vibrierender Metallplatte und Nadel. Dieser Apparat ist der Hauptgegenstand der Erzählung, er repräsentiert die Einheit von Schrift und ...

Aus heiterem Himmel sieht sich der Prokurist Josef K. eines Verbrechens angeklagt. Die Art der Anklage wird ihm nicht mitgeteilt, auch nähere Einzelheiten über das Gericht erfährt er nicht, außer, dass es auf den Dachböden heruntergekommener Vorstadthäuser tagt. Dennoch wird von ihm erwartet, dass er seinen Prozess ordentlich führt. Bekannte, die von seinem Prozess erfahren, bieten ihre Hilfe an, aber im Endeffekt kämpft K. praktisch alleine gegen ein übermächtigen und unbekannten Gegner, und der Ausgang des Prozesses bleibt im Dunkeln... Der Process ist ein Romanfragment von Franz ...

Notes from Underground is an 1864 novella by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Notes is considered by many to be the first existentialist novel. It presents itself as an excerpt from the rambling memoirs of a bitter, isolated, unnamed narrator (generally referred to by critics as the Underground Man) who is a retired civil servant living in St. Petersburg. The first part of the story is told in monologue form, or the underground man's diary, and attacks emerging Western philosophy, especially Nikolay Chernyshevsky's What Is to Be Done?. The second part of the book is called "Àpropos of the Wet Snow," and ...

Convivio (The Banquet) is a work written by Dante Alighieri roughly between 1304 and 1307. This unfinished work of Dante consists of four trattati, or "books": a prefatory one, plus three books that each include a canzone (long lyrical poem) and a prose allegorical interpretation or commentary of the poem that goes off in multiple thematic directions.The Convivio is a kind of vernacular encyclopedia of the knowledge of Dante's time; it touches on many areas of learning, not only philosophy but also politics, linguistics, science, and history. The treatise begins with the prefatory book, or ...

Il Paradiso è la terza e ultima cantica del poema di Dante, che dopo aver attraversato l'inferno e il purgatorio nelle due cantiche precedenti, giungerà ad attraversare i nove cieli che compongono il Paradiso, accompagnato da Beatrice fino ad arrivare alla visione della Trinità (L'Amor che move il sole e l'altre stelle...) - Summary by Pier

La Divina Commedia, originalmente Commedìa, è un poema di Dante Alighieri, capolavoro del poeta fiorentino, considerata la più importante testimonianza letteraria della civiltà medievale e una delle più grandi opere della letteratura universale.È diviso in tre parti chiamate cantiche: Inferno, Purgatorio, Paradiso; il poeta immagina di compiervi un viaggio ultraterrenoIl poema, pur continuando i modi caratteristici della letteratura e dello stile medievali (ispirazione religiosa, fine morale, linguaggio e stile basati sulla percezione visiva e immediata delle cose), tende a una ...

Le Rime (in English, The Rhymes) are the collection of lyric poems written by Dante Alighieri throughout his life. While the rest of Dante's works were prepared by himself for publication, these poems were written by him in letters, as parts of other works or independently, but only collected and ordered much later, by modern critics. Among these is found the famous collection of Rime Petrose, a cycle of poems dedicated to a woman nicknamed Pietra (Stone) due to her insensibility to the poet's love. As the work of a whole life, the poems are varied, and mirror the many different moments of ...

Almayer’s Folly is about a poor businessman who dreams of finding a hidden gold mine and becoming very wealthy. Kaspar Almayer is a white European. He agrees to marry a native Malayan captured by Captain Tom Lingard, his employer, believing the marriage will bring him riches even though he has no love for the woman. They have one daughter named Nina. Almayer relocates with his wife to Malaysian where he hopes to build a trading company and find gold mines. His hopeless daydreams of riches and splendor cause his native wife to loath him.Almayer, desperate, hopes to find his salvation in Dain ...

Set in a time of oppressive colonisation, when large areas of the world were still unknown to Europe, and Africa was literally on maps and minds as a mysterious shadow, Heart of Darkness famously explores the rituals of civilisation and barbarism, and the frighteningly fine line between them.We get the tale through a classic unreliable narrator, relating as Marlow, a ship’s captain, tells how he was sent by the Company to retrieve the wayward Kurtz, and was shaken to discover the true depths of darkness in that creature’s, and in his own, soul. Conrad based the work closely on his own ...

Joseph Conrad was born in former Poland, spent part of his childhood exiled in Russia because of his father's Polish nationalist political activities, learned and read French early, and did not speak a word of English until his late teens. It is perhaps not surprising, then, that when Conrad came to write this, his first novel, it centred on the pain of having a contested sense of identity, the experience of having to choose, in the midst of argument and derision, whether one was really 'this or that'. The Almayer of the story is a morose and hapless trader of Dutch extraction, settled in ...

A European businessman and his Malayan wife have a daughter, Nina. A Malayan prince comes to do trade with the businessman and falls in love with the daughter. Conflict arises when other influences cause distrust in the business partnership and the daughter runs off to be with the prince. (Summary by Kristel Tretter)

Apparently a two part story about a Damsel and a Knight, perhaps a damsel who depends upon the kindness of strangers. It was originally entitled "Dynamite" and first published by installments in the New York Herald. The book itself was the biggest commercial success for Conrad up until that time, 1913. It allowed Conrad for the first time to settle his financial affairs. The author's disdain for people who live on the land is apparent. A new understanding of the word "enthusiastic" is promulgated. And it is a love story. Let us see how the tale goes. (Summary by JCarson)

While the central figures in each of the three stories in this collection are sailing captains, the main action in two of them takes place on land, albeit in sight of the sea. In "A Smile of Fortune", a naive young sea captain falls into grave moral peril when he locks horns with a wily ship chandler in Mauritius. In "The Secret Sharer", a newly appointed sea captain is confronted with an altogether different kind of challenge when he attempts to haul in a rope ladder over his ship's side one evening and finds it much heavier than usual. In "Freya of the Seven Isles", Jasper Allen, the captain...

En 1869, tras seis años de arduo trabajo con la colaboración de su esposa Sophia Tolstaya, Tolstoy publicó la versión final de La Guerra y la Paz, considerada una de las obras cumbres de la literatura universal.La maestría narrativa del autor y su acabado conocimiento de fuentes documentales nos sumergen verazmente en el contexto de la invasión napoleónica de 1805 en esta novela histórica de corte realista.Enriquecida por los detalles visuales, la narración se mueve fluidamente través de los distintos planos, desde el amplio escenario de la guerra, pasando por la vida social en los ...

En 1869, tras seis años de arduo trabajo con la colaboración de su esposa Sophia Tolstaya, Tolstoy publicó la versión final de La Guerra y la Paz, considerada una de las obras cumbres de la literatura universal.La maestría narrativa del autor y su acabado conocimiento de fuentes documentales nos sumergen verazmente en el contexto de la invasión napoleónica de 1805 en esta novela histórica de corte realista.Enriquecida por los detalles visuales, la narración se mueve fluidamente través de los distintos planos, desde el amplio escenario de la guerra, pasando por la vida social en los ...