This is one of the great recordings of a great play. John Gielgud stars as Ernest and Edith Evans gives her indomitable performance as Lady Bracknell in this classic radio recording from 1951. Performance styles may have changed, but this is an unmatched production bearing all the hallmarks of outstanding audio drama featuring some of the finest actors of the twentieth century. Also included are two collections of poetry readings by John Gielgud and Edith Evans.

Historical recordings of actors from the beginning of the recording era. CD 1: Historical Shakespeare performances by Ainley, John Barrymore, Bourchier, Casson, Forbes-Robertson, John Geilgud (1920s and 1940s). CD 2: A miscellany. Some startling historical performances in a wide range of works from Edith Evans, Charles Laughton, Noel Coward, Sarah Bernhardt, Fred Terry, Laurel and Hardy, Edwin Booth, Bransby Williams, Jean Cocteau, Feodor Chaliapin and others.

A comedy of manners in five acts, The Rivals was Sheridan's second commercially produced play. The play is set in Bath in the 18th century, a town legendary for conspicuous consumption and fashion at the time. Wealthy, fashionable people went there to "take the waters", which were believed to have healing properties. Bath was much less exclusive than London, and provides an ideal setting for the characters. The plot centres around the two young lovers, Lydia and Jack. Lydia, who reads a lo...

The Importance Of Being Earnest is undoubtedly Oscar Wilde’s best known play probably due to its sharp wit that cannot help but enchant and entertain any reader or theatregoer. Here his economic and finely honed words are delivered by a superb cast that is headed by England’s finest, namely Sir John Gielgud and Dame Edith Evans that help make this the ultimate listening experience for fans of classic theatre.

The School For Scandal is Sheridan's master work which wittily illustrates 18th century's aristocrats at play. With pinpoint accuracy Sheridan's characterisation of these decadent ruling classes give it a universal appeal as echoes of both the people and their antics are to be found in each generation.

The Passionate Pilgrim was an anthology of twenty poems attributed to William Shakespeare but which present-day scholars think just five of these poems were written by the Bard. Here, the most popular four poems, The Passionate Pilgrim, Sonnets To Sundry Notes of Music, A Lover's Complaint, and The Pheonix and The Turtle are read by Edith Evans, Donald Wolfit, Joan Hart and William Squire.

Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy written early in the career of playwright William Shakespeare about two young "star-cross'd lovers" whose untimely deaths ultimately unite their feuding families. Read by an all star cast that include Albert Finney and Claire Bloom this audio recording is a fantastic piece of literature to ass to your collection.The tragic feud between "Two households, both alike in dignity/In fair Verona", the Montagues and Capulets, which ultimately kills the two you...

Sheridan’s most famous play, The School for Scandal, has been called ‘the best existing English comedy of intrigue’. A favourite with audiences and critics alike since its premiere in 1777, this play is a classic English comedy of manners. Full of satirical wit, it subverts the Georgian social mores of its day with subtlety and charm. This historic recording features Edith Evans, Cecil Parker, and Harry Andrews: some of the finest actors of their generation.

Samuel Beckett, one of the great avant-garde Irish dramatists and writers of the second half of the twentieth century, was born on 13 April 1906. He died in 1989. He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1969. His centenary will be celebrated throughout 2006 with performances of his major plays, but the most popular of them all will be, without doubt, the play with which he first made his name, Waiting for Godot. It opened the gates to the theatre of the absurd as four men appear on the st...

A play replete with puns and double-entendres, this is one of Shakespeare’s earliest and most lighthearted.The young king of Navarre and three of his courtiers have vowed to lock themselves away for three years of study and fasting, and to forswear the company of women for this period. No sooner is their vow made than it is tested, however, as the princess of France and three of her ladies arrive in Navarre on a diplomatic mission. The young men fall instantly and hopelessly in lov...

Like many of Shakespeare's comedies, this one centres on mistaken identity performed by Siobhan McKenna, Paul Schofield and cast. For the first time as a digital download.Like many of Shakespeare's comedies, this one centres on mistaken identity. The leading character, Viola, is shipwrecked on the shores of Illyria during the opening scenes. She loses contact with her twin brother, Sebastian, whom she believes is dead. Masquerading as a young page under the name Cesario, she enters...

Macbeth, Shakespeare’s last great tragedy, has remained one of the most popular plays since it’s first performance in 1606 probably in front of King James. This exciting new audiobook production is directed with fresh imagination by Fiona Shaw who breaks the conventional strait jacket that has hampered the development of Shakespeare on audio. We are as much in the twenty-first century as in medieval Scotland the tensions, the politics, the struggle for power and dark ambition is part of ou...