The CEOs of Britain's largest companies wield immense power, but we know very little about them. How did they get to the top? Why do they have so much power? Are they really worth that exorbitant salary? Michael Aldous and John Turner provide the answers by telling the story of the British CEO over the past century. From gentleman amateurs to professional managers, entrepreneurs, frauds, and fat cats, they reveal the characters who have made it to the top of the corporate ladder, how they ...

Originally published in 1932, this outstanding work of literature is more crucial and relevant today than ever before.“One of the most prophetic dystopian works of the 20th century” —Wall Street JournalCloning, feel-good drugs, antiaging programs, and total social control through politics, programming, and media—has Aldous Huxley accurately predicted our future? With a storyteller’s genius, he weaves these ethical controversies in ...

Denis Stone, a self-conscious young poet, is invited to Crome, renowned for its gatherings of intellectuals. Hosted by Henry and Priscilla Wimbush, the house party has much to offer the naïve Denis. The guests include the self-contained Anne, whom Denis adores; the handsome artist Gombauld, his rival for Anne’s affections; and the cynical Mr. Scogan. All have their stories and ideas to unfold but, as Denis comes to realize, ideas cannot compensate for reality.

Mortal Coils is a collection of five pieces, which were written by Aldous Huxley in the 1920s. The first one, "The Giaconda Smile," is a short murder story. "Permutations among the Nightingales" is a play concerning amorous problems had by patrons of a certain establishment. "The Tillotson Banquet" tells of an old artist who was thought to be dead. "Green Tunnels" is about the boredom of a young girl on holiday with her family. "Nuns at Luncheon" is a story being told of a nun fal...

Our hero Tom, a friendly young rogue with a heart of gold, has fixed his heart on the delicious Sophia, daughter of a wealthy landowner. Losing hope, poor Tom finds solace in the beds of a host of beautiful women, at least one of them old enough to be his mother. He leaves a trail of broken hearts behind him, only to discover… but that would spoil the story − you must listen and see! This great English classic is brought to life by Bill Homewood’s lively reading.

When Carol Milford, a young, liberated woman from St. Paul, Minnesota, marries small-town doctor Will Kennicott, she suddenly finds herself transplanted to Gopher Prairie. Horrified by her new home, an ugly backwater community, she decides it's time the town made a few changes.The story of an idealistic young woman's frustrated attempts to change the set ways of her small town, Main Street has been hailed as one of the essential literary satires of the American scene. An a...

A BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation of the evergreen classic novel by Louisa May Alcott.With their father away fighting in the American Civil War, the four March girls are facing a lean Christmas with their mother. But the sisters’ close bond and determination to make the best of things enables them to find happiness despite their poverty.As the years go by we follow their fortunes as they journey into womanhood. Meg the beauty, Jo the tomboy, shy Beth and precocious Amy ...

Lemuel Gulliver travels on four distinct journeys to exotic strange locations. Some of which include to a place where tiny people live, another of which someone is 72 feet tall. In each of the places he visits he has encounters inhabitants that exhibit some depravity and some good in the nature of their personalities. This audio classic novel has been carefully abridged and adapted into 10 short, easy to understand chapters. This format enables listeners of all ages and English language ab...

Long regarded as the most accurate rendering of Plato’s Republic that has yet been published, this widely acclaimed work is the first strictly literal translation of a timeless classic. This second edition includes a new introduction by Professor Bloom, whose careful translation and interpretation of The Republic was first published in 1968. In addition to the corrected text itself there is also a rich and valuable essay—as well as indexes—which will better enable the reader to approach th...

The Diary of a Madman and Other Stories is a bizarre and colourful collection containing the finest short stories by the iconic Russian writer Nikolai Gogol. From the witty and Kafkaesque The Nose, where a civil servant wakes up one day to find his nose missing, to the moving and evocative The Overcoat, about a reclusive man whose only ambition is to replace his old, threadbare coat, Gogol gives us a unique take on the absurd. Gogol’s tales of inconsequential civil servants, mixing the eve...

In the twilight of life, Silas Marner has only his loom and his gold.…Embittered by a false accusation, disappointed in friendship and love, the weaver Silas Marner hoards a treasure that destroys his spirit until fate steals it from him and replaces it with a golden-haired child. Where she came from, who her parents were, and who really stole the gold are the secrets that fill this moving tale of guilt and innocence.A moral allegory of the redemptive power...

Three men and a dog in a boat on one of the prettiest waterways in the world-the Thames-in summer. Idyllic, wouldn't you say? Perhaps, if George hadn't insisted on camping, and if someone had remembered the can-opener, and if . well, maybe not idyllic, but certainly hilarious, as you'll discover when you take the trip yourself with three men and their dog.