AudioBookRadio are currently archiving many of the programmes we have broadcast. We know it’s not always convenient to listen at a particular time so we’re aiming for everyone to be able to choose from a selection of programmes when you want to as we are sure this is a choice you’d like to have.

The launch of any feature is usually easier said than done but we are looking to add materials on a weekly basis. If there are particular programmes or themes you’d like to hear again then please let us know.

As the archive builds, themes and pockets of interest will develop so you’ll be able to choose more of what you want to hear when you want to hear it.

There are other materials we plan to include here too. Some are what you might call ‘vintage’ or ‘historical’ or just plain old but we hope they’ll still be of interest. You’ll find them here.

Other programmes might just be too specialised to broadcast. Yes, that sounds like a euphemism for boring but it’s probably because they are odd lengths, too niche, a bit long winded by which we mean ‘slow to the boil’. Sometimes we just can’t get broadcast rights but we can deliver them on a one to one basis by streaming. If everything was logical it wouldn’t be as interesting!

Visit regularly for all the latest titles.

Radio Archive featuring Hollywood Stage, Take Five with Peter James & Kobo interviews with Margaret Atwood & Roddy Doyle

Prunella Scales Dandruff Hits The Turtleneck By John Mayfield. Read by Prunella Scales From the moment pub landlord and keen amateur entomologist, Arnold Matson, arrives in Blinkington-on-the-Treacle to take over his new hostelry, the listener is guided superbly by one of Britain’s best-loved actresses, Prunella Scales, as she introduces local characters and intimately narrates her way through a colourful collection of vignettes and poignant flashbacks that are both comically funny and disturbingly familiar.

Seamus Heaney Seamus Heaney was born in April 1939, the eldest member of a family which would eventually contain nine children. Heaney, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1995, uses all aspects of Irish culture, history, folklore, song, myth, and religion to write poetry that not only describes the Irish experience to the reader, but also allows the reader to feel the experience and emotions of the Irish people. He received a Lannan Literary Award for Poetry in 1990.

Gore Vidal Gore Vidal is the author of twenty-two novels, five plays, many screenplays, more than two hundred essays, and the critically lauded, Palimpsest: A Memoir. Vidal’s United States (Essays 1952-1992) won the 1993 National Book Award. In its “American Masters” series PBS said “Vidal’s lineage in American literature may be traced back to Henry James, the sophisticated American from the upper echelons of society who mingles with European sophisticates, and Mark Twain, the raw humorist and critic of American empire.”

TUESDAY 3rd December

Noon & 8pm & 4am

PLAYS/DRAMA

LEAVES IN AUTUMN BY SUSAN CASANOVE

Iris hadn’t clapped eyes on Jerry, the eighteen year old boy who’d swept her off her feet in 1966 for forty-three years – until a chance meeting at a funeral. Both are now widowed, but will the course of Autumnal love run smooth? Leaves in Autumn is a gentle comedy drama about love, destiny and redemption. It stars Josephine Tewson (Keeping Up Appearances, Last of the Summer Wine), Hazel Douglas (Bathilda Bagshot in Harry Potter) and Hugh Walters (Doctor Who, Survivors). It also features West End actors Emma Noakes and Steven Alexander as the young Iris and Jerry.

THE LAST LAUGH BY ERIC YAFFEY

Traditional comedian Will Potts has a stalker and his performance is suffering. Can the maniac be flushed out before the damage becomes terminal?

1pm & 9pm & 5am

IN CONVERSATIONMARIA HINOJOSA

Anchor of an award winning talk show, Maria Hinojosa has helped reveal America’s untold stories and brought to light unsung heroes in America and abroad especially in the Latino community—the fastest growing minority group in the United States

2pm & 10pm & 6am POETS & POETRY featuring GEORGE SZIRTES

Today we feature the accomplished award winning poet George Szirtes, in conversation and reciting a few of his poems.  This is followed by the deeply personal & esoteric poems of Amber Agha and finally we hear Kevin Morris reciting a few of his sometimes nostalgic and always evocative poetry.  georgeszirtes.blogspot.com   http://www.amberagha.info https://hellopoetry.com/kevin-morris/

3pm & 11pm & 7am

ALTERNATIVE RADIO with HILL & TAYLOR on Dismantling the System

Here at Audiobook Radio we are keen to provide a range of voices – very literally as well as in terms of opinions and views of the world. This strand created by Alternative Radio does just that. We will hear from some of the most informed minds and greatest social activists of our time whose take on justice and power does not chime with those that hold the power and don’t provide justice for all so we rarely get to hear from them in mainstream media. Different opinions always help inform our own and we are always eager to hear from listeners about this or any other strand. Contact us on the tab at www.audiobookradio.net

Is it starry-eyed to think about not just regime change but something much larger: system change? The systemic failures of the current crisis and the calamitous fissures it has exposed has raised the question of the efficacy of reform, half-measures and tinkering around the edges. When under duress, the system is agile enough to make some concessions while crucially leaving the fundamental structures of power intact. From the outside systems can look invincible and impregnable. Just tell that to Louis the XVI in 1789 or the Czar in 1917 or the Shah of Iran in 1979 or Hosni Mubarak in 2011. The noted writer, Ursula LeGuin reminds us, “We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings.”  Today’s speakers are Marc Lamont Hill, professor of Media Studies and Urban Education at Temple University in Philadelphia and named by Ebony as one of America’s 100 most influential Black leaders and Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, assistant professor in the Department of African American Studies at Princeton University and the author of From Black Lives Matter to Black Liberation.

4pm & Midnight & 8am

BLACK MUSEUM…ORSON WELLES

Director, Actor, Genius. Orson Welles was all these things and more.  But talent can sometimes make people afraid., And Hollywood was very afraid of Orson Welles. 

So Welles went Indie, making his own works on the proceeds of various jobs that required a big name and that very distinguished voice; perfect for radio.  Here, in the Black Museum he sets the scene as true life crime is retold.  Mr Welles we’re ready……this week THE 22 CALIBRE PISTOL & THE BRASS BUTTON

5pm & 1am & 9am

1001 ARABIAN NIGHTS

We have a really interesting and lively discussion coming up next which explores the monument to world literature and the ageless art of storytelling, that is The Arabian Nights.  The influence of The Arabian Nights on modern literature – from Marcel Proust and James Joyce to Vladimir Nabokov and Margaret Atwood – is unmistakable, but it’s rich legacy is often underestimated.

Authors Marina Warner and Richard van Leeuwen, both of whom have won the Award for their respective books exploring the Nights, and translator of Aladdin Yasmine Seale unpack the influence of this collection of stories – a timeless toolbox of literary motifs.  It is chaired by The Bookseller’s Tom Tivnan and hosted by them and the Sheikh Zayed Book Award.

6pm & 2am & 10am

HOLLYWOOD STAGE with This Gun for Hire

Hollywood is indelibly printed in our minds as a go to place for entertainment and has been for decades. We take you back in time as The Hollywood ringmaster himself, CECIL B DE MILLE unveils This Gun for Hire featuring ALAN LADD

7pm & 3am & 11am

SHORT STORIES – WALPOLE & BENNETT

These comes to you courtesy of Deadtree Publishing who have an excellent range of quality short stories from the masters of the craft.  Do search for Miniature Masterpieces at any digital store for further information or at https://www.deadtreepublishing.com/  This hour opens with Major Wilbraham by Hugh Walpole read by Jake Urry followed by The Letter and the Lie by Arnold Bennett ready Richard Mitchley. Vol 15