The 40 Best Audio books comment: Poet, storyteller and broadcaster, Dylan Thomas was charismatic, outrageous, unpredictable and impossible. He was also a genius with words. The essence of this genius is captured in a glorious collection of his best-known, best-loved and wittiest writing - stories, poems and above all his mould-breaking radio play Under Milk Wood - read by a cast of famous actors, including the incomparable Richard Burton, and the poet himself.
Read by: Dylan Thomas, Richard Bebb, Jason Hughes, and more Audio Length: 4 hours and 52 min.
CDs 1 & 2: Historical Recordings Under Milk Wood - the legendary historical performance with Richard Burton and cast Quite Early One Morning Return Journey to Swansea Poems and stories read by Dylan Thomas CDs 3 & 4: New Recordings Read by Philip Madoc, Richard Bebb and Jason Hughes Selected Poems including Fern Hill Do Not Go Gentle Poem in October Selected Stores including The Outing Peaches Visit to Grandpa The Fight And Death Shall Have No Dominion This varied, well-chosen selection brings onto one CD set the best of Dylan Thomas. Here is the legendary recording of Under Milk Wood, with Richard Burton and Richard Bebb as narrators; but here also are two radio productions he wrote before that great classic, and though interesting in their own right, they show how Under Milk Wood grew gradually in his imagination. Thomas was a charismatic if idiosyncratic performer of his own poetry and stories and here is a representative selection.
But performances of Dylan Thomas have moved on and the greatness of the writer as a poet and storyteller are perhaps best heard in new recordings by actors of our own time. Here Bebb. Madoc and Hughes share some of Thomas finest, most challenging and endearing works.
Dylan Thomas was born in Swansea on 27 October 1914, the son of a senior English master. On leaving school he worked on the South Wales Evening Post before embarking on his literary career in London. Not only a poet, he wrote short stories, film scripts, features and radio plays, the most famous being Under Milk Wood. On 9 November 1953, shortly after his thirty-ninth birthday, he collapsed and died in New York city. He is buried in Laugharne, Carmarthenshire, which had become his main home since 1949. In 1982 a memorial stone to commemorate him was unveiled in 'Poet's Corner' in Westminster Abbey.
