The Cardboard Box | Arthur Conan Doyle | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-08-06 | A quiet, unassuming single lady receives an unexpected parcel in the post, which turns out to enclose rather grisly contents. Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson rouse themselves from the lethargy of a sweltering heatwave to investigate a dark crime... The story begins at 00:01:15. See below for notes on the text and the interesting publication history of this story. Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinTimestamps: 00:00:00 Introduction00:01:15 The Adventure of the Cardboard Box00:58:00 Credits, thanks and further listeningThe music used at the beginning and end of the story is an extract from 'Duet for Two Violins' by Luigi Boccherini, Op 5 N2 Larghetto. The image in the title card is a detail from the painting 'Liverpool Docks by Night', by the English artist John Atkinson Grimshaw (1836–1893).About the author: Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle (1859–1930) was a Scottish doctor and author, celebrated for his world-famous creation Sherlock Holmes, the consulting detective who set the standard for crime fiction into the 20th century and beyond. In addition to his Holmes stories, Conan Doyle is also remembered for his fantasy and science fiction novels and stories, including 'The Parasite' and 'The Lost World' series of novels, his historical fiction, and for numerous short stories contributed to magazines over a 40 year period. He was knighted by King Edward VII in the 1902 Coronation Honours.'The Adventure of the Cardboard Box' has an interesting publication history. It first appeared in The Strand Magazine in January 1893, the 14th Sherlock Holmes story to be printed by that periodical. However, when the second series of 12 stories came to be collected together for book publication as 'The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes' in early 1894, 'The Cardboard Box' was omitted, so the volume was printed with only 11 stories. This was apparently at Arthur Conan Doyle's request, but his reasons aren't entirely clear: it's been speculated that he worried the themes were too shocking to public sentiment at the time, and/or he regretted that the crime was too "sensational". It wasn't until almost 25 years later, when a few of Watson's “later reminiscences” published episodically between 1908 and 1917 were collected together in the 1917 volume 'His Last Bow', that Doyle allowed the story to re-emerge. Perhaps three years into World War I the brutality of the crime seemed less shocking... To this day, some collected works of Sherlock Holmes still include the story in 'His Last Bow', whereas others choose to re-insert it in its original place in 'The Memoirs'. Doyle's decision to withdraw the story from book publication had consequences for another story in 'The Memoirs'. He was particularly pleased with the opening "mind reading" section and was loath to lose it, so he inserted it wholesale at the beginning of 'The Resident Patient', replacing that story's original opening paragraphs. Initially this was rather clumsily done so that the latter story ended up with contradictory references to an August heatwave and stormy October gales, although this was later tidied up in subsequent editions. Again, modern complete works vary, with most restoring the original opening to 'The Resident Patient' and a few retaining the 'Cardboard Box' insert so that two stories have exactly the same opening sequence. 'The Cardboard Box' was also the very last episode of the 1984–94 Granada television series, starring Jeremy Brett as Holmes. Like many of the later episodes of that final series, the adaptation made several striking changes to the original, most notably moving the setting to Christmas time, so that the crime of passion takes place amidst a frozen and snowy landscape, instead of a heatwave.A note on the text: for those reading along with the book, please be aware that there are numerous minor differences between the text of the story as originally printed in The Strand (1893) and the later book publication (1917). They don't impact on the story, but there are several grammatical changes and a few words are replaced with synonyms, e.g. "deep thought" becomes "deep meditation". For clarity, the text read here is the original 1893 Strand Magazine version. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
Murder by Proxy | M. McDonnell Bodkin | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-08-22 | A classic "locked room" mystery from 1897: Squire Neville is found shot dead in his study on a sultry August afternoon. Witnesses swear that no-one could have entered or left by the door or window, but the case is clearly murder. The victim's nephews, John and Eric, agree to call in the celebrated "rule of thumb detective" Paul Beck to investigate...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinTimestamps:00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 Murder by Proxy00:52:53 Credits, thanks and further listeningMatthias McDonnell Bodkin (1850–1933) was born in County Galway, Ireland, the second son of a doctor. Over the course of a long career he was a journalist, newspaper editor, barrister (QC during the reign of Victoria), county court Judge (for County Clare) and, for a brief period (1892–95), a Member of Parliament for North Roscommon, sitting in the House of Commons as an Irish Nationalist during Gladstone's fourth and final term as prime minister. Somehow alongside all this he managed to find time to write fiction, which he produced quite prolifically from the 1890s through to the late 1920s. In this capacity he created two popular "rivals of Sherlock Holmes": Paul Beck, "the rule of thumb detective", who made his debut in 1897, and Dora Myrl, "the lady detective", whose adventures appeared in 1900. He subsequently had the ingenious idea of having them meet and work together, get married and produce a son (Paul Beck junior) who became a detective in his own right, appearing in stories from 1911 onwards. His other fictional output included a trilogy of historical novels set at the time of the Irish Rebellion of 1798, one of which ('Lord Edward Fitzgerald', 1896) was dedicated to William Gladstone, as well as several other novels, both contemporary and historical. He also published plays, works of history and some political journalism.'Murder by Proxy' was one of the earliest stories to feature Paul Beck. It was the third adventure to be published and first appeared in Pearson’s Weekly, on 6 February 1897. It is probably Bodkin's best known short story and has been since appeared in a number of popular anthologies, including Hugh Greene's 'The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes volume 3' (1973).Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023.
The Bruce-Partington Plans | Arthur Conan Doyle | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-08-04 | One of the finest Sherlock Holmes short stories, from its wonderfully atmospheric opening description of a fog-girt London to the dramatic unmasking of the criminal, 'The Bruce-Partington Plans' is a Holmesian masterclass of deduction and reasoning to uncover a tale of treason, espionage and murder. It also features one of only two appearances of Holmes's brother Mycroft in the original Conan Doyle stories. Story begins at 00:01:15Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:15 The Adventure of the Bruce-Partington Plans01:14:00 Credits, thanks and further listeningThe music used at the beginning and end of this recording is an extract from 'Duet for Two Violins' by Luigi Boccherini, Op 5 N2 Larghetto.About the author: Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle (1859–1930) was a Scottish doctor and author, celebrated for his world-famous creation Sherlock Holmes, the consulting detective who set the standard for crime fiction into the 20th century and beyond. In addition to his Holmes stories, Conan Doyle is also remembered for his fantasy and science fiction novels and stories, including 'The Parasite' and 'The Lost World' series of novels, his historical fiction, and for numerous short stories contributed to magazines over a 40 year period. He was knighted by King Edward VII in the 1902 Coronation Honours.From his debut in Beeton's Christmas Annual in 1887, in 'A Study in Scarlet', Sherlock Holmes established himself as the first, the best and the most famous of all private consulting detectives. His serialised adventures in The Strand Magazine, starting with 'A Scandal in Bohemia' in 1891, developed the character into a literary sensation and in the 20th century he was to become the most portrayed character in screen history. The enormous impact of the character of Dr Watson should also be noted: the narrator/companion figure became a staple of detective fiction in future generations. Significant and influential portrayals of the duo have included: Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce; Peter Cushing and Nigel Stock; Jeremy Brett and David Burke (later Edward Hardwicke); and most recently the contemporary take on the characters by Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman. 'The Adventure of the Bruce-Partington Plans' was the 42nd Sherlock Holmes story (of 60) by Conan Doyle, and first appeared in The Strand Magazine in December 1908, with illustrations by Arthur Twidle. It subsequently appeared in book form as part of the collection 'His Last Bow', published in 1917.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
The Last Exploit of Harry the Actor | A Max Carrados story by Ernest Bramah | Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-07-27 | The Lucas Street Safe Deposit proudly claims itself to be impregnable, with multiple layers of security, including keys and passwords, to gain access. While accompanying his friend Mr. Carlyle on a visit to "The Safe", the blind detective Max Carrados perceives sounds and smells which lead him to suspect that an audacious theft is in preparation... The story starts at 00:01:20Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The Story begins 01:25:37 Credits, thanks and further listening If you'd like to hear more stories featuring Max Carrados, I have a playlist in development, available here: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLi95qAoufCZLjwoLUZBvPAFemYFKiqB7zOr for a selection of other Victorian and Edwardian detective stories, do take a look at the "Rivals of Sherlock Holmes" playlist: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLi95qAoufCZL5tiXECltwXUI2QDDFrDHDAbout the author: Ernest Bramah (1868–1942) was born Ernest Bramah Smith, probably in or near Manchester, where he attended grammar school. An intensely private man, very little information is known about his personal life. His early career included a stint as assistant to Jerome K. Jerome; his first success as a writer came as a contributor of humorous sketches somewhat in the manner of Jerome, to newspapers and periodicals, and he later became editor of one of Jerome's magazines. As an author he is best remembered for creating two characters: Kai Lung, a Chinese storyteller who appeared in a number of humorous stories from 1900; and Max Carrados, the blind detective, created in 1913. He also wrote science fiction, and his 1907 novel 'What Might Have Been' (also known as 'The Secret of the League') is a dystopian story which was acknowledged by George Orwell as a major influence on his own 'Nineteen Eighty-four'. Orwell was also a great admirer of the Max Carrados stories, bracketing them with Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes and Freeman's Dr Thorndyke as "the only detective stories since Poe that are worth re-reading". The character of Carrados appeared in more than 25 short stories and novels between 1913 and 1934, and by the 1920s was more popular than Sherlock Holmes (whose later cases appeared alongside Carrados in The Strand Magazine). His blindness proves no obstacle to his detective skills; indeed his other senses are heightened and he regularly outwits criminals and fellow detectives alike. Ernest Bramah Smith died in June 1942, aged 74, in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset. He was survived by his wife Lucy Smith. 'The Last Exploit of Harry the Actor' first appeared under the title 'The Great Safe Deposit Coup' in The News of the World, on 5th October 1913. It was reprinted the following year – under the new title – as part of the first collection of Carrados stories to appear in book form, simply entitled 'Max Carrados (Methuen & Co., Ltd., 1914).Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
Number 13 | A Ghost Story by M. R. James | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-07-13 | While researching church history in Denmark, Mr. Anderson notices that the inn where he is staying has no room numbered 13. Or does it...? One of the best known ghost stories by M. R. James, first heard at Christmas 1899. The story starts at 00:01:20Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 Number 1300:44:33 Credits, thanks and further listeningMontague Rhodes James (1862–1936) was a medievalist and scholar, and is probably the best known and most celebrated English ghost story writer of the 20th century, although he actually began composing supernatural tales in the late Victorian era, beginning with 'Canon Alberic's Scrap-Book' (1894). He was born in Kent, but spent most of his childhood in Suffolk, a county which features prominently in many of his stories, including 'Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad'. Several of James's protagonists also reflect his own antiquarian interests, with academics and historians featuring regularly. James published four volumes of ghost stories in his lifetime: 'Ghost Stories of an Antiquary' (1904), 'More Ghost Stories of an Antiquary' (1911), 'A Thin Ghost and Others' (1919) and 'A Warning to the Curious and Other Stories' (1925).During a long academic career which encompassed several positions at King's College, Cambridge, and Eton College, M. R. James developed a tradition of reading his ghost stories aloud to a group of friends, most famously on Christmas eve, and the majority of his published stories were first heard in that setting. In his preface to 'Ghost Stories of an Antiquary', the first volume of his stories to be published in book form, in 1904, M. R. James states that "I wrote 'Number 13' in 1899", which implies that it was first heard performed at the Christmas gathering that year.Some notes on the text: – "The old terrier of the Bishop’s property" mentioned by the Archivist: "terrier" is an historical term for an inventory or catalogue of assets, in this case belonging to the church.– The Latin words from the Psalter, taken from Psalm 150, quoted by Herr Jensen, "omnis spiritus laudet Dominum", translates roughly as: "Let everything that has breath praise the Lord."Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023.
The Disappearance of Crispina Umberleigh | Saki (H. H. Munro) | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-07-07 | Two English travellers on a train crossing central Europe fall into conversation about strange disappearances. One of them relates the remarkable story of his aunt, Crispina Umberleigh, who vanished mysteriously some years earlier. The true story behind it has been hushed up, until now... The story starts at 00:01:18 Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:18 The Story begins 00:13:40 Credits, thanks and further listeningSaki was the pen name of Hector Hugh Munro, one of the greatest masters of the short story form in English. He was born in 1870 in Burma, then part of British India, where his father was an Inspector General for the Imperial Police, but his life was affected by tragedy when he was just two years old: his mother Mary Munro was charged by a cow while visiting family back in England, and she died as a result of her injuries. Hector and his siblings were sent home to England, to live in Devon with his paternal grandmother and two maiden aunts. The aunts (Augusta and Charlotte) were apparently strict and austere and provided much material for future character studies in Saki's satires. After some 10 years or so, Hector eventually "escaped" to boarding school. In his early 20s he followed his father's footsteps and enrolled in the Indian Imperial Police, but was invalided home with fever after little over a year. Turning to writing to make his living, Munro began working as a journalist in the late 1890s. He wrote countless pieces for magazine and newspaper publication, and took up the pen name Saki around 1900. His always witty – and sometimes macabre – stories established his reputation as one of the greatest satirists of the Edwardian era. Despite being officially over-age for military service, turning 44 at the end of 1914, he enlisted in World War I, turning down the offer of a commission and serving as an ordinary trooper in the 2nd King Edward’s Horse regiment. Tragically, he was killed by a sniper while sheltering in a shell hole during the Battle of the Ancre in November 1916. His last words were reported to be “Put that bloody cigarette out”. His resting place is unknown.The date of composition and first publication of 'The Disappearance of Crispina Umberleigh' is unclear. The first recorded publication of the story which I've been able to find was some three years after the author's death, as part of the collection 'The Toys of Peace, and Other Papers' (John Lane, 1919); I've not been able to ascertain whether it was printed in a newspaper or periodical during Munro's lifetime. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
The Man With Two Beards | A Father Brown Story by G. K. Chesterton | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-06-25 | Breakfast in the Bankes household is enlivened by news that a notorious jewel thief is believed to be living nearby under an assumed name, not least because Mrs. Bankes is the owner of a valuable emerald necklace. The new lodger at Smith the bee-keeper's farm seems to be an obvious suspect. As robbery develops into murder, luckily Smith's friend Father Brown is on hand to investigate...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The story begins00:54:47 Credits, thanks and further listeningGilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936) was an English author, theologian, philosopher and critic, who produced a wide-ranging output of fiction, poetry and journalism. His writing covered a wide variety of subjects, ranging from crime fiction to Christianity. His most famous novel is probably the "metaphysical thriller" 'The Man Who Was Thursday' (1908), but his most famous fictional creation is surely Father Brown, the Catholic priest-detective who featured in more than 50 short stories published episodically between 1910 and 1936. A complete contrast to his (near) contemporary Sherlock Holmes, Father Brown is quiet, unassuming and solves crimes with instinct, intuition and a deep understanding of human nature.'The Man With Two Beards' first appeared in the April 1925 edition of Cassell's Magazine, London (issue No.157), and in Harper's Magazine (in the USA) in the same month. It was subsequently published in the fourth collection of stories featuring the priest-detective, 'The Secret of Father Brown' (Cassell & Co., 1927).Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
The Secret Garden | A Father Brown Story by G. K. Chesterton | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-06-25 | One of the most celebrated Father Brown stories, an outdoor "locked room" mystery in which a body is discovered in a sealed garden. But with no access to the outside world how did the victim get into the garden – and how did the murderer get out?Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The story begins00:55:39 Credits, thanks and further listeningGilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936) was an English author, theologian, philosopher and critic, who produced a wide-ranging output of fiction, poetry and journalism. His writing covered a wide variety of subjects, ranging from crime fiction to Christianity. His most famous novel is probably the "metaphysical thriller" 'The Man Who Was Thursday' (1908), but his most famous fictional creation is surely Father Brown, the Catholic priest-detective who featured in more than 50 short stories published episodically between 1910 and 1936. A complete contrast to his (near) contemporary Sherlock Holmes, Father Brown is quiet, unassuming and solves crimes with instinct, intuition and a deep understanding of human nature.'The Secret Garden' reintroduces the character of Valentin, chief of the Paris police, who featured in the first Father Brown story, 'The Blue Cross'. It was first published in the October 1910 issue of The Story-Teller magazine, and the following year as the second story in 'The Innocence of Father Brown', the first of several books which comprise the Father Brown series.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2020–2023
Was It An Illusion? | A Ghost Story by Amelia B. Edwards | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-06-25 | A schools inspector visiting a remote part of northern England has a strange encounter with an errant boy pursued by a grim and unsympathetic schoolmaster. But do either of them really exist? Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The story begins00:55:05 Credits, thanks and further listeningAmelia Ann Blanford Edwards (1831–1892) was a prolific journalist, traveller and Egyptologist, as well as a hugely popular English novelist of the Victorian era. Born in London she was well educated at home by her Irish mother, and showed early promise as a writer as well as demonstrating skill in several other areas, including painting and musical composition. She devoted herself to writing professionally from the early 1850s, producing novels including 'My Brother's Wife' (1855) and 'Barbara's History' (1864). She also travelled widely, in particular with her companion Lucy Renshawe, and published several travelogues, including 'A Thousand Miles up the Nile' (1877), which is still widely read and admired today. Aside from her travel writing she is best remembered today for her many short stories with ghostly, supernatural and mysterious themes, many of which were contributed anonymously to literary magazines. Charles Dickens regularly invited her to compose seasonal tales for his annual Christmas numbers of 'All the Year Round' between 1860 and 1866, including probably her best known and most reprinted story, 'The Phantom Coach' (1864). It's unclear why she didn't contribute any stories to the publication between 1867 and 1870 – it's possible Dickens rejected her 1866 story 'The Four-fifteen Express' as too long, so she took it elsewhere – but his son, Charles Dickens junior, invited her to return after Dickens's death in 1870.'Was it an Illusion?' was her last published ghost story, and first appeared in 'Arrowsmith's Christmas Annual' in 1881.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
The Room in the Tower | A Ghost Story by E. F. Benson | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-06-23 | After many years of experiencing a strange and recurring dream, of an unseen, unidentified terror lurking in a room at the top of a mysterious house, our narrator is disturbed to find that his nightmare appears to be crossing over into real life...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The story begins00:40:36 Credits, thanks and further listeningEdward Frederic Benson (1867–1940) is probably best remembered today for his social satires, the Mapp and Lucia stories. However in his lifetime he was perhaps more famous for his many "spook stories" (as he liked to call them) which he composed regularly for publication in periodicals – usually Hutchinson's or Pearson's magazines – from the late 1890s through to the 1930s. He was a friend and contemporary of M. R. James, the most celebrated of 20th century ghost story authors, and was a member of the Chitchat Club, the Cambridge University literary society where James would read aloud his ghost stories to a select few. As a writer of ghost stories, E. F. Benson's own output includes an unusually wide and adventurous range of styles and themes, encompassing stories of vampires, homicidal spirits, monstrous creatures, as well as satires of charlatan mediums who became so fashionable in the 1920s. The Room in the Tower first appeared in the January 1912 issue of Pall Mall Magazine. It was subsequently published in book form later that year as the title story in 'The Room in the Tower and Other Stories'.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2020/2023
Summer Ghost Stories | Volume 2 | E. F. Benson, M. R. James & others | A Bitesized Audio Anthology Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-06-16 | Six classic ghost stories which all take place in the summer months – not the season we most commonly associate with ghosts, but chills and thrills aren't confined to the cold weather seasons. Story timestamps can be found below. The stories are already available on the channel as individual uploads if you prefer to listen that way, although I've taken the opportunity while producing this anthology to remaster and re-edit some of my older recordings. If you enjoy this video, you may also enjoy my previous anthology of summer ghost stories – Volume 1 includes 'A View from a Hill' (M. R. James), 'The Upper Berth' (F. Marion Crawford) and 'The Sand Walker (Fergus Hume) and can be heard here:youtube.com/watch?v=cHndvN5i76gTimestamps:00:00:00 Introduction 00:01:43 The Room in the Tower by E. F. Benson00:41:09 In the Confessional by Amelia B. Edwards01:26:26 Count Magnus by M. R. James02:04:06 The Wood of the Dead by Algernon Blackwood 02:42:15 The Cold Embrace by Mary Elizabeth Braddon 03:10:18 The Bus Conductor by E. F. Benson 03:35:43 Credits and thanks(Story teasers below)If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinThe Room in the Tower | E. F. Benson | 00:01:43After many years of experiencing a strange and recurring dream, of an unseen, unidentified terror lurking in a room at the top of a mysterious house, our narrator is disturbed to find that his nightmare appears to be crossing over into real life...In the Confessional | Amelia B. Edwards | 00:41:09An English traveller walking the upper Rhine encounters the troubled priest of a small town on the Swiss-German border. Unsettled by the man's strange appearance, he resolves to find out more about the tragic story which has haunted him for over 30 years.Count Magnus | M. R. James | 01:26:26 ‘Are you awake, Count Magnus? Are you asleep, Count Magnus?’ While travelling in Sweden, Mr. Wraxall becomes fascinated by the legend surrounding Count Magnus De la Gardie, a nobleman of evil memory. He soon regrets his curiosity...The Wood of the Dead | Algernon Blackwood | 02:04:06 A traveller on a walking tour in the south west of England takes his lunch at a lonely country inn, where he encounters a strange old rustic and hears the local legend of the Wood of the Dead...The Cold Embrace | Mary Elizabeth Braddon | 02:42:15 An early work by one of the most popular authors of Victorian suspense, Mary Elizabeth Braddon, 'The Cold Embrace' is gothic tale of young love, betrayal and tragic consequences...The Bus Conductor | E. F. Benson | 03:10:18 Two friends, one a believer in the supernatural and the other a sceptic, talk over a night they spent in a "haunted" house, which brought no results. But then the sceptic surprises his friend by telling of a very strange experience which happened to him a year earlier...Original recordings © Bitesized Audio 2019–22. This compilation © 2023.
How Śiva Spoke | L. T. Meade and Robert Eustace | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-06-07 | John Bell, Victorian adventurer and "professional exposer of ghosts", is asked by a doctor acquaintance to investigate the case of Edward Thesiger, who claims the statue of Śiva speaks to him. Thesiger seems perfectly sane in other respects, yet his nephew wants him committed to an asylum. Can Bell unravel the mystery of how Thesiger hears Śiva's voice, even though others present in the same room hear nothing?Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction 00:01:20 The Story begins 00:55:00 Credits and thanksL. T. Meade (Elizabeth Thomasina Meade Smith, 1844–1914) was born in County Cork, Ireland. She began writing fiction at the age of 17, and had a highly prolific career, publishing almost 300 books in her lifetime. She married Alfred Toulmin Smith in London, in 1879, when she was in her mid-30s. She was an advocate of feminist causes, and as a solo writer became most associated with adventure stories for girls and young people, of which the most famous was ‘A World of Girls’, published in 1886. However, she was also much associated with mystery and suspense stories, and her name appeared frequently in the periodicals of the 1890s and early 1900s. Interestingly, in this genre she often wrote in collaboration with medical practitioners; first with Dr. Clifford Halifax, with whom she produced a series entitled ‘Stories from the Diaries of a Doctor’ in 1893, and later with Robert Eustace, who collaborated with her on several successful series from the mid-1890s onwards. It’s not fully known how the collaborations worked, but it seems likely that she did the majority of the actual writing while the doctors supplied the ideas and scientific details which underpin many of the plots.Robert Eustace is something of a shadowy figure. It's obviously a pen name, but the identity of the person behind the name is very uncertain. The most often cited candidate is Dr. Eustace Robert Barton, although there’s no certainty or consensus about that, not least because his given birth date varies wildly between sources (1854, 1869 or 1871, depending on the source), and he’s recorded as having died in both 1932 and 1943, and also as still living (but retired) in 1947. This confusion suggests to me that two different people may have used the same pseudonym. Whoever he was, aside from his work with L. T. Meade, the pen name of Robert Eustace is probably best remembered today for a much later work of crime fiction, collaborating with Dorothy L. Sayers on her 1930 novel 'The Documents of the Case'.Together Meade and Eustace created a number of recurring characters, including John Bell, who describes himself in the introduction to his collected stories as "a professional exposer of ghosts, and one who can clear away the mysteries of most haunted houses" – making him in effect a more sceptical counterpart to William Hope Hodgson's Carnacki, the Ghost Finder (who first appeared in print a decade or so later). Bell featured in a series of stories in Cassell’s Magazine in 1897, which were later published in book form under the title 'A Master of Mysteries' in 1898. 'How Śiva Spoke' was the fifth (of six) stories in the series, and first appeared in the October 1897 issue of Cassell's Magazine. Other stories from this series are available to listen via this playlist: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLi95qAoufCZLC2ixFiWF3flPkm1JhyCnJRecording © Bitesized Audio 2023
In the Confessional | A Ghost Story by Amelia B. Edwards | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-06-07 | An English traveller walking the upper Rhine encounters the troubled priest of a small town on the Swiss-German border. Unsettled by the man's strange appearance, he resolves to find out more about the tragic story which has haunted him for over 30 years.Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The story begins00:46:36 Credits, thanks and further listeningAmelia Ann Blanford Edwards (1831–1892) was a prolific journalist, traveller and Egyptologist, as well as a hugely popular English novelist of the Victorian era. Born in London she was well educated at home by her Irish mother, and showed early promise as a writer as well as demonstrating skill in several other areas, including painting and musical composition. She devoted herself to writing professionally from the early 1850s, producing novels including 'My Brother's Wife' (1855) and 'Barbara's History' (1864). She also travelled widely, in particular with her companion Lucy Renshawe, and published several travelogues, including 'A Thousand Miles up the Nile' (1877), which is still widely read and admired today. Aside from her travel writing she is best remembered today for her many short stories with ghostly, supernatural and mysterious themes, many of which were contributed anonymously to literary magazines. Charles Dickens regularly invited her to compose seasonal tales for his annual Christmas numbers of 'All the Year Round' between 1860 and 1866, including probably her best known and most reprinted story, 'The Phantom Coach' (1864). It's unclear why she didn't contribute any stories to the publication between 1867 and 1870 – it's possible Dickens rejected her 1866 story 'The Four-fifteen Express' as too long, so she took it elsewhere – but his son, Charles Dickens junior, invited her to return after Dickens's death in 1870, and 'In the Confessional' was her contribution for Christmas 1871. The story reflects her own interest in foreign travel and her many continental tours.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
The Case of the Dixon Torpedo | Arthur Morrison | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-05-26 | Private Detective Martin Hewitt is consulted by an engineer who has fallen victim to an impossible theft: important naval blueprints have gone missing from his suite of offices, although nobody has entered or left the office since the drawings were last seen... Where have the plans gone, and can Hewitt recover them before they fall into the hands of enemy agents?Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:18 The story begins00:52:00 Credits, thanks and further listeningArthur Morrison (1863–1945) was a journalist and author who made his name with realistic portrayals of English working class life in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, typified by his most famous novel, 'A Child of the Jago' (1896). In addition, he composed numerous short stories for periodical publication between 1891 and 1913, with themes ranging from horror and the supernatural to detective tales. In the latter genre he created two popular contemporary "rivals of Sherlock Holmes", Martin Hewitt and Horace Dorrington.Morrison was born in Poplar, in the east end of London, into a working class family. His father, a dock worker, died of tuberculosis when Arthur was eight. He began his career as an office boy at the London School Board and gradually worked his way up through the ranks of various publications, first as a clerk and eventually as a journalist and editor. He married Elizabeth Thatcher in 1892, and their son Guy was born the following year.Morrison's detective character Martin Hewitt first appeared in The Strand Magazine just weeks after Conan Doyle apparently killed off Sherlock Holmes in 'The Final Problem', beginning with 'The Lenton Croft Robberies' in March 1894. Morrison was initially uncredited as the author, although his name was finally printed at the end of the series. The stories were illustrated by Sidney Paget, who had illustrated all the Holmes adventures for The Strand. Hewitt was deliberately conceived by Morrison as a more realistic contrast to the "superman" figure of Holmes: he's workmanlike, practical and down to earth. That first series featured monthly in The Strand until September 1894; they were then collected in book form under the title 'Martin Hewitt, Investigator'. Three subsequent series of adventures featuring Hewitt appeared in The Windsor Magazine between 1895 and 1897, while Morrison's second detective character, Horace Dorrington, also made his debut in The Windsor Magazine in January 1897, in 'The Dorrington Deed Box'. Dorrington is another unusual detective: described as "deeply corrupt" and a "lower class answer to Sherlock Holmes", he blurs the lines of the law, never afraid to resort to blackmail, burglary or fraud to achieve his results.In addition to his career as a successful author of fiction, Morrison was also a collector of Japanese artwork, publishing a noted book and several articles on the subject. On his death his collection of Japanese paintings, prints and ceramics was left to the British Museum, his son Guy having pre-deceased him.'The Case of the Dixon Torpedo' first appeared in The Strand Magazine in June 1894.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
The Empty Chair | Alice and Claude Askew | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-05-14 | A young couple take their honeymoon in the Lake District, where the bride suggests her husband has “a day off duty" walking the fells. When he loses his way, he seeks aid at a remote and desolate looking house... but could Fate have brought him here?Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The story begins00:42:23 Credits, thanks and further listeningClaude Askew (1865–1917) and Alice Askew (née Leake, 1874–1917) were a husband and wife writing team, who achieved tremendous popular success together in the Edwardian era, collaborating on numerous novels and short stories which appeared frequently in the periodicals of the day. They were both born in London. Claude was educated at Eton, while the details of Alice's education are obscure. Alice apparently stated that she began writing "for her own amusement" before marrying Claude, although only one story is known to be credited to her under her own name (Alice Jane de Courcy Leake): 'A Modern-Day Saint', which was printed in 'Belgravia' magazine in 1894. Claude and Alice married in July 1900 and initially lived in the Marylebone area of London, where their son and older daughter were born. They later moved out to Godalming in Surrey, and eventually Haywards Heath in Sussex. It appears that they began their writing partnership soon after their marriage; short stories were printed under their joint names from 1903 onwards, and their first novel, 'The Shulamite', was published in 1904. According to a profile of the couple from the 'Review of Reviews' in 1912: "About a year after they had been married it occurred to them that it would be pleasant to work together, since their tastes were so strikingly similar. They began with short stories, in which they have been as successful as they have been prolific, and contributed practically a new story every week to Household Words."Interestingly, given the plot of 'The Empty Chair', it's said that both Claude and Alice often found their ideas for stories as a result of dreams. Typically, if Claude dreamed up a plot, he would write the first half of the story, while Alice finished it and improved it; and the reverse would be the case when Alice dreamed up her plots. The Askews were well-known celebrities of the day by the time of the outbreak of the First World War in 1914. Although they were both in their forties by this point, they volunteered to help the war effort. After some time in Belgium assisting an ambulance station in late 1914/early 1915, they returned to Britain and published at least two novels, 'The Tocsin' (1915) and 'Nurse!' (1916), drawing upon their wartime experiences. Later in the war they took up the cause of aid for Serbia, raising funds in London as well as travelling to the eastern Mediterranean to write about and document experiences in the region. Alice spent some time working with the Serbian Red Cross, while Claude was appointed an honorary Major in the Serbian army in recognition of his support.As they worked together and achieved success together, so Alice and Claude Askew died together, casualties of war when the ship they were travelling on was struck by a torpedo fired by a German U-boat in the Adriatic. They were sailing on the Città di Bari, en route to Corfu, when the ship sank at about 4.30am on 6 October 1917. Claude's body was never recovered, but Alice's body was washed up on the tiny Croatian island of Zvirinovik some weeks later, identified by letters and telegrams found in her clothing. As a result she was buried in Karbuni and a stone cross and memorial was erected in her memory there. Alice and Claude were survived by their three children, the youngest of whom was aged just one, having been born in London in July 1916. 'The Empty Chair' first appeared in The Pall Mall Magazine in September 1910.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
Ten Classic Detective Stories | A Bitesized Audio Compilation Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-05-04 | A selection of 10 classic stories featuring some of the detective "rivals of Sherlock Holmes" who began to appear in popular periodicals after Conan Doyle apparently killed Holmes off in 1893. Featuring cases for Loveday Brooke, Max Carrados, Father Brown, the Old Man in the Corner, and Dr. Thorndyke. All narrated/performed by me, Simon Stanhope. The stories are already available on the channel as individual uploads if you prefer to listen that way, although I've taken the opportunity while producing this anthology to remaster and re-edit some of my older recordings. Timestamps:00:00:00 Introduction and notes by Simon Stanhope00:02:25 The Redhill Sisterhood by Catherine Louisa Pirkis01:00:10 The Missing Actress Sensation by Ernest Bramah 02:08:20 The Secret Garden by G. K. Chesterton03:02:36 The Robbery in Phillimore Terrace by Emma Orczy 03:41:02 Gleanings from the Wreckage by R. Austin Freeman 04:33:37 Drawn Daggers by Catherine Louisa Pirkis 05:26:28 The Secret of Dunstan's Tower by Ernest Bramah06:28:27 The Oracle of the Dog by G. K. Chesterton07:26:19 The Fenchurch Street Mystery by Emma Orczy08:12:34 The Naturalist at Law by R. Austin Freeman09:21:19 Credits, thanks and further listening(Story teasers below)If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinThe Redhill Sisterhood | 00:02:25Surrey police call in the services of 'Lady Detective' Loveday Brooke, to investigate the activities of a local order of nuns which they suspect may be a cover for a gang of country house burglars. The Missing Actress Sensation | 01:00:10A young actress making her London debut in the west end becomes an overnight star after earning rave reviews on the opening night, even though she only plays a supporting role in the piece. But a few days later, her name is in the newspapers again for a very different reason...The Secret Garden | 02:08:20One of the most celebrated Father Brown stories, an outdoor "locked room" mystery in which a body is discovered in a sealed garden. But with no access to the outside world how did the victim get into the garden – and how did the murderer get out?The Robbery in Phillimore Terrace | 03:02:36A daring double theft of diamonds, from the homes of two dealers who are near neighbours in Kensington, has baffled the police – especially when the prime suspect vanishes under their very noses. Gleanings from the Wreckage | 03:41:02On a late-night walk through London, Thorndyke and Jervis are witnesses to a small explosion and fire in a laboratory. Then the widow of a scientist killed in the blast seeks Thorndyke's help to satisfy the insurers that his death was an accident, and not suicide...Drawn Daggers | 04:33:37A valuable diamond necklace disappears while its owner, a young heiress, is staying with the Hawke family, but for some reason she seems reluctant to report the loss to the police. Then Mr. Hawke receives the first in a series of cryptic anonymous drawings: could they be a warning? Loveday Brooke investigates...The Secret of Dunstan's Tower | 05:26:28Max Carrados is asked by an old school friend to investigate the case of the Aynosfordes, who are apparently haunted by a strange and inexplicable manifestation on the stairs in their ancient family seat, Dunstan's Tower...The Oracle of the Dog | 06:28:27The press calls it the "invisible murder case": Colonel Druce was stabbed while alone in his summerhouse – yet multiple witnesses confirm that no-one was seen to enter or leave. And the victim's dog, who was out on a walk at the time of the murder, began to howl inexplicably at just about the time the crime was committed. Could the dog really hold the key to the mystery?The Fenchurch Street Mystery | 07:26:19Journalist Polly Burton is initially annoyed to have her lunch disturbed by a strange man who sits at her corner table. But her interest is piqued when he begins to talk to her about a baffling murder case which has confounded the police and the public for more than a year...The Naturalist at Law | 08:12:34 When a man's body is found drowned in a shallow ditch, it seems a clear case of suicide. But there are several puzzling features: why did he travel miles from home from an area where he was unknown, and how did he get there? Original recordings © Bitesized Audio 2020–23. This compilation © 2023.
The Man Who Called Himself Hamilton Cleek | Thomas W. Hanshew | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-04-26 | Superintendent Maverick Narkom of Scotland Yard is on the hunt for "the vanishing cracksman", a daring thief who is a master of disguise. Police Constable Collins, on point duty at Blackfriars Bridge, could be the man to nab him at last... Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:19 The Kinematograph Film00:22:51 Sir Horace Wyvern and Miss Ailsa Lorne00:48:18 Superintendent Narkom's Visitor01:00:03 Credits, thanks and further listeningThomas Washington Hanshew (1857–1914) was an American actor and author who spent the latter part of his life and career in England. He was born in Brooklyn, New York, and began a career on the stage in the early 1870s, when he was in his mid-teens. There's not a great deal of verifiable information about either his life or career, but it appears he worked in his formative years with Adelaide Neilson (1848–1880), a British theatre star who achieved notable success in New York in a number of celebrated productions between 1872 and 1877. He is also recorded as having worked with Ellen Terry (1847–1928), perhaps the best known British actress of the late 19th century, leading lady to Henry Irving, and part of the illustrious Terry dynasty (whose later members included Ellen's great-nephew Sir John Gielgud). Ellen Terry toured the USA six times from 1883 onwards, but it's unclear whether Hanshew worked with her in America or in England (or both). Whether through his connection with Neilson, or Terry, or some other route, Hanshew eventually made his way to Britain and settled in London. Exactly when he made the move is unclear, but he seems to have been established in London by the early 20th century, as he is recorded as contributing fiction to various periodicals, including Pearson's, Cosmopolitan, The Windsor Magazine, and many others, from 1904 onwards. He sometimes wrote under the pseudonym "Charlotte May Kingsley", and possibly other (female) pen names. Hanshew's most celebrated creation, for which he's best remembered, is Hamilton Cleek, a master of disguise, known as "The Man of the Forty Faces" and "The Vanishing Cracksman", a successful gentleman thief who reforms and decides to use his talents to help the police as a detective. As far as I can ascertain, Cleek's adventures first appeared in print circa 1909–10; a series of his adventures appeared monthly in the "People’s Ideal Fiction Magazine" from August 1910 onwards, but it appears one or two stories featuring the character were published singly prior to that. A second (this time weekly) series appeared in Cassell's Saturday Journal in 1911–12, and such was the success of the character that many more were to follow before Hanshew's death in March 1914. The character actually survived the author's death, as it was continued by his wife Mary E. Hanshew: new stories continued to appear into the mid 1920s, usually jointly credited to "Mary E. Hanshew and Thomas W. Hanshew". Mary had also occasionally been credited as co-author during her husband's lifetime but this doesn't seem to have been consistent, so it's unclear quite how the partnership worked. Hanshew's use of female pseudonyms makes it difficult to be certain, but it's believed he produced 150 novels in his lifetime, plus dozens of short stories (mostly featuring Cleek). Cleek was a wildly popular character with the public, leading to a successful series of silent films starring the American actor Ben F. Wilson, beginning with 'The Vanishing Cracksman' (1913).The story narrated here actually forms the prologue to the 1910 volume 'Cleek, the Master Detective' and serves as an introduction to the character and how he came to join the forces of law and order after working against them. In that volume it is given the title "The Man Who Called Himself Hamilton Cleek", but it may have appeared separately in magazine publication under the title "The Man of the Forty Faces" (August 1910); however I've not been able to verify that it's definitely the same story. There are certainly records of other adventures (featuring Cleek as a detective) published in April 1910 and possibly earlier, so it may be that Hanshew decided to go back and write this "origin story" for his character. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
The Withered Arm | Thomas Hardy | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-04-14 | Rural superstitions, jealousy and betrayal, with a hint of witchcraft, combine in this tragic tale of a young wife and her husband's abandoned lover. An atypical incursion into the realms of gothic horror and the supernatural by one of the great late Victorian novelists. Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:18 Map of Hardy's WessexChapters:00:01:34 I. A Lorn Milkmaid00:07:08 II. The Young Wife00:16:38 III. A Vision00:26:57 IV. A Suggestion00:36:29 V. Conjuror Trendle00:43:19 VI. A Second Attempt00:50:16 VII. A Ride01:02:16 VIII. A Waterside Hermit01:09:35 IX. A Rencounter01:17:42 Credits, thanks and further listeningThomas Hardy (1840–1928) ranks as one of the greatest Victorian novelists, although he regarded himself primarily as a poet – and in the last thirty years of his life devoted himself almost exclusively to writing poetry after his last novel, 'Jude the Obscure' was published in 1895. He was born in Upper Bockhampton, Dorset, in 1840, the son of a stonemason and builder, also called Thomas. His mother Jemima educated young Thomas at home for some years, before he attended school in Bockhampton and Dorchester, where he thrived academically. He was apprenticed to a local architect at the age of 16, which led eventually to his studying at King's College London in his early 20s. However, he was never comfortable living in London and felt his social inferiority and rural origins keenly; as a result he became interested in social reform. In later life he expressed his "harmony of view" with the great liberal philosopher John Stuart Mill, whose work 'On Liberty' Hardy discovered at around this time.His career as a writer began in the late 1860s, although his first novel, 'The Poor Man and the Lady' (1867) failed to find a publisher as it was regarded as too "socialistic" and revolutionary. Hardy later destroyed the manuscript. His first two published novels 'Desperate Remedies' (1871) and 'Under the Greenwood Tree' originally appeared anonymously. It was his next two novels, 'A Pair of Blue Eyes' (1873) and 'Far from the Madding Crowd' (1874) which really began to make his name. 'A Pair of Blue Eyes', based on Hardy's courtship of Emma Gifford, who became his first wife, is credited with inventing the term "cliffhanger", as one chapter ends with one of the main characters literally hanging off a cliff... and readers of the serialised version in Tinsley's Magazine had to wait a month until the next issue to find out what happened next.All of Hardy's novels are set in a fictionalised version of his native Dorset: a map of the area, based on Hardy's own sketches, can be seen in this video at 00:01:18 Later novels include some of his best known works, 'The Return of the Native' (1878, set in the same part of Wessex as 'The Withered Arm'), 'The Mayor of Casterbridge' (1886), 'Tess of the D'Urbervilles' (1891) and 'Jude the Obscure' (1895). The last two in particular were highly controversial in their day, for their challenge to Victorian sexual morality. After Jude, Hardy turned almost exclusively to writing poetry – although he had composed poetry throughout his writing career, he only published his first volume in 1898. He was appointed to the Order of Merit in 1910, and twice nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature (1910 and 1921).Thomas Hardy married Emma Gifford (of 'Blue Eyes' fame) in 1874. They had no children and became gradually estranged, eventually living apart from the late 1890s, until her death in 1912. In 1914 he married Florence Dugdale, who had been his assistant since 1908. She survived him upon his death aged 87 in 1928.'The Withered Arm' first appeared in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine in January 1888, and was subsequently published in book form as part of the collection 'Wessex Tales' later the same year. The art on the title card is a detail from 'Woman on a path by a cottage', by John Atkinson Grimshaw (1836–1893). (Public domain; source Wikiart.org)Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
The Easter Egg | Saki (H. H. Munro) | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-04-06 | Lester Slaggby is indisputably a coward, much to the regret of his mother Lady Barbara, who takes pride in her "good fighting stock". But when events at an Easter parade take an unexpectedly sinister turn, Lester surprises himself by rising to the occasion... The story starts at 00:01:18 Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:18 The Story begins 00:12:05 Credits, thanks and further listeningSaki was the pen name of Hector Hugh Munro, one of the greatest masters of the short story form in English. He was born in 1870 in Burma, then part of British India, where his father was an Inspector General for the Imperial Police, but his life was affected by tragedy when he was just two years old: his mother Mary Munro was charged by a cow while visiting family back in England, and she died as a result of her injuries. Hector and his siblings were sent home to England, to live in Devon with his paternal grandmother and two maiden aunts. The aunts (Augusta and Charlotte) were apparently strict and austere and provided much material for future character studies in Saki's satires. After some 10 years or so, Hector eventually "escaped" to boarding school. In his early 20s he followed his father's footsteps and enrolled in the Indian Imperial Police, but was invalided home with fever after little over a year. Turning to writing to make his living, Munro began working as a journalist in the late 1890s. He wrote countless pieces for magazine and newspaper publication, and took up the pen name Saki around 1900. His always witty – and sometimes macabre – stories established his reputation as one of the greatest satirists of the Edwardian era. Despite being officially over-age for military service, turning 44 at the end of 1914, he enlisted in World War I, turning down the offer of a commission and serving as an ordinary trooper in the 2nd King Edward’s Horse regiment. Tragically, he was killed by a sniper while sheltering in a shell hole during the Battle of the Ancre in November 1916. His last words were reported to be “Put that bloody cigarette out”. His resting place is unknown.'The Easter Egg' first appeared in print in The Westminster Gazette, on 15th April 1911. It subsequently appeared in book form later that same year in 'The Chronicles of Clovis' (published in August 1911 by John Lane).Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
The Secret of the Growing Gold | Bram Stoker | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-03-30 | Two families, divided by generations of bitter rivalry and internecine quarrels, are bound together when Margret Delandre takes up with Geoffrey Brent. Their stormy relationship, however, is only the prelude to darker events... A short tale by the author of Dracula, dating from 1892. Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:12 The Story begins 00:36:56 Credits, thanks and further listeningAbraham "Bram" Stoker (1847–1912) was an Irish author, who created one of the most iconic characters in fiction, Dracula (1897). Born in Dublin, he had a lifelong interest in the theatre, and began his writing career as a drama critic for the Dublin Evening Mail (part-owned by the famous Irish ghost story writer Sheridan Le Fanu) in the 1870s. From c.1878 he worked as assistant and secretary to the great actor-manager Sir Henry Irving, at the Lyceum Theatre in London, a position he maintained for almost 27 years, until Irving's death in 1905.He married Florence Balcombe, a famous beauty of the day, in 1878. Oscar Wilde, a contemporary of Stoker's at Trinity College, Dublin, was a rival for Florence's hand, and the engagement strained the two authors' friendship, but they were eventually reconciled and Stoker visited Wilde in exile after his disgrace.Aside from Dracula, he published several novels and shorter fiction between 1890 and his death in 1912. His name will be forever associated with Dracula, but his other horror-themed novels include The Lady of the Shroud (1909) and The Lair of the White Worm (1911). Bram Stoker died after a series of stokes on 20 April 1912; there is speculation that he may also have suffered from syphilis as his death certificate records "Locomotor ataxia" as the immediate cause of death. He was 64 years old. His widow Florence was appointed his executrix and subsequently arranged for publication of a number of his uncollected short stories in book form. 'Dracula's Guest and Other Weird Stories' was published in 1914. 'The Secret of the Growing Gold' is included in that volume, although it had first appeared more than two decades earlier, printed in 'Black and White', a weekly review magazine, in January 1892.The image on the title card is a detail from the painting 'Golden Hair' (c.1900) by the English Pre-Raphaelite artist Frederic Shields (1833-1911).Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023.
Lost Hearts | A Ghost Story by M. R. James | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-03-21 | Newly orphaned Stephen Elliot arrives to live under the care of his much older cousin, Mr. Abney, at his house in Lincolnshire. But Stephen soon discovers that he's not the first young person to have been given a home at Aswarby Hall...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:12 The Story begins 00:29:01 Credits, thanks and further listeningMontague Rhodes James (1862–1936) was a medievalist and scholar, and is probably the best known and most celebrated English ghost story writer of the 20th century, although he actually began composing supernatural tales in the late Victorian era, beginning with 'Canon Alberic's Scrap-Book' (1894). He was born in Kent, but spent most of his childhood in Suffolk, a county which features prominently in many of his stories, including 'Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad'. Several of James's protagonists also reflect his own antiquarian interests, with academics and historians featuring regularly. James published four volumes of ghost stories in his lifetime: 'Ghost Stories of an Antiquary' (1904), 'More Ghost Stories of an Antiquary' (1911), 'A Thin Ghost and Others' (1919) and 'A Warning to the Curious and Other Stories' (1925).During a long academic career which encompassed several positions at King's College, Cambridge, and Eton College, M. R. James developed a tradition of reading his ghost stories aloud to a group of friends, most famously on Christmas eve, and the majority of his published stories were first heard in that setting. It's believed that James performed an early draft of 'Lost Hearts' to the 1893 or 1894 gathering; it subsequently appeared in its present form in the December 1895 issue of the Pall Mall Magazine. It was later published in book form as the second story in James's first anthology, 'Ghost Stories of an Antiquary' (1904).Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023.
A Race with the Sun | L. T. Meade and Clifford Halifax | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-03-08 | A rip-roaring and frankly slightly bonkers tale of derring-do from 1897; the shadow of war looms and foreign spies abound. Scientist and inventor Paul Gilchrist finds himself embroiled in a devilish plot devised by "fiends in human shape", culminating in a breathtaking race against time for his very survival...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The Story begins 01:01:32 Credits, thanks and further listeningL. T. Meade (Elizabeth Thomasina Meade Smith, 1844–1914) was a prolific author of mystery and suspense stories, dominating the periodicals of the 1890s and early 1900s. Born in County Cork, Ireland, she began writing fiction at the age of 17 and had a highly productive career, publishing almost 300 books in her lifetime. Meade married Alfred Toulmin Smith in London, in 1879, when she was in her mid-30s. She was an advocate of feminist causes, and as a solo writer became most associated with adventure stories for girls and young people, of which the most famous was ‘A World of Girls’, published in 1886. However, she was also much associated with mystery and suspense stories, and her name appeared frequently in the periodicals of the 1890s and early 1900s. Interestingly, in this genre she often wrote in collaboration with medical practitioners, who apparently supplied the scientific details which underpin many of the plots of her stories. Her most frequent collaborators were Robert Eustace (Dr. Eustace Robert Barton, 1854–1943) and Clifford Halifax. A short biographical sketch of Meade and a discussion of the identity of Robert Eustace can be found in the introduction to my video of 'The Mystery of the Felwyn Tunnel', available on this channel: youtu.be/mIdI03Zzms4"Clifford Halifax M.D." was the pen name of Dr Edgar Beaumont (1860–1921), who maintained a general practice in Crystal Palace, south London. He collaborated with L. T. Meade on several series of stories which ran in the Strand Magazine in the 1890s, most notably the 'Stories from the Diary of a Doctor' (1893–96), in which the character of Dr Clifford Halifax recounted episodes from his medical life, and 'The Adventures of a Man of Science' (1896–97), which featured the exploits of Paul Gilchrist, scientist and adventurer.According to his obituary in The Lancet, Clifford Halifax's main contribution to the partnership was to come up with the plot and basic storyline, while L. T. Meade did the writing. Based on 'A Race to the Sun', he clearly had quite an imagination!'A Race to the Sun' first appeared in The Strand Magazine in January 1897, with illustrations by J. Finnemore.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2019 & 2023.
Gleanings from the Wreckage | R. Austin Freeman | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-02-25 | On a late-night walk through London, Thorndyke and Jervis are witnesses to a small explosion and fire in a laboratory. A few days later, Thorndyke is consulted by the widow of a scientist killed in the blast, seeking help to satisfy the insurers that his death was an accident, and not suicide...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The Story begins 00:53:37 Credits, thanks and further listeningRichard Austin Freeman (1862–1943) was born in London and trained in medicine at the Middlesex Hospital. After a spell as a house surgeon, he joined the Colonial Service and spent some years working in Africa. He was invalided home with blackwater fever in 1891. Returning to London he worked as an ear, nose and throat specialist, as well as in general practice and, for a time, as Medical Officer at Holloway Prison. He began writing fiction in the early 1900s, initially under the pseudonym "Clifford Ashdown", including the Romney Pringle stories which were serialised in Cassell's Magazine in 1902. Five years later, under his own name, he wrote 'The Red Thumb Mark', the novel which introduced the character of Dr. John Thorndyke. Thorndyke is a self-described "medical jurispractitioner", having given up practice as a medical doctor to train in the law, and established himself as what is now known as a forensic scientist. He is accompanied in his investigations by his friend and colleague Dr. Christopher Jervis, who narrates the adventures. Of all the many "rivals" to Sherlock Holmes who appeared in fiction at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, the Thorndyke and Jervis partnership is perhaps the closest parallel to the world of Holmes and Watson. The similarities are underscored both by the original illustrators who depicted Thorndyke very much in the mould of Holmes and also by the casting of John Neville as Thorndyke in a 1971 television adaptation of one of his adventures (Neville played Holmes in the 1965 film 'A Study in Terror', as well as on stage in William Gillette's play). Making his first appearance four years after Holmes's 1903 retirement to Sussex to keep bees, Thorndyke takes on the mantle of Holmes for the next generation, and with his medico-legal training is well equipped for the modern scientific advances of the new century. He appeared in 21 novels and 40 short stories between 1907 and 1942.Freeman continued writing throughout his career, despite suffering the onset of Parkinson's disease in later life. He briefly paused his output at the start of the second world war in 1939 – before resuming writing in an air raid shelter in his garden. He died aged 81 at his home in Gravesend, Kent, in September 1943.The earliest verifiable publication of 'Gleanings from the Wreckage' appears to have been as part of 'The Magic Casket', a collection of short stories featuring Dr. Thorndyke, published in 1927. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023.
The Death Mask | A Ghost Story by H. D. Everett | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-02-14 | Tom Enderby has been left a widower in early middle age, and should be seen as highly eligible for a second marriage. But it would seem that his late wife is unhappy at the prospect of him moving on...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:22 The Story begins 00:29:44 Credits, thanks and further listeningHenrietta Dorothy Everett, nee Huskisson (1851–1923) was born in Gillingham, Kent. She married Isaac Edward Everett in 1869, when she was 18, but it was not until more than a quarter of a century later that she took up writing, at the age of 44. Between 1896 and 1920 she produced a number of highly popular books and short stories, including historical novels as well as works of fantasy and the supernatural, and nascent science fiction, exploring themes such as possession, vampirism and spiritualism. Regular listeners will notice that the title card for this story doesn't include the usual portrait of the author: I have not been able to find one on this occasion. Indeed, very little information is known about H. D. Everett's personal life and her name is little remembered today despite the popularity of her fiction with contemporary readers. For much of her career she published her novels under the pen name "Theo Douglas"; it was not until 1910 that her real identity became known, and she occasionally published later works under her own name while also continuing to use the Douglas pseudonym. She died in Derbyshire in 1923, at the age of 72. Her husband had pre-deceased her, but she was survived by at least one son, Isaac Arthur Huskisson Everett.'The Death-Mask' first appeared in 1920, the title story in 'The Death-Mask and Other Ghosts' a collection of short stories published under the name H. D. Everett. (Previous story collections had been published credited to "Theo Douglas".) M. R. James singled out the volume in his 1929 essay 'Some Remarks on Ghost Stories', noting that it contained "some excellently conceived stories". Despite this praise, the volume remained out of print for many decades until it was re-published in the 1990s.The title card image is a detail from an untitled 1897 painting by the Polish artist Władysław Ślewiński (1856–1918).Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
Ten Classic Railway Stories | A Bitesized Audio Compilation Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-02-03 | A selection of 10 classic stories set on the railway in the age of steam. This collection includes detective puzzles, ghost stories and other tales of mystery and suspense, ranging in date from 1866 to 1907. The stories are already available on the channel as individual uploads if you prefer to listen that way, although I've taken the opportunity while producing this anthology to remaster and re-edit some of the older recordings. Timestamps00:00:00 Introduction00:01:49 The Lost Special by Arthur Conan Doyle (1898)00:50:44 How He Cut His Stick by M. McDonnell Bodkin (1900)01:16:05 The Four-fifteen Express by Amelia B. Edwards (1866)02:23:07 The Tragedy on the London and Mid-Northern by Victor L. Whitechurch (1905)02:55:40 The Mystery of the Felwyn Tunnel by L. T. Meade & Robert Eustace (1897)03:46:09 The Mysterious Death on the Underground Railway by Emma Orczy (1901)04:32:31 The Affair of the German Dispatch Box by Victor L. Whitechurch (1905)05:00:22 The Unseen Hand by M. McDonnell Bodkin (1907)05:40:38 Sir Gilbert Murrell's Picture by Victor L. Whitechurch (1905)06:12:39 The Signalman by Charles Dickens (1866)06:39:49 Credits, thanks and further listening(Story teasers below)Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinThe Lost Special | 00:01:49 How could an entire train – engine, carriages, passengers and all – vanish from the face of the earth on a straight line of track between stations? The best brains in England, including the most celebrated amateur detective of the day, are baffled by the mystery...How He Cut His Stick | 00:50:44A classic "locked room mystery", involving an audacious and inexplicable theft from a locked carriage on a train travelling at 60 miles per hour. Dora Myrl, "the Lady Detective", investigates...The Four-fifteen Express | 01:16:05 On a grey and foggy December afternoon, a traveller finds himself sharing his private compartment on the four-fifteen express train out of London... The Tragedy on the London and Mid-Northern | 02:23:07 When an unknown man is found dead with a head wound, leaning out of the window of a locked first class railway compartment in which he was travelling alone, it at first appears to be a tragic accident. Thorpe Hazell, railway enthusiast and amateur detective, suspects there may be more to the case than meets the eye...The Mystery of the Felwyn Tunnel | 02:55:40John Bell is asked to investigate the mysterious death of a railway signal-man in Wales, close to the mouth of a lonely tunnel which has the reputation of being haunted. The police seem confident it's murder, and have a suspect in custody, but can Bell demonstrate that other forces are at play?The Mysterious Death on the Underground Railway | 03:46:09A lady travelling in a first class carriage of a London underground train, alongside several other passengers, is found dead at the end of the line. Could it be suicide, or a most ingenious murder? The Affair of the German Dispatch Box | 04:32:31 Thorpe Hazell is drawn into the world of international diplomacy, when the British Undersecretary for Foreign Affairs calls upon him to help recover a stolen document from a train en route for the continent...The Unseen Hand | 05:00:22 Paul Beck, the "rule of thumb detective", is called in to investigate the mysterious death of a man found dead in a locked railway compartment, his head crushed in by a violent blow. An accidental fall, or is another party involved? And does the pungent smell of asafoetida have anything to do with the mystery...?Sir Gilbert Murrell's Picture | 05:40:38 Thorpe Hazell investigates a baffling mystery concerning a goods truck which vanished from the middle of a moving train, while the carriages on either side remained in place. The valuable artwork on board the truck provides a clear motive for theft, but how on earth was it done?The Signalman | 06:12:39 One of the most celebrated of all Victorian ghost stories, written by one of the greatest nineteenth century English novelists, Charles Dickens (1812–1870). A lonely signal-man in his box is haunted by a mysterious figure who appears by the danger light at the mouth of a railway tunnel. It seems to be warning him of impending disaster, but the message is frustratingly unclear...Original recordings © Bitesized Audio 2019–22. This compilation © 2023.
The Missing Actress Sensation | A Max Carrados story by Ernest Bramah | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-01-24 | A young actress making her London debut in the west end becomes an overnight star after earning rave reviews on the opening night, even though she only plays a supporting role in the piece. But a few days later, her name is in the newspapers again for a very different reason. Inquiry agent Mr. Carlyle and his friend Max Carrados investigate...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The Story begins 01:09:15 Credits, thanks and further listeningIf you'd like to hear more stories featuring Max Carrados, I have a playlist in development, available here: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLi95qAoufCZLjwoLUZBvPAFemYFKiqB7zOr for a selection of other Victorian and Edwardian detective stories, do take a look at the "Rivals of Sherlock Holmes" playlist: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLi95qAoufCZL5tiXECltwXUI2QDDFrDHDAbout the author: Ernest Bramah (1868–1942) was born Ernest Bramah Smith, probably in or near Manchester, where he attended grammar school. An intensely private man, very little information is known about his personal life. His early career included a stint as assistant to Jerome K. Jerome; his first success as a writer came as a contributor of humorous sketches somewhat in the manner of Jerome, to newspapers and periodicals, and he later became editor of one of Jerome's magazines. As an author he is best remembered for creating two characters: Kai Lung, a Chinese storyteller who appeared in a number of humorous stories from 1900; and Max Carrados, the blind detective, created in 1913. He also wrote science fiction, and his 1907 novel 'What Might Have Been' (also known as 'The Secret of the League') is a dystopian story which was acknowledged by George Orwell as a major influence on his own 'Nineteen Eighty-four'. Orwell was also a great admirer of the Max Carrados stories, bracketing them with Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes and Freeman's Dr Thorndyke as "the only detective stories since Poe that are worth re-reading". The character of Carrados appeared in more than 25 short stories and novels between 1913 and 1934, and by the 1920s was more popular than Sherlock Holmes (whose later cases appeared alongside Carrados in The Strand Magazine). His blindness proves no obstacle to his detective skills; indeed his other senses are heightened and he regularly outwits criminals and fellow detectives alike. Ernest Bramah Smith died in June 1942, aged 74, in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset. He was survived by his wife Lucy Smith. ‘The Missing Actress Sensation’ first appeared in The News of the World, on 14th December 1913. It was subsequently published in book form in 1923 as part of the second volume of collected Carrados adventures, 'The Eyes of Max Carrados'. Some textual notes:Mr. Enniscorthy makes reference to offering a witness a "Bradbury"; Bradburys were the nickname given to special £1 notes issued by the British Treasury at the beginning of World War I in August 1914. The notes were issued as part of the war effort in an attempt to help the Treasury preserve its stock of gold bullion; they were known as "Bradburys" after Sir John Bradbury, the then Permanent Secretary to the Treasury, whose signature appeared on the notes. Intriguingly, this story first appeared in the News of the World in December 1913, some eight months prior to the war and the introduction of Bradburys, which indicates the text of the story was revised by Bramah after the original publication. The text read here is from the 1923 volume 'The Eyes of Max Carrados', the second collection of his adventures published in book form.There's a passing reference in the story to the Boadicea statue on the Thames Embankment. I've pronounced it as it was spelt in the published text, which was the predominant pronunciation at the time of the story, although it's now generally acknowledged that this spelling and pronunciation are incorrect due to a misreading of old manuscripts, and the name is now more commonly known (and pronounced) as Boudicca. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
The Phantom Luncheon | Saki (H. H. Munro) | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-01-17 | They say there's no such thing as a free lunch. When Sir James Drakmanton MP asks his wife to entertain some of his political supporters, she decides to demonstrate the truth behind this cliché... Another comic short by the Edwardian master satirist Saki. The story starts at 00:01:18 Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinSaki was the pen name of Hector Hugh Munro, one of the greatest masters of the short story form in English. He was born in 1870 in Burma, then part of British India, where his father was an Inspector General for the Imperial Police, but his life was affected by tragedy when he was just two years old: his mother Mary Munro was charged by a cow while visiting family back in England, and she died as a result of her injuries. Hector and his siblings were sent home to England, to live in Devon with his paternal grandmother and two maiden aunts. The aunts (Augusta and Charlotte) were apparently strict and austere and provided much material for future character studies in Saki's satires. After some 10 years or so, Hector eventually "escaped" to boarding school. In his early 20s he followed his father's footsteps and enrolled in the Indian Imperial Police, but was invalided home with fever after little over a year. Turning to writing to make his living, Munro began working as a journalist in the late 1890s. He wrote countless pieces for magazine and newspaper publication, and took up the pen name Saki around 1900. His always witty – and sometimes macabre – stories established his reputation as one of the greatest satirists of the Edwardian era. Despite being officially over-age for military service, turning 44 at the end of 1914, he enlisted in World War I, turning down the offer of a commission and serving as an ordinary trooper in the 2nd King Edward’s Horse regiment. Tragically, he was killed by a sniper while sheltering in a shell hole during the Battle of the Ancre in November 1916. His last words were reported to be “Put that bloody cigarette out”. His resting place is unknown.'The Phantom Luncheon' first appeared in print in the 'The Bystander' on 27th March 1912. It subsequently appeared in book form in 1919 as part of the posthumously-published collection 'The Toys of Peace and Other Papers'.A textual footnote: Lady Drakmanton's reference to "free food principles" early in this story is a reference to the Free Food League, founded in 1903 by a group of mainly Conservative parliamentarians to campaign for free trade. One of the League's members was Winston Churchill, then a young backbench Conservative MP, although he (along with some other FFL members) defected to the Liberal Party in 1904. The League gradually declined in significance after the Liberal Party won the election in 1905 and was essentially defunct by 1910, two years before this story first appeared.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023
The Robbery in Phillimore Terrace | Emma Orczy | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2023-01-07 | A daring double theft of diamonds, from the homes of two dealers who are near neighbours in Kensington, has baffled the police – especially when the prime suspect vanishes under their very noses. The Old Man in the Corner explains all to Polly at their latest tea-shop meeting...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 / £1 / €1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinTimestamps:00:00:00 Introduction00:01:01 The Story begins00:39:19 Credits, thanks and further listeningEmma (Emmushka) Orczy (1865–1947) was born Emma Magdolna Rozália Mária Jozefa Borbála Orczy de Orci, to an aristocratic family in Hungary. Her father was the composer Baron Félix Orczy de Orci, her mother Countess Emma Wass de Szentegyed et Cege, and her grandparents on both sides included senior politicians and royal councillors. The family fled their country estate in in Tarnaörs when Emma was two years old, following a local peasant uprising, and her childhood was spent travelling through Europe, including periods in Budapest, Paris and Brussels, before eventually settling in London when she was 14. Emma's early ambition was to be a painter and she attended art school, where she met her future husband Henry George Montagu MacLean Barstow. They married in 1894 and had one child, John, born in 1899. It was after John's birth that she took up writing and her first success was a series of detective stories submitted to the Royal Magazine in 1901, featuring the character of the Old Man in the Corner. The old man is an "armchair detective" who sits in the corner of a tea room and – while tying and untying knots in a piece of string – unravels unsolved mysteries which have baffled the police, for the benefit of his regular listener, Miss Polly Burton, a "lady journalist". He is not a conventional detective as he doesn't work with the police, and very often sympathises with the criminals, so that even after he has explained the mystery he doesn't alert the authorities. The stories are also notable for their indirect style of narration: while they are told in the third person, the majority of the words are actually narrated by the Old Man talking to Polly. After his 1901 debut the Old Man went on to feature in regular magazine stories through the early 1900s, and his adventures were collected in book form in three volumes: The Case of Miss Elliot (1905), The Old Man in the Corner (1909, but chronologically the first stories) and Unravelled Knots (1925). In 1903 Baroness Orczy created her most famous character, for which she is best remembered today: Sir Percy Blakeney, the Scarlet Pimpernel. This character established the idea of a dashing and daring figure who hides behind a meek disguise, so Orczy was in effect the originator of an enduring trope which was later followed by the creators of Superman, Batman and many others. She was very proud of her Pimpernel stories, to the exclusion of most of her other work: her memoirs, published just weeks before her death in 1947, are dominated by the character, whereas she barely mentions the Old Man in the Corner at all. 'The Robbery in Phillimore Terrace' first appeared in the Royal Magazine in June 1901. It later appeared in book form as part of the 1909 collection 'The Old Man in the Corner'. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023.
Christmas at Thompson Hall | Anthony Trollope | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-12-21 | Mr. and Mrs. Brown are trying to return from the south of France to spend Christmas at Mrs. Brown's old family home, Thompson Hall at Stratford-le-Bow. Mr. Brown's sore throat makes him a reluctant traveller, but Mrs. Brown will stop at nothing to make sure they reach their destination by Christmas morning...An original narration of a classic public domain text, performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinChapters/Timestamps:00:00:00 Introduction00:01:21 Chapter 1: Mrs. Brown's Success00:23:48 Chapter 2: Mrs. Brown's Failure00:39:15 Chapter 3: Mrs. Brown Attempts to Escape00:57:43 Chapter 4: Mrs. Brown Does Escape01:23:57 Chapter 5: Mrs. Brown at Thompson Hall01:42:40 Merry Christmas, thanks and further listeningAnthony Trollope (1815–1882) is now regarded as having secured a place as one of the great Victorian novelists, ranked alongside such contemporaries as Charles Dickens, George Eliot, Thomas Hardy, Wilkie Collins, William Thackeray and Mrs. Gaskell, although towards the end of his life his literary reputation fell and his work was somewhat overlooked until a critical reassessment in the mid-20th century. He was born in London, one of several children of Thomas Anthony Trollope, a barrister, and his wife Frances Milton Trollope, who was herself to become a successful and highly regarded novelist in the 1830s and 40s (her 1836 book 'Jonathan Jefferson Whitlaw' was a strongly anti-slavery novel which is said to have influenced Harriet Beecher Stowe in writing 'Uncle Tom's Cabin').Anthony stayed in London when his mother (and later his father) spent several years living in the United States; soon after their return to Europe his father's debts obliged the family to relocate to Belgium, and Anthony joined them there briefly before returning to England to take up a clerkship in the General Post Office, arranged by a family friend. He remained with the postal service for several years, including a stint in Ireland as a postal surveyor. He began writing while taking countless long train journeys around Ireland in the course of his official duties as a Post Office Inspector. During his Irish service he met and married his wife, Rose Heseltine (1821–1917). Many of his early novels were set in and about Ireland, although these received a mixed reception. Trollope was sent back to England in 1851, to take charge of the postal service in south west England and Wales, which again necessitated much travel. It was at this time that he conceived the "Barchester" novels which were to make his name, beginning with 'The Warden' (1855) and 'Barchester Towers' (1857). His seniority at the Post Office grew in parallel with his success as a novelist, and on being passed over for the role of Chief Secretary to the Postmaster General in the early 1860s he decided to resign and make his living as an author. He contributed fiction to the Cornhill Magazine, St Paul's Magazine and other periodicals, and also co-founded his own magazine, the Fortnightly Review, in 1865. Leaving public service meant he was now free to indulge his interest in politics; he became active in Liberal circles and at the 1868 general election he stood as the Liberal candidate for Parliament at Beverley, in the East Riding of Yorkshire. Although the Liberal Party won that election, bringing William Gladstone to power as prime minister for the first of his four terms, Trollope himself failed to gain his seat, being defeated by the Conservatives. The "Palliser" novels, his second great series of novels (after Barchester) reflect his interest in politics, government, the use of (and corruption by) power. Trollope travelled widely in the later years of his life, to the USA, Australia and South Africa, and published some travel writing as a result of his experiences. He died in London in 1882, and was buried in Kensal Green Cemetery. He was survived by his wife and two children. 'Christmas at Thompson Hall' was first published in 'The Graphic' Christmas number in December 1876.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022.
Count Magnus | A Ghost Story by M. R. James | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-12-20 | ‘Are you awake, Count Magnus? Are you asleep, Count Magnus?’ While travelling in Sweden, Mr. Wraxall becomes fascinated by the legend surrounding Count Magnus De la Gardie, a nobleman of evil memory. He soon regrets his curiosity...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:12 The Story begins 00:38:46 Credits, thanks and further listeningMontague Rhodes James (1862–1936) was a medievalist and scholar, and is probably the best known and most celebrated English ghost story writer of the 20th century, although he actually began composing supernatural tales in the late Victorian era, beginning with 'Canon Alberic's Scrap-Book' (1894). He was born in Kent, but spent most of his childhood in Suffolk, a county which features prominently in many of his stories, including 'Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad'. Several of James's protagonists also reflect his own antiquarian interests, with academics and historians featuring regularly. James published four volumes of ghost stories in his lifetime: 'Ghost Stories of an Antiquary' (1904), 'More Ghost Stories of an Antiquary' (1911), 'A Thin Ghost and Others' (1919) and 'A Warning to the Curious and Other Stories' (1925).During a long academic career which encompassed several positions at King's College, Cambridge, and Eton College, M. R. James developed a tradition of reading his ghost stories aloud to a group of friends, most famously on Christmas eve, and the majority of his published stories were first heard in that setting. 'Count Magnus' was apparently composed and read somewhere between 1900 and 1902; it was first published in 1904 as part of James's first anthology, 'Ghost Stories of an Antiquary'.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022.
The Unseen Hand | M. McDonnell Bodkin | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-12-09 | Paul Beck, the "rule of thumb detective", is called in to investigate the mysterious death of a man found dead in a locked railway compartment, his head crushed in by a violent blow. An accidental fall, or is another party involved? And does the pungent smell of asafoetida have anything to do with the mystery...?Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinTimestamps:00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The Story begins00:41:19 Credits, thanks and further listeningMatthias McDonnell Bodkin (1850–1933) was born in County Galway, Ireland, the second son of a doctor. Over the course of a long career he was a journalist, newspaper editor, barrister (QC during the reign of Victoria), county court Judge (for County Clare) and, for a brief period (1892–95), a Member of Parliament for North Roscommon, sitting in the House of Commons as an Irish Nationalist during Gladstone's fourth and final term as prime minister. Somehow alongside all this he managed to find time to write fiction, which he produced quite prolifically from the 1890s through to the late 1920s. In this capacity he created two popular "rivals of Sherlock Holmes": Paul Beck, "the rule of thumb detective", who made his debut in 1897, and Dora Myrl, "the lady detective", whose adventures appeared in 1900. He subsequently had the ingenious idea of having them meet and work together, get married and produce a son (Paul Beck junior) who became a detective in his own right, appearing in stories from 1911 onwards. His other fictional output included a trilogy of historical novels set at the time of the Irish Rebellion of 1798, one of which ('Lord Edward Fitzgerald', 1896) was dedicated to William Gladstone, as well as several other novels, both contemporary and historical. He also published plays, works of history and some political journalism.'The Unseen Hand' first appeared in the Royal Magazine in December 1907, as part of the serial entitled 'The Quests of Paul Beck' which ran monthly from March 1907 to February 1908.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022.
The Signalman | A Ghost Story by Charles Dickens | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-11-30 | One of the most celebrated of all Victorian ghost stories, written by one of the greatest nineteenth century English novelists, Charles Dickens (1812–1870). A lonely signal-man in his box is haunted by a mysterious figure who appears by the danger light at the mouth of a railway tunnel. It seems to be warning him of impending disaster, but the message is frustratingly unclear...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinChapters/Timestamps:00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The story begins00:38:12 Credits, thanks and further listeningCharles John Huffam Dickens (1812–1870), one of the most famous and celebrated novelists of the Victorian era, created some of the most memorable characters in world literature. He completed 14 full-length novels, including 'Oliver Twist', 'Great Expectations', 'Bleak House', 'Little Dorrit' and the semi-autobiographical 'David Copperfield', five novellas (including 'A Christmas Carol') and hundreds of short stories and essays. Much of his work is notable for biting social commentary on the plight of the poor, and sharp satire lampooning the rich and powerful. 'The Signalman' was first published in the 1866 Christmas edition of Dickens' own periodical 'All the Year Round', as part of the famous 'Mugby Junction' collection of railways stories by Dickens and a select number of collaborators, including Amelia B. Edwards and Hesba Stratton. Incidentally, Dickens had survived the Staplehurst rail crash of the previous year, and the experience took a toll on him which affected his health in the last few years of his life. Whether this inspired the story of the Signalman can only be conjectured, but he certainly showed a fascination for railway disasters in several stories - for example in his 1848 novel Dombey and Son. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2019.
Drawn Daggers | Catherine Louisa Pirkis | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-11-18 | A valuable diamond necklace disappears while its owner, a young heiress, is staying with the Hawke family, but for some reason she seems reluctant to report the loss to the police. Then Mr. Hawke receives the first in a series of cryptic anonymous drawings: could they be a warning? Loveday Brooke is asked to investigate...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinTimestamps:00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The Story begins00:53:58 Credits, thanks and further listeningCatherine Louisa Pirkis (1839–1910), often credited as C. L. Pirkis, was born Catherine Louisa Lyne to a middle class family in London. She became a prominent author of detective and mystery fiction in the final quarter of the 19th century, publishing 14 novels between 1877 and 1894, after which she gave up writing in order to focus on campaigning for animal rights. She co-founded, with her husband Frederick Edward Pirkis and some like-minded friends, the British National Canine Defence League, which still exists today under the name 'The Dogs Trust'. As a writer she is best remembered for her last published work, 'The Experiences of Loveday Brooke, Lady Detective', a series of adventures featuring the eponymous sleuth, almost certainly the first female detective in fiction, and the first to be created by a female author. An insight into contemporary attitudes to the revolutionary nature of the character may be seen in an 1893 review in the Glasgow Herald, which, after praising Brooke's insights and detective skill, added "We are just afraid Miss Brooke is too clever in catching criminals ever to catch a husband." Almost inevitably "Miss Brooke" became known as "The female Sherlock Holmes"; she certainly shared Holmes' eye for detail and ability to see past the obvious solution to find the truth behind the crime. Pirkis died after a long illness in October 1910, just two days before her husband also died; they were survived by their two children. 'Drawn Daggers' first appeared in June 1893 as part of 'The Experiences of Loveday Brooke, Lady Detective', a six-part series of stories which appeared in the Ludgate Monthly magazine from February to July 1893; the series was subsequently published in book form by Hutchinson in 1894. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022.
The Redhill Sisterhood | Catherine Louisa Pirkis | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-11-18 | Surrey police call in the services of 'Lady Detective' Loveday Brooke, to investigate the activities of a local order of nuns which they suspect may be a cover for a gang of country house burglars. The criminals are well organised, and Loveday finds herself hemmed in by spies as she attempts to thwart their nefarious plans...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinTimestamps:00:00:00 Introduction00:01:20 The Story begins00:58:49 Credits, thanks and further listeningCatherine Louisa Pirkis (1839–1910), often credited as C. L. Pirkis, was born Catherine Louisa Lyne to a middle class family in London. She became a prominent author of detective and mystery fiction in the final quarter of the 19th century, publishing 14 novels between 1877 and 1894, after which she gave up writing in order to focus on campaigning for animal rights. She co-founded, with her husband Frederick Edward Pirkis and some like-minded friends, the British National Canine Defence League, which still exists today under the name 'The Dogs Trust'. As a writer she is best remembered for her last published work, 'The Experiences of Loveday Brooke, Lady Detective', a series of adventures featuring the eponymous sleuth, almost certainly the first female detective in fiction, and the first to be created by a female author. An insight into contemporary attitudes to the revolutionary nature of the character may be seen in an 1893 review in the Glasgow Herald, which, after praising Brooke's insights and detective skill, added "We are just afraid Miss Brooke is too clever in catching criminals ever to catch a husband." Almost inevitably "Miss Brooke" became known as "The female Sherlock Holmes"; she certainly shared Holmes' eye for detail and ability to see past the obvious solution to find the truth behind the crime. Pirkis died after a long illness in October 1910, just two days before her husband also died; they were survived by their two children. 'The Redhill Sisterhood' first appeared in April 1893 as part of 'The Experiences of Loveday Brooke, Lady Detective', a six-part series of stories which appeared in the Ludgate Monthly magazine from February to July 1893; the series was subsequently published in book form by Hutchinson in 1894. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2021.
Walnut-Tree House | A Ghost Story by Charlotte Riddell | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-10-31 | Edgar Stainton returns to his native England, having made his fortune in the colonies, to take possession of Walnut-Tree House, an abandoned mansion inherited from a cousin who died in an asylum. Can he solve the mystery which surrounds the old house, which drove his relative out of his wits and which has led tenants and tradespeople alike to avoid the place at all costs...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinChapters/Timestamps:00:00:00 Introduction00:01:16 Chapter 1: The New Owner00:12:49 Chapter 2: The Child00:29:05 Chapter 3: Seeking for Information00:42:58 Chapter 4: Brother and Sister00:53:01 Chapter 5: The Next Afternoon01:01:37 Chapter 6: The Missing Will01:06:45 Credits, thanks and further listeningCharlotte Riddell (1832–1906), sometimes credited (in typically Victorian fashion) under her husband's name as "Mrs. J. H. Riddell", was born Charlotte Eliza Lawson Cowan in Carrickfergus, County Antrim, Ireland. She moved to London in 1855 and married Joseph Hadley Riddell, a civil engineer, two years later. She apparently turned to writing to make a living after her husband lost all his money, early in their marriage. Her early works were published under pseudonyms, as "R. V. M. Sparling" for 'Zuriel’s Grandchild' (1856), as "Rainey Hawthorne" for 'The Ruling Passion', and as "F. G. Trafford" for 'The Moors and the Fens' (both 1857); she continued using the Trafford alias until 1866. Recalling this period in an 1890 interview in The Pall Mall Gazette, Riddell said: “At that time I wrote under the nom de plume of ‘Trafford,’ for it was not considered quite the thing for a lady to write in her own name. My husband was much amused one day when a man told him that he knew Trafford the novelist well, and that he was a ‘very good sort of fellow, don’t you know?’ But though there were few ladies writing in those days it was not a bit easier to get one’s work accepted than now. All my publishers would look upon my writing as a joke at first.”In all she wrote 56 novels and short stories, of which several had a supernatural theme. Her best remembered shorter ghost stories include 'A Strange Christmas Game' and 'The Open Door'. She was also the co-proprietor and editor of the periodicals 'Home' and 'St. James's Magazine' in the 1860s and 70s. Her husband died suddenly in 1880; there were no children from their marriage, and from 1886 she "retired in seclusion" to Upper Halliford, Middlesex, until her death in September 1906. 'Walnut-Tree House' first appeared in The Illustrated London News on 28 December 1878. It was subsequently republished in book form as part of 'Weird Stories', a collection of Charlotte Riddell's shorter fiction, in 1882. The setting in Lambeth, south-east London, reflects her own knowledge of the area – she lived for a number of years at 75 South Lambeth Road in "an old-fashioned house" (sadly now demolished) and the opening of 'Walnut-Tree House' describes the area vividly with old mansions still standing while new streets and houses were rapidly built up around them. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022.
The Ghost Stories of M. R. James | A Bitesized Audio Anthology Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-10-21 | A selection of six classic tales by the early 20th century master of the ghost story, M. R. James. The stories are already available on the channel as individual uploads if you prefer to listen that way, although I've taken the opportunity while producing this anthology to remaster and re-edit some of the older recordings. Chapters:00:00:00 Introduction00:01:32 Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad (1903)00:55:07 The Treasure of Abbot Thomas (1904)01:45:58 The Stalls of Barchester Cathedral (1910)02:31:59 Mr. Humphreys and His Inheritance (1911)03:42:37 A View from a Hill (1925)04:33:20 A Warning to the Curious (1925)(Story teasers and more details below)Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinAbout the author: Montague Rhodes James (1862–1936) was a medievalist and scholar, and is probably the best known and most celebrated English ghost story writer of the 20th century, although he actually began composing supernatural tales in the late Victorian era, beginning with 'Canon Alberic's Scrap-Book' (1894). He was born in Kent, but spent most of his childhood in Suffolk, a county which features prominently in many of his stories, including 'Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad'. Several of James's protagonists also reflect his own antiquarian interests, with academics and historians featuring regularly. James published four volumes of ghost stories in his lifetime: 'Ghost Stories of an Antiquary' (1904), 'More Ghost Stories of an Antiquary' (1911), 'A Thin Ghost and Others' (1919) and 'A Warning to the Curious and Other Stories' (1925).During a long academic career which encompassed several positions at King's College, Cambridge, and Eton College, M. R. James developed a tradition of reading his ghost stories aloud to a group of friends, most famously on Christmas eve, and the majority of his published stories were first heard in that setting. Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad | 1903 | 00:01:32 Professor Parkins is not superstitious. So when he digs up an old whistle while investigating the site of some ancient ruins, he is not afraid to blow it. He would have been wiser to take heed of the cryptic inscriptions...The Treasure of Abbot Thomas | 1904 | 00:55:07 For centuries, clergy and scholars have puzzled over the whereabouts of the treasure hidden by Abbot Thomas of Steinfeld, until antiquarian Mr. Somerton discovers some stained glass which appears to hold the key to the mystery. He hastens to Germany to follow the clues amid the Abbey ruins... but has the Abbot set a trap for the unwary treasure seeker?The Stalls of Barchester Cathedral | 1910 | 01:45:58When Dr. Haynes is appointed Archdeacon of Barchester, his zeal and enthusiasm is in marked contrast with his elderly predecessor. But he has something on his conscience, and the grotesque carved figures in the choir stalls appear to seek retribution for his sins...Mr. Humphreys and His Inheritance | 1911 | 02:31:59 Mr. Humphreys unexpectedly inherits a country house and estate from an uncle he never met. On his arrival to take up residence he is charmed by the gardens – and intrigued by the overgrown maze, which has been locked up, with entry forbidden on the orders of his uncle, for more than 40 years...Note: this story contains a number of Latin tags and phrases, which James does not translate. I have made a glossary of them here:Dolebat se dolere non posse: Sorry that he could not feel sorryPenetrans ad interiora mortis: Penetrating to the interior of deathPrinceps tenebrarum: The Prince of DarknessQuid multa?: Need I say more?Secretum meum mihi et filiis domus meae: My secret for me and the sons of my houseUmbra mortis: The shadow of deathVallis filiorum Hinnom: Valley of the Sons of Hinnom at GehennaA View from a Hill | 1925 | 03:42:37When Mr Fanshawe visits his new friend, Squire Richards, he is entranced by the spectacular scenery and determines to explore the countryside. But the binoculars he borrows prove less than ideal for his purpose...A Warning to the Curious | 1925 | 04:33:20A visitor to Seaburgh is fascinated by the local legend of an Anglo-Saxon crown buried nearby, guarding against invaders. He follows the clues to see where they lead, but soon finds himself wishing he'd left well alone...Recordings © Bitesized Audio 2020–22.
The Cold Embrace | A Ghost Story by Mary Elizabeth Braddon | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-10-18 | An early work by one of the most popular authors of Victorian suspense, Mary Elizabeth Braddon, 'The Cold Embrace' is gothic tale of young love, betrayal and tragic consequences...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction 00:01:30 The Story begins 00:29:20 Credits, thanks and further listeningMary Elizabeth Braddon (1835–1915) was born in London. She was privately educated, although her childhood was disrupted by her parents' separation when she was five years old. Her older brother Edward emigrated aged 16, and later became Premier of Tasmania. She worked as an actress in her early 20s, and was successful enough to support her mother and herself, before turning to writing fiction. She had an early success with 'Lady Audley's Secret' (1862), one of the best known of the "sensation novels" which were hugely popular in the mid-Victorian era and she is most closely associated with that genre. It's the work for which she is best remembered today and has never been out of print. In addition, she also wrote a number of supernatural short stories, the best known of which include 'The Cold Embrace', 'At Chrighton Abbey' and 'The Shadow in the Corner' (also available to listen to on this channel). Braddon married John Maxwell (1824–1895), a publisher and property developer, in 1874, although they were in a relationship and living together for more than a decade prior to this. At the time they met in 1860, he had a wife who was confined to a mental asylum in Ireland. Braddon and Maxwell had six children together, including Fanny Margaret Maxwell, Gerald Melbourne Maxwell (who became an actor) and William Babington Maxwell, a successful novelist and playwright. The family lived in Richmond, Surrey, where a number of the streets are named after characters in her fiction (thanks to her property developer husband).'The Cold Embrace' is one of Braddon's earliest published stories, having first appeared in 'The Welcome Guest' in September 1860.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022.
Six Classic Ghost Stories | A Bitesized Audio Compilation Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-10-07 | A selection of six classic ghost stories, ranging in date from 1887 to 1921. The stories are already available on the channel as individual uploads if you prefer to listen that way, although I've taken the opportunity while producing this anthology to remaster and re-edit some of the older recordings. Story timestamps:00:00:00 Introduction00:01:33 Thurnley Abbey by Perceval Landon00:46:38 Man-size in Marble by Edith Nesbit 01:25:35 The Corpse Light by J. E. Preston-Muddock02:04:34 Mr. Mortimer's Diary by Amyas Northcote02:46:01 The Tomb of Sarah by F. G. Loring03:25:41 The Kit-Bag by Algernon Blackwood03:59:59 Credits, thanks and further listening(Story teasers and more details below)Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinThurnley Abbey | Perceval Landon | 1908 | 00:01:33 What should one do if one encounters a ghost? Speak to it, suggests John Broughton, new owner of Thurnley Abbey. During a Mediterranean crossing, Broughton's friend Alistair Colvin recounts to a fellow passenger his experience visiting Thurnley...Perceval Landon (1869–1927) was an English journalist and travel writer, little remembered today except for this one story. 'Thurnley Abbey' was first published in McClure's Magazine in 1907; however it was rewritten and published in Landon's 1908 collection, 'Raw Edges', and the revised version is the text which we know today.Man-size in Marble | Edith Nesbit | 1887 | 00:46:38 A Halloween ghost story: a young couple enjoy a life of bliss in their remote country cottage, and even make use of the local legends of "things that walk" to earn some money by writing. But when All Saint's Eve arrives, they find that one of the legends may not be simply an old wives' tale... Although best remembered today for her children's stories, including The Railway Children, Edith Nesbit (1858–1924) also wrote several novels and numerous short stories for adults, many of them with a horror or supernatural theme. The Corpse Light | J. E. Preston Muddock | 1899 | 01:25:35 The old and half-ruined windmill on a remote stretch of highroad has inevitably become the home of bats and owls – and, according to local legend, of something more fearsome than either... James Edward Preston Muddock (1843–1934) was an incredibly prolific author who published stories of horror and mystery under several pseudonyms, including as 'Dick Donovan', the name of his fictional detective. Although largely forgotten today, at his peak in the 1890s his stories rivalled those of Conan Doyle in popularity.Mr. Mortimer's Diary | Amyas Northcote | 1921 | 02:04:34 The strange behaviour of Mr. Roger Mortimer puzzled his friends and neighbours at the time, but the man himself and the peculiar circumstances of his demise have long been forgotten. When, after 25 years, his long-lost diary is discovered, the mystery can finally be explained...Amyas Northcote (1864–1923) was the youngest son of a senior politician of the Victorian era, Sir Stafford Northcote. Scarcely anything is known about his life and work; as an author he's only known to have published one book: a collection of stories entitled 'In Ghostly Company' (1921).The Tomb of Sarah | F. G. Loring | 1900 | 02:46:01During renovation of a west country church it becomes necessary to move one particular tomb, for the safety of the building. Unfortunately it happens to be the one tomb with an inscription warning against disturbing the occupant...Frederick George Loring (1869–1951) was an English naval officer and author of magazine journalism and short stories, of which this is the only one remembered today. He was born on the Isle of Wight, and followed family tradition by serving in the Navy, eventually retiring as Commander in 1909.The Kit-Bag | Algernon Blackwood | 1908 | 03:25:41Fresh from working on a gruesome murder trial, Johnson stays up late packing his borrowed kit-bag for a Christmas break. But he finds the memory of his recent case difficult to shake off – and he increasingly senses that a sinister presence has joined him in his lonely top-floor chambers...Algernon Blackwood (1869–1951) was an English author and journalist. In his youth he travelled widely and gained experience in a startling variety of professions, including hotel management, dairy farming, journalism and violin teaching.Recordings © Bitesized Audio 2019–22.
The Treasure of Abbot Thomas | A Ghost Story by M. R. James | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-09-28 | For centuries, clergy and scholars have puzzled over the whereabouts of the treasure hidden by Abbot Thomas of Steinfeld, until antiquarian Mr. Somerton discovers some stained glass which appears to hold the key to the mystery. He hastens to Germany to follow the clues amid the Abbey ruins... but has the Abbot set a trap for the unwary treasure seeker?Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction00:01:09 The Story begins 00:51:49 Credits, thanks and further listeningMontague Rhodes James (1862–1936) was a medievalist and scholar, and is probably the best known and most celebrated English ghost story writer of the 20th century, although he actually began composing supernatural tales in the late Victorian era, beginning with 'Canon Alberic's Scrap-Book' (1894). He was born in Kent, but spent most of his childhood in Suffolk, a county which features prominently in many of his stories, including 'Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad'. Several of James's protagonists also reflect his own antiquarian interests, with academics and historians featuring regularly. James published four volumes of ghost stories in his lifetime: 'Ghost Stories of an Antiquary' (1904), 'More Ghost Stories of an Antiquary' (1911), 'A Thin Ghost and Others' (1919) and 'A Warning to the Curious and Other Stories' (1925).During a long academic career which encompassed several positions at King's College, Cambridge, and Eton College, M. R. James developed a tradition of reading his ghost stories aloud to a group of friends, most famously on Christmas eve, and the majority of his published stories were first heard in that setting. 'The Treasure of Abbot Thomas' was first published in 1904 as the last story in James's first anthology 'Ghost Stories of an Antiquary'.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022.
The Corner House | A Ghost Story by Bernard Capes | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-09-16 | Two old acquaintances meet on Vauxhall Bridge on a damp and foggy night in November. For one of them, the encounter seems an eerie echo of a strange mystery surrounding his father, who was last seen on Vauxhall Bridge exactly 15 years earlier... Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction 00:01:07 The Story begins 00:40:27 Credits, thanks and further listeningBernard Capes (1854–1918) was born in London to a large family, one of eleven children (including an elder sister, Harriet Capes, who was a noted author of children's books). He began his writing career as a journalist and made countless contributions to popular magazines of the era, including the Illustrated London News, Pall Mall Magazine, The Idler, Cornhill Magazine, and Blackwood's. In 1889 he succeeded Clement Scott as editor of 'The Theatre', the leading magazine of the day for reviews and theatrical news, as well as sketches and stories.In the course of his career Capes published more than forty volumes of fiction, including romances and mysteries, as well as poetry and historical novels. After giving up journalism to become a full time author, his work rate was prodigious: he typically produced three or four novels a year in his heyday in the late 1890s/early 1900s. Alongside his longer fiction, he also penned a great number of short stories for magazines and periodicals. He's probably best remembered today for his ghost stories, thanks in great part to Hugh Lamb, who rescued them from obscurity in the 1970s and included several of them in his anthologies. Capes died on 2 November 1918 at the age of 64, a victim of the global influenza pandemic which began that year.'The Corner House' first appeared in a periodical entitled 'Short Stories' in November 1909, and was shortly after reprinted in The London Magazine (January 1910). It was subsequently published in book form as part of Capes's collection 'Bag and Baggage' in 1913.A historical note: the "dynamiters" mentioned in this story may refer to the Fenian bombing campaign which took place in London between 1881 and 1885, led by Irish republicans fighting for an independent Irish state. This period saw a great number of dynamite attacks on targets such as London Bridge and government and military buildings, and led to the establishment of the secret police unit known as the Special Branch. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022.
The Diver | An Uncanny Tale by A. J. Alan | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-09-06 | Alan has been told by the BBC that he must relate a true ghost story... and he obliges with an eerie and strange tale of second sight in a most unlikely setting: the swimming bath at his club.Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction 00:01:13 The Story begins 00:20:21 Credits, thanks and further listeningA. J. Alan was the pseudonym of the multi-talented Leslie Harrison Lambert (1883–1941), an English civil servant and intelligence officer whose readings of his own short stories on the fledgling BBC radio service in the early 1920s were incredibly popular with contemporary audiences. He was born in Nottingham, he went to school at Rugby, and initially trained as a surveyor. After working for a few years as a surveyor, he made quite a radical career change: in about 1906 he became a professional magician and was accepted into the Magic Circle. He also developed an interest in amateur radio in the years before the First World War which proved pivotal to his life and career: on the outbreak of war in August 1914 he volunteered to work at a coastguard station intercepting German wireless communications, and by the end of that year was working for the British Admiralty in Naval Intelligence Room 40, which was later to become part of what is now known as GCHQ. Lambert remained in the Intelligence service for the rest of his career. He still held a senior role at the outbreak of the Second World War, and transferred to Bletchley Park where he worked in Hut 8 (alongside Alan Turing amongst many others). However by this stage his health was declining, and he died in December 1941 at the age of 58.Shortly after the foundation of the BBC in 1922, Lambert contacted the Corporation offering to read his own short stories as radio broadcasts, and he began doing so in January 1924. He performed those readings under the pseudonym A. J. Alan, and his real identity was kept a closely-guarded secret, although apparently his voice was once recognised by an old school friend. There are various popular legends about Alan’s broadcasts: that he had his scripts pasted onto cardboard so that the paper wouldn’t make a noise on the microphone, and that he turned up in full evening dress to do the broadcasts, with his own candle in case the lights in the studio went out.Lambert, or Alan's, stories were distinctive in tone, with a highly conversational, off-the-cuff style which belied the intense preparation which went into every episode. The broadcasts were hugely popular with contemporary audiences and made "A. J. Alan" into a household name. The stories themselves are typically a blend of humour and suspense, often with a twist. The majority of them were subsequently published in contemporary newspaper or periodicals, as well as published in book form ('Good Evening, Everyone!' in 1928 and 'A. J. Alan's Second Book' in 1933).If you'd like to hear the voice of the man himself, a couple of his stories are available on the 'Stars of the Wireless' website, from gramophone recordings produced in the 1930s: rfwilmut.net/wireless/alan.html This recording © Bitesized Audio 2022
The Affair of the German Dispatch Box | Victor L. Whitechurch | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-08-31 | Amateur detective and railway enthusiast Thorpe Hazell is drawn into the world of international diplomacy, when the British Undersecretary for Foreign Affairs calls upon him to help recover a stolen document from a train en route for the continent...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction 00:00:59 The Story begins 00:29:03 Credits, thanks and further listeningThe Rev. Victor Lorenzo Whitechurch (1868–1933) was Church of England clergyman, who during his career served as Chaplain to the Bishop of Oxford and later became Rural Dean of Aylesbury. He is best remembered today for a series of rural crime novels which he published in the 1920s and early 30s, with titles such as 'Murder at the Pageant', 'Shot on the Downs' and 'Murder at the College'. However, much earlier in his career, while he was still a curate, he wrote a series of detective mysteries for magazine publication, which appeared in numerous periodicals in the 1890s and into the first decade of the 20th century. He invented the character of Thorpe Hazell, who is a specialist in railways, and solves mysteries and crimes committed in and around trains. Hazell is an eccentric character; in addition to his fascination with trains and the British railway network, he's a keen collector of antiquarian and rare books and is also notable for his unusual diet and health regimes. He is (relatively unusually for the era) a vegetarian, and several of the stories reference this, as well as his "digestive exercises" and other oddities which amuse and perplex his clients and associates. 'The Affair of the German Dispatch Box' first appeared in the December 1905 edition of The Royal Magazine. It was subsequently published in book form along with several other stories featuring Thorpe Hazell, under the title 'Thrilling Stories of the Railway', in 1912. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022.
The Former Passengers | A Ghost Story by B. M. Croker | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-08-23 | En route to his sister's wedding in Singapore, Lawrence has missed his boat and is obliged to beg passage on a cargo ship, The Wandering Star. It's unusually large and well-appointed for a cargo vessel, but it isn't until half way through the crossing that the 'Star's' sinister history is revealed... Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction 00:00:58 The Story begins 00:26:03 Credits, thanks & further listeningBithia Mary (or May) Croker (c.1848–1920), usually credited as B. M. Croker, is best remembered for her many novels and stories set in British India, as well as for bring a noted writer of ghost stories. She was born Bithia Mary Sheppard in Kilgefin, County Roscommon, Ireland, the daughter of clergyman and author the Rev. William Sheppard. She was educated in England and France and in her youth was a noted and skilled horsewoman. She married John Stokes Croker, an army officer, in 1871, and in 1877 moved with him to Madras, and later to Bengal. They lived in India for 14 years, during which time she began writing – apparently initially as something to keep her occupied, especially during the hot weather. Her first novel, 'Proper Pride', was written secretly and originally shared only with women friends, but she later rewrote it and had it published in England in 1882 under the gender-neutral initials B. M. Croker. Perhaps inevitably for the time, it was assumed to be written by a man, and was hugely successful. Croker went on to write 42 novels and several collections of short stories, a large number of which were set in India (such as 'The Road to Mandalay') or in Ireland ('Terence'). Her ghost stories were also very popular with contemporary readers; probably her best-known contributions to the genres are 'Number Ninety', a classic haunted house story, and 'To Let' (1893), also set in India, which has appeared in a number of anthologies including the Oxford Book of Victorian Ghost Stories. Upon her husband's retirement in 1892, the couple moved to County Wicklow in Ireland, and then later to England, where John Croker died in Kent in 1911. Bithia Croker died in London in October 1920, survived by her only child, Eileen.'The Former Passengers' was first published in Croker's 1893 collection, 'To Let, and Other Ghost Stories'. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022.
Miss Bracegirdle Does Her Duty | Stacy Aumonier | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-08-10 | Millicent Bracegirdle has led a sheltered life, the unmarried sister of a rural clergyman. When she is obliged to travel abroad for the first time, to France, a trivial mistake in her hotel has unfortunate consequences, placing her in an extremely compromising situation...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction and background notes, written and read by Simon Stanhope00:00:53 The Story begins 00:46:21 Credits and thanksStacy Aumonier (1877–1928) was an artist, actor, essayist and author, best known for his highly regarded short stories. He was described by his contemporary John Galsworthy as "one of the best short-story writers of all time". He was born in London into an artistic family of Hugenot descent, his father William Aumonier being a well-known architectural sculptor and his uncle James Aumonier a celebrated landscape painter. After finishing school at Cranleigh in Surrey, Stacy initially followed in their footsteps as a visual artist, exhibiting paintings at the Royal Academy on a number of occasions in the early 1900s. Stacy married Gertrude Peppercorn, a well-known concert pianist, in 1907, and it was after his marriage that he began to develop a new artistic career as a writer and performer of his own sketches. His stage performances were incredibly popular, and when he was called up for service in World War I (at the relatively late age of 40, in 1917) he gave his occupation as "Actor and writer". He was soon to become extremly acclaimed in the latter field, publishing six novels and volumes of essays and sketches. But it was his short stories – about 90 in all, published in numerous contemporary magazines and periodicals between 1915 and 1929 – that earned him his highest praise, and on which his reputation really rests today. His style is most often compared to the 19th century French author Guy de Maupassant. Aumonier began to suffer from tuberculosis in the mid-1920s, when he was in his late 40s, and spent the last few years of his life in sanatoria in England and Europe. He died at a sanatorium in Geneva in December 1928, aged just 51. He was survived by his wife, their son Timothy (born 1921), and his stories, which his friend Galsworthy wrote at the time would ensure that "he will outlive nearly all the writers of his day."'Miss Bracegirdle Does Her Duty' was first published in The Strand Magazine in September 1922, and appeared in book form the following year in a volume of Aumonier's collected stories entitled 'Miss Bracegirdle and Other Stories'. The story was adapted for television as a 30 minute episode of 'Alfred Hitchcock Presents' in 1958.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022.
A Selection from Saki | H. H. Munro | A Bitesized Audio Production Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-08-03 | A collection of seven classic tales by the Edwardian master of the macabre, Saki. See below for details and timestamps. As Saki's stories are typically very short, I've put together this compilation featuring four stories already available on the channel to listen to individually, plus three brand new recordings.00:00:00 Introduction00:01:04 The Open Window00:10:14 The Lumber Room00:25:40 The Hounds of Fate00:45:32 Tobermory01:06:03 The Story-Teller01:19:53 Sredni Vashtar01:34:03 The Music on the Hill01:50:49 Credits and thanks(Story teasers and more details below)Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinSaki was the pen name of Hector Hugh Munro, one of the greatest masters of the short story form in English. He was born in 1870 in Burma, then part of British India, where his father was an Inspector General for the Imperial Police, but his life was affected by tragedy when he was just two years old: his mother Mary Munro was charged by a cow while visiting family back in England, and she died as a result of her injuries. Hector and his siblings were sent home to England, to live in Devon with his paternal grandmother and two maiden aunts. The aunts (Augusta and Charlotte) were apparently strict and austere and provided much material for future character studies in Saki's stories, notably ‘The Lumber Room’ and ‘Sredni Vashtar’, which both feature in this compilation. Hector eventually "escaped" to boarding school. In his early 20s he followed his father's footsteps and enrolled in the Indian Imperial Police, but was invalided home with fever after little over a year. Turning to writing to make his living, Munro began working as a journalist in the late 1890s. He wrote countless pieces for magazine and newspaper publication, and took up the pen name Saki around 1900. His always witty – and sometimes macabre – stories established his reputation as one of the greatest satirists of the Edwardian era. Despite being officially over-age for military service, turning 44 at the end of 1914, he enlisted in World War I, turning down the offer of a commission and serving as an ordinary trooper in the 2nd King Edward’s Horse regiment. Tragically, he was killed by a sniper while sheltering in a shell hole during the Battle of the Ancre in November 1916. His last words were reported to be “Put that bloody cigarette out”. His resting place is unknown.The Open Window | 00:01:02Framton Nuttell, a nervous and neurotic young man on a rest-cure in the country, visits his neighbour Mrs. Sappleton. Her 15 year old niece, Vera, entertains him by explaining the sinister reason that the French windows are kept open every night...The Lumber Room | 00:10:14As punishment for bad behaviour at the breakfast table, Nicholas is excluded from a family outing as well as forbidden from playing in the gooseberry garden. But he soon manages to turn the situation to his advantage, allowing him to explore a hitherto forbidden room at the top of the house...The Hounds of Fate | 00:25:37Martin Stoner is homeless, penniless and reaching the end of his tether, when Fate does him an unexpected good turn and he finds refuge under extraordinary circumstances. But have the Hounds of Fate truly relented, or are they simply biding their time?Tobermory | 00:45:32 Lady Blemley has invited clever Mr. Cornelius Appin to join her weekend party in the hope that he might contribute towards the entertainment. She finds he delivers rather more than she bargained for...The Story-Teller | 01:06:03 A long train journey on a hot day is not an ideal environment for bored children. Luckily one of their fellow passengers, a stranger, knows how to keep them entertained...Sredni Vashtar | 01:19:51Sickly 10-year old Conradin lives under the "care" of his older cousin and guardian, Mrs De Ropp, his only escape a vivid imagination which transforms a neglected garden shed into a cathedral in which he worships at the shrine of a polecat-ferret...The Music on the Hill | 01:34:01 Despite her name, Sylvia doesn't know or understand the countryside. She only knows she'd like to live there. But when she and her husband Mortimer go to live at Yessney, her satisfaction at "settling him down" doesn't last long...Recordings © Bitesized Audio 2020–22
The Wood of the Dead | Algernon Blackwood | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-07-24 | A traveller on a walking tour in the south west of England takes his lunch at a lonely country inn, where he encounters a strange old rustic and hears the local legend of the Wood of the Dead...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction 00:01:10 The Story begins 00:38:52 Credits and thanksAlgernon Blackwood (1869–1951) was an English author and journalist best remembered for his "weird tales" and ghost stories. He was born in Kent and went to school at Wellington College in Berkshire. In his youth he travelled widely, in particular in North America, and gained experience in a startling variety of professions, including hotel management and dairy farming in Canada, as well as newspaper journalism and violin teaching in New York City. He contributed short stories and other pieces of journalism to a number of publications on both sides of the Atlantic; his first short story, 'A Mysterious House' was published in The periodical 'Belgravia' in July 1889. Blackwood settled back in the UK in the first decade of the 20th century and his first collection of supernatural fiction, 'The Empty House and Other Ghost Stories' was published in 1906. He went on to write many more, as well as 14 novels and a number of children's books. He also found success as a playwright, often as adaptor or co-author, most famously 'The Starlight Express' (1915), an adaptation of his own children's story with Violet Peam. His short ghost stories and novellas remain very highly regarded today: amongst the best-known are 'The Willows' (1907), 'The Wendigo' (1910), as well as a short series featuring the supernatural detective John Silence (1908).'The Wood of the Dead' first appeared in Blackwood's 1906 collection 'The Empty House and Other Ghost Stories', and has been much anthologised ever since.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022
The Secret of Dunstans Tower | A Max Carrados story by Ernest Bramah | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-07-13 | Max Carrados, the blind detective, is asked by an old school friend to investigate the case of the Aynosfordes, who are apparently haunted by a strange and inexplicable manifestation on the stairs in their ancient family seat, Dunstan's Tower...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction and background notes, written and read by Simon Stanhope00:04:09 The Story begins 01:06:04 Credits and thanksIf you'd like to hear more stories featuring Max Carrados, I have a playlist in development, available here: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLi95qAoufCZLjwoLUZBvPAFemYFKiqB7zOr for a selection of other Victorian and Edwardian detective stories, do take a look at the "Rivals of Sherlock Holmes" playlist: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLi95qAoufCZL5tiXECltwXUI2QDDFrDHDAbout the author: Ernest Bramah (1868–1942) was born Ernest Bramah Smith, probably in or near Manchester, where he attended grammar school. An intensely private man, very little information is known about his personal life. His early career included a stint as assistant to Jerome K. Jerome; his first success as a writer came as a contributor of humorous sketches somewhat in the manner of Jerome, to newspapers and periodicals, and he later became editor of one of Jerome's magazines. As an author he is best remembered for creating two characters: Kai Lung, a Chinese storyteller who appeared in a number of humorous stories from 1900; and Max Carrados, the blind detective, created in 1913. He also wrote science fiction, and his 1907 novel 'What Might Have Been' (also known as 'The Secret of the League') is a dystopian story which was acknowledged by George Orwell as a major influence on his own 'Nineteen Eighty-four'. Orwell was also a great admirer of the Max Carrados stories, bracketing them with Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes and Freeman's Dr Thorndyke as "the only detective stories since Poe that are worth re-reading". The character of Carrados appeared in more than 25 short stories and novels between 1913 and 1934, and by the 1920s was more popular than Sherlock Holmes (whose later cases appeared alongside Carrados in The Strand Magazine). His blindness proves no obstacle to his detective skills; indeed his other senses are heightened and he regularly outwits criminals and fellow detectives alike. Ernest Bramah Smith died in June 1942, aged 74, in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset. He was survived by his wife Lucy Smith. ‘The Secret of Dunstan’s Tower’ first appeared in two parts in The News of the World, on 2nd and 9th November 1913. It was subsequently published in book form as part of the compilation volume 'The Eyes of Max Carrados' in 1923.Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022
The Mystery of the Felwyn Tunnel | L. T. Meade and Robert Eustace | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-07-01 | John Bell is summoned from his London laboratory to investigate the mysterious death of a railway signal-man in Wales, close to the mouth of a lonely tunnel which has the reputation of being haunted. The police seem confident it's murder, and have a suspect in custody, but can Bell demonstrate that other forces are at play?Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction and background notes, written and read by Simon Stanhope00:03:38 The Story begins 00:54:16 Credits and thanksL. T. Meade (Elizabeth Thomasina Meade Smith, 1844–1914) was a prolific author of mystery and suspense stories, dominating the periodicals of the 1880s and 90s. She often wrote in collaboration with medical practitioners, who apparently supplied the scientific details which underpin many of her plots; first with Dr. Clifford Halifax, and later with Robert Eustace (believed to be the pen name of Dr. Eustace Robert Barton, 1854–1943). Robert Eustace is probably best remembered today for his much later collaboration with Dorothy L. Sayers on her 1930 novel 'The Documents in the Case'.Meade and Eustace created a number of recurring characters, including John Bell, "professional exposer of ghosts, and one who can clear away the mysteries of most haunted houses" – making him in effect a more sceptical counterpart to William Hope Hodgson's Carnacki, the Ghost Finder (who first appeared in print a decade or so later). Bell featured in a series of stories in Cassell’s Magazine in 1897, which were later published in book form under the title 'A Master of Mysteries' in 1898. The Mystery of the Felwyn Tunnel first appeared in the August 1897 issue of Cassell's Magazine. Other stories from this series are available to listen via this playlist: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLi95qAoufCZLC2ixFiWF3flPkm1JhyCnJRecording © Bitesized Audio 2022
Classic Summer Ghost Stories | M. R. James & others | A Bitesized Audio Production Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-06-21 | A few listeners have requested that I upload longer stories. For various reasons that's not practical with my current workload, but I thought this anthology of some of my older uploads (recorded between 2019 and 2021) may appeal to those of you who'd like a longer listen. The stories are already available on the channel as individual uploads if you prefer to listen that way, although I've taken the opportunity to remaster and re-edit the older recordings. Story timestamps:00:00:00 Introduction00:00:30 A View from a Hill by M. R. James (1925)00:51:12 The Upper Berth by F. Marion Crawford (1886)01:48:47 The Sand-walker by Fergus Hume (1906)02:34:42 Mr. Humphreys and His Inheritance by M. R. James (1911)03:44:50 Credits and thanks(Story teasers and more details below)If you enjoyed this compilation, you may like to listen to more summer themed ghost stories in Volume 2, including 'The Room in the Tower' and 'Count Magnus', available here: youtu.be/qt97r9fYx4ANarrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/joinA View from a Hill | M. R. James | 1925 | 00:00:30When Mr Fanshawe visits his new friend, Squire Richards, he is entranced by the spectacular scenery and determines to explore the countryside. But the binoculars he borrows prove less than ideal for his purpose...The Upper Berth | F. Marion Crawford | 1886 | 00:51:12On a well-appointed transatlantic steamer, the stateroom numbered 105 has acquired a somewhat dubious reputation. Mr. Brisbane, a seasoned seafarer, is determined to get to the bottom of the mystery surrounding his cabin and his elusive room-mate... The Sand-walker | Fergus Hume | 1906 | 01:48:47Whatever you do, don’t go on to the beaches at dusk, or the Sand-walker will come to your window at night. Such is the sinister warning given to the new lodger at the Beach Farm, a lonely house on the North Sea coast of England. But who, or what, is the Sand-walker?Mr. Humphreys and His Inheritance | M. R. James | 1911 | 02:34:42When Mr Humphreys unexpectedly inherits a country house and estate from an uncle he never met, he is charmed by the gardens – and intrigued by the overgrown maze, which has been locked up, with entry forbidden on the orders of his uncle, for more than 40 years...Recordings © Bitesized Audio 2019-22
The Underground Ghost | John Berwick Harwood | A Bitesized Audiobook Bitesized Audio Classics 2022-06-10 | A tourist exploring one of Cheshire's famous salt mines becomes separated from the rest of his party and loses himself in the maze of dark tunnels...Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me:* Occasional/one-off support via Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio* Monthly support on Patreon: patreon.com/bitesizedaudio* Visit my Bandcamp page to hear more of my performances of classic stories, and you can purchase and download high quality audio files to listen offline: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com * Become a Bitesized Audio Classics member on YouTube, from $1 per month with various benefits:youtube.com/c/BitesizedAudioClassics/join00:00:00 Introduction and background notes, written and read by Simon Stanhope00:02:12 The Story begins 00:47:15 Credits and thanksThe setting for this story is a salt mine in Cheshire, north west England. Cheshire was then, and still is today, a leading centre for rock salt mining in Britain. In the 19th century, the working mines were also a notable tourist attraction. One of the largest mines at the time, the Adelaide Mine near Northwich, covered an excavated area of 15 acres. At the foot of the shaft was a huge open cavern hewn out of rock salt, the roof held up by vast pillars of salt. It was known locally as the Crystal Ballroom as dances and public entertainments were held there, and the lights reflecting from the walls of rock salt was said to be spectacular. The Adelaide Mine closed in 1928, after a flood caused the salt pillars to dissolve, leading the ground above to collapse. The largest working salt mine in Cheshire today is at Winsford, but sadly they no longer offer tours to members of the public. Since the early 2000s the older parts of the mine have been used for document storage, and millions of assets and documents are now stored there, including some of the UK's national archives. There are very few verifiable biographical details available about John Berwick Harwood (c.1828–c.1899), which is the more surprising given that he was a relatively prolific author in the mid Victorian era. Between 1850 and 1890 he published about 20 novels, with titles such as 'The Serf-Sisters', 'Plain John Orpington', and 'Miss Jane, the Bishop's Daughter', as well as several short stories, generally with a theme of sensation, mystery or suspense. Part of the uncertainty about the exact number of works credited to him stems from the fact that many of his stories were published anonymously in magazines, as was very common at the time. 'The Underground Ghost' first appeared anonymously in the Christmas 1864 edition of Chambers Journal, and subsequently in the 1866 volume 'Major Peter', a collection of Harwood's stories published under his own name. Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022.
