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  • Alison Larkin Presents: The Happy Prince and Other Stories

  • By: Oscar Wilde
  • Narrated by: Simon Jones
  • Length: 7 hrs and 30 mins
  • 4.0 out of 5 stars (2 ratings)
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Alison Larkin Presents: The Happy Prince and Other Stories

By: Oscar Wilde
Narrated by: Simon Jones
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Summary

B.P. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award, December 2020

Golden Voice narrator Simon Jones perfectly narrates these sweet, tender fairy stories about princes, giants, nightingales, and roses. The collection begins with the timeless story of the Happy Prince, a young nobleman who in life sought only pleasure but in death, as a gold-encrusted statue, provides help to those in need.

Currently starring in the HBO TV series The Gilded Age, Simon Jones’ film and theater credits run to multiple pages, from Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life to playing King George in Downton Abbey (the movie) and Arthur Dent in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Simon Jones recently won an AudioFile Earphones award for his narration of Right Ho, Jeeves by P. G. Wodehouse, also for Alison Larkin Presents.

Story Order: "The Happy Prince", "The Selfish Giant", "The Remarkable Rocket", "The Nightingale and the Rose", "The Young King", "The Birthday of the Infanta", "The Star Child", "The Fisherman and His Soul", "The Devoted Friend", "The Canterville Ghost", "Lord Arther Saville’s Crime".

The bonus story in this collection, exclusively for Audible, is "The Model Millionaire".

“Alison Larkin Presents classics are always delightful because they are so easy to listen to. Choosing Simon Jones to narrate Oscar Wilde was an inspired idea. Listeners will be enchanted.” (Michael Gates Gill)

Public Domain (P)2020 Alison Larkin Presents

Critic reviews

"With a gentleman's grace and a finely tuned ear for character voices, narrator Simon Jones does a wonderful job bringing to life this collection of children's fairy tales by one of the English language's greatest wits. Expanding on the original five stories, first published in 1888, this collection adds seven other gems, including the beguiling 'Canterville Ghost', which gives Jones a chance to exercise a few of his comic American accents. Although written for children, Oscar Wilde's unique twists on children's literature are a little edgier, a bit more playful, a trifle wiser, and a lot more fun than your average fairy-tale fare. And with Simon Jones at the helm, the whole production is nothing less than enchanting." (AudioFile Magazine, December, 2020) 

What listeners say about Alison Larkin Presents: The Happy Prince and Other Stories

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    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Good for children of older years

I was given this audiobook by audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

Very wordy tales, prettily told but a little lacking for my age. I think these would be great for children of younger years though and for that I can't fault them

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

"Dead hobby horses dragged solemnly away..."

It is more than six decades since I fell in love with the works of Oscar Wilde, reading almost all that I could, including the biography by his son. But I was a fickle child, distaining the literature seemingly aimed more at children. So, despite adoring, and always shamelessly crying at the end of every reading of The Happy Prince, this book was my first introduction to several of these dazzling stories, so hung about with meals of description and glitter, like baubles on the Christmas tree. So, New to me was The Remarkable Rocket (chapter 4), The Young King (ch.6), Birthday of the Infants (ch.7), The Star Child (ch.8), The Fisherman and His Soul (chapter 9), and the bonus story, The Model Millionaire: A Note of Admiration (ch.25).
Also included in this fine edition are, of course, The Happy Prince (ch.2), The Selfish Giant (ch .3), The Nightingale and the Rose (ch.5), The Devoted Friend (ch.11), and the two longer stories The Centerville Ghost (ch.12), and Lord Arthur Saville's Crime (ch.19).

This excellent audible edition is an Alison Larkin Presents volume, narrated beautifully by Simon Jones, his well modulated voice conveying emotion as well as being clear and giving individual voice to the protagonists.
Everyone should enjoy this book, young and old. It is magical, warm, funny, sad and eternally youthful. My thanks to the rights holder who, at my request, freely gifted me with a complimentary of via Audiobook Boom. Absolutely delicious.

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