Told After Supper, Jerome K. Jerome
Told After Supper, Jerome K. Jerome
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Told After Supper

Author: Jerome K. Jerome

Narrator: Robert Bethune, Susie Berneis

Unabridged: 1 hr 16 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 12/20/2007


Synopsis

There's a long tradition of English Christmas stories, sometimes serious, sometimes humorous, often revolving around ghosts and apparitions. Dickens drew on it in a serious vein in A Christmas Carol; here Jerome K. Jerome tells hilarious stories from around an English Christmas fireside.

A few selected Christmas poems and stories rounds out the program, including the classic story of the Nativity from the Bible.

Told After Supper, by Jerome K. Jerome

First of all, there's a hilarious 19th-century piece you've probably never heard of, called Told After Supper, by Jerome K. Jerome. It's a wonderful spoof of the grand old English tradition of telling ghost stories at Christmas--a tradition Charles Dickens made fine use of in A Christmas Carol and other stories. Only in Jerome's work, everything goes hilariously wrong, and the narrator of the story even winds up wandering around on the streets drunk as a lord, somewhat incompletely dressed!

"Christmas Trees", by Robert Frost.

In this early poem, we hear Frost's dry, matter-of-fact New England voice making "a simple calculation" about "Christmas trees I didn't know I had."

"Mistletoe", by Walter de la Mare.

A dreamlike experience of a gentle touch from a special person late in the night on Christmas is as fine a piece of dreamland as one could wish.

"Ring Out!", by Alfred Lord Tennyson.

A passionate appeal that the new year may be better than the old.

"The Three Kings", by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

The majesty and indeed the worldly wisdom of the three who came to give great gifts to the infant in the manger has never been better expressed.

Luke 2:1-20 (King James version)

In the beautiful language of the King James Bible--the only successful contribution to literature ever made by a committee--we hear not only how a babe was born, but how his mother came to believe great things of him.

About Jerome K. Jerome

Jerome K. Jerome (1859–1927), an English novelist, playwright, and actor, is best known as a humorist. In his writing, he was able to explore sensitive issues regarding human emotions through humor and light-hearted narrations.

Born in Walsall, Staffordshire, Jerome was brought up in the East End of London in relative poverty. He left school at fourteen and worked variously as a clerk, a hack journalist, an actor, and a schoolmaster. His first book, On the Stage and Off, was published in 1885. This was followed by numerous plays, books, and magazine articles, but he is best known for Three Men in a Boat. In 1927, one year after writing his autobiography My Life and Times, he was made a Freeman of the Borough of Walsall.

Though a relaxed, urbane man, Jerome was a relentless explorer of new ideas and experiences. He travelled widely throughout Europe, was a pioneer of skiing in the Alps, and visited Russia and America several times. He was a prolific writer whose work has been translated into many foreign languages.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Pramod

And not only do the ghosts themselves always walk on Christmas Eve, but live people always sit and talk about them on Christmas Eve. Whenever five or six English-speaking people meet round a fire on Christmas Eve, they start telling each other ghost stories. Nothing satisfies us on Christmas Eve but......more

Goodreads review by Mita

Ho un nipotino, 7 anni, che adora le storie di fantasmi. Ogni volta che resta di sera a casa mia, vuole che accenda il fuoco, poi spenge tutte le luci, dispone plaid e cuscini per terra tra tavolini e poltrone a formare una nicchia. Crea l'atmosfera insomma! E a questo punto vuole che mi metta a sed......more

«Era la vigilia di Natale.... Il fantasma inglese medio adora profetizzare le sventure.» England, one thousand eight hundred and ninety-one... maybe... (1) È la vigilia di Natale. Il narratore si trova a casa di suo zio John, al 47 di Laburnham Grove, a Tooting. Nel salotto debolmente illuminato........more