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Thursday, March 30, 2006

Librivox Villette

LibriVox- "acoustical liberation of books in the public domain." The site publishes audio books in the public domain, recorded by volunteers. Thanks to Heather, a co-ordinator for writing in to tell us about Villette, the first collaborative LibriVox Bronte work. There are no finished Bronte works yet although Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights are being recited by two people attempting solo recordings. Most pressingly, under 20% of the chapters are claimed as of yet and they still need volunteers to recite chapters.

Aw, no Vanity Fair? ... Well, I do think that book just might kill anyone attempting a solo recitation.

A friend of mine has a similar project on hand. Very slow productions of Shakespeare, which each part recorded separately online and then pasted together. It is very very slow work. And, I myself have a project which, from the start, was doomed to never actually be done- to put together a similar performance of Jane Eyre: The Musical. The trouble (...one of the troubles) is that all of my friends willing to entertain the idea are young ladies, so our Rochester is a soprano and I'm playing St.John Rivers (I am likewise a soprano, but this isn't quite so bad in St.John's case. No, really, some of his demo songs are very high! It's creepy...). It doesn't matter that I have dark hair and dark eyes, but I do burst out laughing at inappropriate times. Very out of charater.It will never, ever, ever be recorded (although I do have one clip of our (Miss) Rochester singing 'As Good As You').

7 comments:

mysticgypsy said...

Androgynous Rochester. That is interesting! Given Rochester's crying fits and effusions, and how we were linking him with Bell Nicholls and Charlotte's heroines, my curiosity is piqued at this interpretation of yours!

Glaukôpis said...

Well, considering all the early all-male performances that have been done over the millenia, I think an all-female performance of *something* is in order anyway. :-D

Although I, for one, am suspicious of this recording to which our illustrious Bronteana refers. ;-)

Brontëana said...

to Mysticgypsy:

I've already picked out some bits from my archives of how often Mr Rochester impersonates women in his musical incarnations! Besides the gypsy songs in which he sometimes uses a falsetto, there's at least two impersonations of Celine as well. Some of the extra dialogue from the earlier musical version of the gypsy scene is fun as well. I only have a sound recording, but it seems as though he doesn't remove all of his costume when one of the male servants comes in. He remarks that the dress is "very pretty, sir."

I forgot to mention what happened to our Jane... It looks like while St.John and Rochester were contending for her, she slipped away with Monsieur Paul. She joined a Franciscan order last year. And while she was there she met a young man in the order and they feel in love. They have both left the order, and I have not heard from them since. I was surprised but then I recall how she had planned on making secret pockets to hide a copy of Villette, so perhaps it is not so unexpected after all- but you don't expect such things to happen outside of novels. :)

Brontëana said...

to Glaukopis:

Sort of like The Wiz only for women :) Except that Jane Eyre has a huge female cast to begin with so...

Not following that line of thought. :P

Quiet you! Do not tempt me lest I vow terrible vengence.

Glaukôpis said...

Yeah. Hmmmm...

Moi? Tempt? Whatever do you mean??

Brontëana said...

You know exactly what I mean!

*does find file serch*

There.

Glaukôpis said...

There where?