I feel the title of this topic should be changed to audio dramas. Audiobooks aren't like plays. They're people reading book aloud.

@col-klink. I changed the title of the topic to audio dramas.  But if people want to discuss other audiobooks such as the reading of novels it’s fine with me.  I have a set of vinyl LP’s which have readings from the Narnia books by well known actors, and they have really good voices.  They are theatrical performances so I guess they are dramatic in a way.  Even if it’s a one man show (or one woman reading it) it demands some acting talent. 🙂

I've got the Focus on the Family versions of Narnia on CD — I have to admit I haven't yet listened to all of them, but the ones I've heard have been excellent! Definitely very faithful adaptations and beautifully done.

There IS another complete set of the seven Chronicles as audio dramas, produced by the BBC. There was an episode of Talking Beasts dedicated to them some time ago. The conclusion seemed to be that they were fairly good, but FOTF did a better job overall. I haven't heard any of the BBC ones, so can't judge.

I did at one stage have two of the audiobook recordings of the Chronicles on CD as well — The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and The Horse and His Boy. Both were well read and quite good to listen to, but the disadvantage of having only one person reading the whole story is that one single actor can't necessarily do effective voices for such a huge range of characters. LWW was a case in point. The reader — Michael York, I think? — had a good reading voice overall, but, well, being a bloke, he really didn't do very effective voices for the female characters, especially the White Witch, who just sounded like a silly caricature.

What annoyed me even more, though, was what he did for several of the non-human characters. Instead of trying to imagine what a Faun or a Talking Wolf or a Talking Beaver might actually sound like, he just gave them blatant stereotypical dialect accents from different parts of the British Isles. Yes, seriously — he did Mr Tumnus with an Irish accent, Maugrim with a Scottish accent and the Beavers with Yorkshire accents. Which just sounded ridiculous, honestly. I was wondering and half dreading what he'd do for Aslan — a Welsh accent, maybe?? — but no, Aslan was just standard BBC newsreader English. (Almost a pity, really. I love Welsh accents. )

Posted by: @narnian78

I have a set of vinyl LP’s which have readings from the Narnia books by well known actors

That sounds so cool! How many books were read by them? (Or maybe it was parts of books)

@highkingpete

The readings from the books are each about one hour long and they are read by Ian Richardson, Clare Bloom, and Anthony Quayle. The four vinyl LP’s feature readings from The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Prince Caspian, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, and The Silver Chair. I bought this LP set in the 1980’s, and now it is very hard to find.   I think there are still some new CD’s available with the stories read by different actors.  

@courtenay

I love the Focus on the Family radio dramas.  I think I might have the same sets of CD’s that you have , although it may be a different edition since I purchased it in the 1990’s from a Christian bookstore.  Aslan’s voice was a little difficult to get used to,  but now I kind of enjoy it. Being an American, I don’t know if they got the accents of the other characters right.  Although it takes a lot of time, it is well worth listening to all seven audio dramas.  The Voyage of the Dawn Treader is great with its audio sea voyage. The Last Battle really has a good climax.

@narnian78

Oh wow!! Anthony Quayle is a gem ? Must've been a wonderfully lucky instance for you to get the entire LP set at once! (lol maybe you should post in the Narnian Merchandise topic)

I'll take a look myself for some new audio dramas available on the books, as the only ones I had heard of were the radio theatre set for the series from 2003 I think.

Thanks for sharing!

The Focus on the Family set of Narnia stories first came to my notice in the late 90s on local Christian radio, with HHB and LWW. It also introduced me to Douglas Gresham's voice.

I think they were new then, and I bought a set of CDs in 2005. Recently bought a digital copy from FotF as CDs were starting to age. 

Always my default for the telling of the stories. 

Posted by: @narnian78  

I love the Focus on the Family radio dramas.  I think I might have the same sets of CD’s that you have , although it may be a different edition since I purchased it in the 1990’s from a Christian bookstore.

I bought mine off the internet a couple of years ago — I think I found it via Amazon. I've no idea whether there were different editions published. Even though the FOTF radio dramas have an all or mostly British cast, I don't think they were ever released here in the UK. I've a feeling they would have been seen as too much competition with the home-grown BBC versions.

 Aslan’s voice was a little difficult to get used to,  but now I kind of enjoy it.

That's David "Hercule Poirot" Suchet to you. I'd also say he doesn't have quite the kind of voice I would have expected for Aslan, and he hams it up a bit too much occasionally. But in a lot of the more serious and quiet scenes, I think he really nails it. At least in the ones I've heard so far... I was listening to them in original-book-publication order, so I've only heard LWW, PC, VDT and not quite half of SC. I must get back to them some time!!

Being an American, I don’t know if they got the accents of the other characters right.

I'm an Aussie and I think they sound fine. I've no idea what the "right" accent for Narnian characters really is, anyway. When I mentioned Michael York's interesting interpretations for the LWW audiobook, I only meant I found it a bit tacky that he resorted to doing very obvious stereotypical regional British and Irish accents, as if he couldn't think of any better way to make each character sound different!!

Now that does make me wonder what C.S. Lewis himself would think of all this... he didn't live to see any adaptations of the Chronicles come about, although I'm aware he made comments at times on the sorts of things he wouldn't like done to them. (I seem to recall he detested the thought of Disney animating them and also hated the idea of Aslan being portrayed by a man in a lion costume.) I wonder what his own preferences would have been for the accents or kinds of voices used for each character? Or maybe he wouldn't have minded too much? (He was Irish himself and hated English accents when he first heard them, although he ended up with one himself by the time he was an adult...)

Talking of accents (slightly off topic), do you know how long it's taken me — having grown up thinking of Narnia as quintessentially British — to get used to hearing a bunch of Americans discussing it on Talking Beasts??  

 Although it takes a lot of time, it is well worth listening to all seven audio dramas.  The Voyage of the Dawn Treader is great with its audio sea voyage. The Last Battle really has a good climax.

I'll look forward to that when I finally get to it, then!!

I do wish I had more time to just sit and listen to them, honestly — at first I tried playing them in the car, but the engine noise muffles a lot of the sound effects (solution: get a Tesla... I wish ), and of course one doesn't want to become TOO engrossed in fantasy worlds while driving. And I have a lot of other things going on in my life at the moment. But I will make time for the whole series eventually!

I have also enjoyed audio dramas of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.  The Hobbit was broadcast on NPR and The Lord of the Rings was created for the BBC.  I think Ian Holmes was the voice of Frodo Baggins and another actor, James Arrington, was Bilbo Baggins.  These dramas were made in the 1970’s and 1980’s, long before Peter Jackson’s movies.   If you ever get a chance to listen to the dramas I think you will be pleased at their accuracy to Tolkien’s books.  It takes a long time to listen to them since The Hobbit is on four CD’s and The Lord of the Rings is on twelve. But the programs offer much more from the books than any TV series or film.

Here is some more information on the BBC radio drama:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lord_of_the_Rings_(1981_radio_series)

@highkingpete

Believe it or not, I actually found the LP’s in a discount clearance store of a Christian book seller.  Many stores were selling out their LP’s during the 1980’s to make room for CD’s and other items.  They didn’t realize at that time that vinyl would return and become popular again.

Posted by: @narnian78

 They didn’t realize at that time that vinyl would return and become popular again.

Honestly, has vinyl ever gone out of style? LOL Truly a lucky find for you! I'm  glad you get to enjoy such an older adaption (at least for me) today without having to go on a scavenger hunt for it. Although I'm sure that would be very gratifying too

Posted by: @courtenay

Talking of accents (slightly off topic), do you know how long it's taken me — having grown up thinking of Narnia as quintessentially British — to get used to hearing a bunch of Americans discussing it on Talking Beasts??  

Haha, that's hilarious! I didn't even think that there would be British podcasts or shows in the same vein of TB. Something else to go looking for I suppose.  

 I also wonder what Lewis would've thought of each different adaptation that's come out, audio dramas included. It would be interesting to see which adaptation best represents what Lewis would've wanted. But if anyone has a comprehensive list, it would've probably be Gresham lol.

Posted by: @highkingpete

Haha, that's hilarious! I didn't even think that there would be British podcasts or shows in the same vein of TB. Something else to go looking for I suppose.  

I was just going to say I don't know if there are any British podcasts or shows specifically about Narnia, but I just remembered Pints with Jack, which is based in America but has one British presenter (David Bates), so that sort of counts...

But other than that, I don't know of any British presenters who regularly talk about Narnia, or Lewis and his works in general. I was referring to the fact that I grew up knowing that the Narnia books came from Britain (like most of my favourite books), and the BBC TV series came out when I was 7-8 years old and I watched it again and again (on video... yes, I'm dating myself here ). So that's how I always hear the characters speak in my imagination, and it just sounded a bit funny at first to hear them discussed and excerpts from the books read in American accents, that's all. (And the same would probably sound just as funny in an Aussie accent, I know.)

People used to like radio plays like The Shadow and The Lone Ranger, but I think Narnia offers so much more depth.  At the Back of the North Wind and The Secret Garden are also offered by Focus on the Family as well as some of the Dickens books (including A Christmas Carol).  I’m sure they are well worth checking out, although I haven’t listened to all of them.  I would suggest buying the original books or borrowing them from a library so that you can compare them with the dramas. It’s amazing how much of a book can be dramatized in two hours, which is the length of most of the audio versions.