Tag: horror

Future Tense: Richard Matheson’s Born Of Man And Woman

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

Richard Matheson’s first published story, Born Of Man And Woman, is a powerful three page Science Fiction Horror tale written in the form of a diary. An uneducated and abused child, our protagonist, is kept chained in the basement by his or her parents, he or she has never been outdoors or upstairs. It’s a thoughtful tragic masterpiece.

Though I take the title as an allusion to a line in William Shakespeare’s Macbeth it also, I think, adds a layer of depth to the story’s sketch.

Born Of Man And Woman by Richard Matheson from Fantasy & Science Fiction, Summer 1950


Future TenseFuture Tense – Born Of Man And Woman
Adapted from the story by Richard Matheson; Performed by a full cast
1 |MP3| – Approx. 10 Minutes [RADIO DRAMA]
Broadcast: WMUK Special Projects
Broadcaster: May 30, 1974
Provider: SciFi Friday
First published in Fantasy & Science Fiction, Summer 1950.

External |PDF|

Posted by Jesse Willis

At The Mountains Of Madness by H.P. Lovecraft (abridged, read by Richard Coyle)

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

Though I’m of the opinion you should go for the Wayne June version (physical copy HERE or Audible.com HERE) I should point out that the abridged 2010 BBC reading of H.P. Lovecraft’s At The Mountains Of Madness, as read by Richard Coyle (with added bed music) is wholly available streaming.

Here’s the official description:

This 2010 adaptation comprises 5 episodes, originally aired on BBC Radio 7, and offered here in exclusive EXTENDED EDITIONS. You will find an additional 30 mins of terror-filled audio within these five episodes!

Abridged by Paul Kent
Read by Richard Coyle
Music by Jon Nicholls
Produced by Neil Gardner

Posted by Jesse Willis

Wireless Theatre Company + Moonlight Audio Theatre: Burke And Hare

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

Up the close and doun the stair,
But and ben wi’ Burke and Hare.
Burke’s the butcher, Hare’s the thief,
Knox the boy that buys the beef.
—19th-century Edinburgh skipping rhyme

Burke And Hare

There may never have been a blacker comedy than this horrifying (and horrifyingly funny) audio drama about a pair of real life murderers. William Burke and William Hare apparently killed sixteen people in the early 19th century selling the corpses to an anatomist named Dr. Robert Knox.

This audio drama, which I found in the Moonlight Audio Theatre podcast feed, is well written, smartly acted, and full of ripe innuendo. Burke And Hare is clever and creepy. If you’ve seen the 1999 horror/comedy film Ravenous, also based on a true story, you know how disturbing this kind of mix can be.

Moonlight Audio TheatreBurke And Hare
By Terence Newman; Performed by a full cast
2 MP3 Files – Approx. 77 Minutes [AUDIO DRAMA]
Podcaster: Moonlight Audio Theatre
Podcast: June 2013
This is the story of the infamous 19th Century Scottish Grave-robbers who weren’t Scottish and didn’t rob graves. They were actually Irish and as robbing graves to supply the needs of Edinburgh’s anatomists proved to be rather hard work, they just took to murdering people – usually their neighbours – for profit. In collaboration with their common-law wives they set about supplying corpses for Dr John Knox an eminent Scottish surgeon with considerable enthusiasm and gusto. The play follows their business exploits from small beginnings, through their days of peak output to the final reckoning – set against a world that is becoming recognisably modern.

Part 1 |MP3|
Part 2 |MP3|

Podcast feed: http://moonlightaudio.libsyn.com/rss

Starring:
Rob Crouch
Jonathan Clarkson
Genevieve Swallow
Holly McLay
Clive Greenwood
Neil McCormack
Adam Hall

Edited by: Joe Siddons
Directed by: Robert Valentine
Music by: Adam Bernstein

Posted by Jesse Willis

The Highwayman by Lord Dunsany (read by Mike Vendetti)

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

The Highwayman by Lord Dunsany

I love The Highwayman by Lord Dunsany. It’s a terrific twelve minute tale, a prose poem of career criminals turned beneficent brigands. And my friend Mike Vendetti liked it a whole bunch too, have a listen a listen to his reading of it! |MP3|

Here’s a fully illustrated |PDF|.

Posted by Jesse Willis

Christmas Eve by Guy de Maupassant

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

Christmas Eve by Guy de Maupassant
Guy de Maupassant’s Christmas Eve, first published in Le Gaulois, December 25, 1882, is an 8 minute gem of comic horror.

I think of it as kind of a French version of A Christmas Carol. But unlike Scrooge, who is a “man of business,” our protagonist is a writer. He isn’t too busy with economy to appreciate the holiday, oh no, he is a generous fellow and he doesn’t have anyone to share his Christmas Eve feast with!

I think you’ll agree that narrator John Feaster’s roller-coaster reading of this great story will mold the merry Xmas spirit into a jolly July.

|MP3|

And here’s the |PDF|

Posted by Jesse Willis