Classics Narrated

NOT recommended for children; Edgar Allan Poe's tale of increasing evil, alcoholism, and murder may haunt the listener as the cat haunted the protagonist.

Moving from Adventures of Tom Sawyer, to one of the more appalling stories of Edgar Allan Poe calls for some word of explanation. First, be assured I have little or nothing in common with the protagonist. I loved my little black cat, and stumbled over this story waiting for software to download. It was her memory that drew me to it. I would never raise my hand to my spouse, and am rigorously moderate about alcohol.

Why, then, offer this?

First, it moved me with the everyday quality of the protagonist's moral decay, and seemed to prefigure such characters as Highsmith's Ripley, or Lindsay's Dexter Morgan. Also, at least two of Poe's stories, The Tell-Tale Heart, and The Cask of Amontillado have been widely anthologized, but this was new to me, and very disturbing.

Also, I hope to keep listener interest by varying the type and tenor of these twice-told tales, to help keep them alive: some of them smiling in memory, and others scratching softly at a door we don't want to open.