Audio Books Find a Voice Through LibriVox

Audio book lovers rejoice! LibriVox is an online resource offering thousands of recordings of a wide variety of written works. Including everything from Shakespeare to Hans Christian Andersen, LibriVox’s titles are all available through the public domain and read by volunteers, meaning that users can download recordings completely for free! Perfect for a snug winter day indoors.

For many people, fond memories of childhood include being read to by someone. During the winter months, snuggling in a cozy spot with a book and a reader is a perfect way to pass the time (and to warm up if you sit close enough together!). However, sometimes busy households don’t always have readers available, and other times, the readers would perhaps like to enjoy some listening time themselves. While local libraries offer endless titles in audio form and storyhours for kids, snow days, holidays and colds & flus can keep families away – so what’s a story-loving family to do when it’s time for a story?

LibriVox offers recordings of thousands of public domain books and stories, all available for families’ listening pleasure online! Listeners are able to download recordings for free as a result of the public domain nature of the content – and thanks to the volunteers who read and record the stories themselves. It’s entirely cost-free and incredibly accessible, as stories are recorded in English and many other languages, too!

In addition to filling an audio-book-shaped void, LibriVox provides listeners with a look into the past, as the majority of public domain material dates from 1923 and earlier! Archived audio books range in genre from children’s fiction to short stories, religious texts, letters, and even historical documents. Filled with nursery rhymes and literary classics, Librivox’s children’s archives alone include over 500 titles. From The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn to the Hans Christian Andersen Fairytale Collection to endless environmentally-themed animal tales by Thornton Burgess, LibriVox offers a wide variety of tales – some of which may be a surprise to discover within the realm of public domain!

Families can utilize the recordings offered by LibriVox not only to enhance indoor winter days and car rides, but can take advantage of the educational nature of some of the materials as well. Recording of, for example, The Gettysburg Address or the Declaration of Independence can support studies of important moments in American history, while a Shakespeare anthology can serve as an introduction to the works of an important playwright.

[Photo credit: (cc) The Preiser Project]