LitReading - Classic Short Stories

Humans have shared stories for millennia. For most of that time, telling tales was a verbal process. A storyteller would regale an audience with accounts of adventure, bravery, compassion, despair, enlightenment, and fear. Stories were a shared experience, until the advent of inexpensive mass-printing processes in the 19th century which allowed most of us to read to ourselves. Yet, that desire to have a story read aloud is still ingrained in our collective soul.

While we still read books for pleasure, most of today’s stories are told via newer forms of visual media like movies and television. Consuming stories via any visual medium requires an active commitment to the process. You probably shouldn’t read a book or watch a TV program while driving, but your brain still craves a good story.

An audio book is suitable for a long road trip. But what about those times when you only have a few minutes? Enter the audio short story.

Allow me to help you fill those moments and fulfill your need for a captivating tale with readings of some of the world’s greatest literary masters best brief works.

My love of the spoken word has been honed by a more than 30-year career in radio and voice acting with a modicum of performance passion from decades of stage performances.

This venture is my hobby (I have a great full-time job), so much of the content is free of cost. I hope you enjoy them.

If you would like to share thoughts or comments, please drop me a line. If you enjoy these stories, please spread the word, subscribe, and leave a review on your favorite podcast service.

Thanks for stopping by,

Don McDonald

Fiction
Performing Arts
Books
26
An Idle Fellow by Kate Chopin
What is the best way to study life?
4 min
27
Eve's Diary by Mark Twain
The diary of the first woman "translated from the original source."
42 min
28
Excerpts from Adam's Diary by Mark Twain
Mark Twain's humorous take on the stars of the Book of Genesis
27 min
29
Before the Law by Franz Kafka
6 min
30
The White Heron by Sarah Orne Jewett
27 min
31
Coco By Guy de Maupassant
Human cruelty is nothing new. It has been a demon we have had to battle since the dawn of our kind. Yet, we also have the capacity to defeat our callousness and inhumanity (a term that drips with irony). This short powerful short story illustrates the...
11 min
32
The Aged Mother by Matsuo Basho
Life in the ancient world was often brutal and cruel. Resources were often limited leading to leaders ruthless edicts. In this old Japanese folktale, a young peasant is faced with an impossible decision. Matsuo Basho, one of Japan’s most famous...
7 min
33
A Slice of Life by P. G. Wodehouse
This witty tale is about a veritable snake-oil salesman who uses his wares to help win the love of a beautiful young ward of an English Baronet. British author P. G. Woodhouse was one of the mid-20th century’s most popular humorists – on both side...
35 min
34
The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Women’s health issues have long been explained away as emotional issues due to their role as the “weaker sex.” Serious illnesses were diagnosed as nothing more than hysteria and rest was prescribed. This ignorance of women’s real health problems is...
36 min
35
Hermann the Irascible by Saki
How times have changed. Just over a century ago, women were still fighting for the right to vote and the prevailing belief among men was that they were too emotional and fragile to do so. Our next story takes place, ironically, in a fictional Britain...
7 min
36
The Man with Two Lives by Ambrose Bierce
Here is the perfect story for those times when you need to fill a few minutes with entertainment. This tale is a surreal story of a 19th century soldier traversing a dangerous section of the the Great Plains on foot to deliver dispatches from one Old...
7 min
37
Diary Of A Madman by Guy de Maupassant
In this truly chilling tale, we explore the darkest parts of the human mind - the hidden recesses where derangement resides. A word of caution: this tale is very dark and is not suitable for younger children.
15 min
38
The Haunted Mind by Nathaniel Hawthorne
Since the dawn of our species, we have been bewildered by about that strange period of altered consciousness that occurs just before, during, and at the end of our daily slumber. Our next story expressively explores this activity that we all share...
13 min
39
Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Bruce-Par...
When the plans for a top-secret British defense project are stolen and the apparent thief is found dead, the government turns to legendary detective Sherlock Holmes to solve the mystery and find the documents.
59 min
40
That's Marriage by Edna Ferber
Marriage takes the simple concept of procreation and turns it into a lifelong commitment that can, at times, lead to unexpected anger and resentment. As Mark Twain once said, "God's great cosmic joke on the human race was requiring that men and women...
56 min
41
The Widow's Cruise by Frank Stockton
We have been sharing stories with each other since the beginning of time. On occasion these tales have been known to grow a bit tall, as was the case when four elderly seamen spent an evening with a widow sharing a variety of yarns each one wilder...
29 min
42
The Three Day Blow by Ernest Hemingway
Our second tale in this story series by a young Ernest Hemingway picks up a few months after our last story, "The End of Something," which you might want to hear before listening to this tale. A few month's after his breakup, Nick visits his friend...
25 min
43
The End of Something by Ernest Hemingway
This story is part of a series of tales written by a young Earnest Hemingway. It’s a “slice of life” story about the conflicting emotions in a relationship between a young couple. “The End of Something” was written when Hemingway was in his early...
10 min
44
The Tell Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe
Halloween is the season of the macabre and one the greatest authors of dark frightening fiction was Edgar Allen Poe. This season I decided to share the Poe story that frightened me most when I was young. Considered to be the finest American Gothic...
14 min
45
The Log by Guy de Maupassant
The lure of an illicit affair is not a new facet of human nature. People have been both tempting and tempted throughout time. But for a sudden twist of fate, our next story might have ended badly for everyone involved. Henri René Albert Guy de...
12 min
46
Desiree's Baby by Kate Chopin
Racism has always been an ugly part of the human condition. Yet, the horrors of racism in America are most undeniably illustrated by the treatment of African-Americans, particularly in the South. Here is just a small example of the pain caused by...
15 min
47
The McWilliamses And The Burglar Alarm by Mark ...
We aren't the first generation to be frustrated by advancing technology. More than a century ago, new fangled products were making people crazy like this gentleman who supposedly related our next hilarious tale Mark Twain. Mark Twain (the pen name...
16 min
48
The Romance of a Busy Broker by O. Henry
There are those for whom work becomes an obsession to the detriment of their personal lives. The businessman in our next story gives new meaning to the modern term “workaholic.” William Henry Porter, better known as O. Henry led a short albeit...
10 min
49
The Mark on the Wall by Virginia Woolf
Virginia Woolf demonstrates how simply focusing on one thing has the power to unleash torrents of thoughts and memories. Born Adeline Virginia Stephen in 1882, British author Virginia Woolf went on to become an icon of modern 20th century literature.
21 min
50
A Country Cottage by Anton Chekhov
Life has a nasty habit of throwing us curves that we can either cause us long-term misery or force us to make the best of a bad situation as illustrated in this very short tale. Anton Chekhov was undoubtedly brilliant. A physician by trade, his...
6 min