Librivox.org

Freshman year, when I was taking a British novels course, I often found that I had little time to read but that I spent a lot of time walking/biking around campus. If only I could somehow read the novels while I was in transit without becoming a hazard to those around me. That's when I found www.librivox.org , an online database of audio recordings for tons of novels/literature in the public domain. I thought it was an incredible find: downloadable audio versions of all the novels I was reading in class and because they were in the public domain, they were completely free (and still are!).

All you have to do is type in the name of your text and a list of matches will pop up. For the most part, texts are divided into chapters or sections which you can download individually. Then, you can listen on your computer or better yet, upload them to your ipod or mp3 player and listen on the go! Suddenly it became much easier for me to keep up with the readings while still doing everything else I had to do.

Now before I go any further, I can practically hear the gasps of horror that may be coming from some of you: "You cheater, you lazy bum! I'd rather you crash into quad bound pedestrians while reading on your bike than have you stoop to such a degrading form of consuming literature! And I certainly hope you're not about to suggest we use this cheater's paradise as a teaching tool!"

Maybe your reaction wasn't that dramatic, but hear me out. I really think this could be a useful tool if one day (either by choice or by force) we are teaching a "classic" to students. Having an audio recording on hand would be great for those texts that just make more sense when they are read out loud. I'm not saying you should replace reading with listening, but if the assigned text is particularly lengthy or difficult, librivox recordings can be used to help students along the way.

Of course there are some pitfalls to librivox. Every now and then you get a volunteer with a less than pleasant reading voice, and the site only provides audio versions of books in the public domain (so it couldn't be used for any contemporary novels or literature).

I made the choice to listen to audio books so I could keep up with my coursework and I don't really see why students shouldn't be able to make the same choice. If you want to provide students with free audio of public domain literature, librivox.org is the place to go!