Biographies and AutobiographiesTalking Books
The titles in this booklist are just a selection of the titles available for loan from the RNIB National Library Talking Book Service.
Don’t forget you are allowed to have up to 6 books on loan. When you return a title, you will then receive another one.
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Film and Television
Crawford, Michael
Parcel arrived safely, tied with string: my autobiography. 2000. Read by Gordon Dulieu, 11hours 35minutes. TB 13521.
In his autobiography, Crawford recalls his childhood, his early years in showbusiness and the friendships to which it led. Stage shows like "The Phantom of the Opera" and films such as "Hello Dolly" are all remembered, and he offers plenty of professional and personal behind-the scenes anecdotes. TB 13521.
Davis, Sammy
Sammy: an autobiography. 2001. Read by Jeff Harding and Bill Roberts, 18hours 29minutes. TB 13681.
Sammy Davis Jr rose from Childhood stardom on the vaudeville stage to become one of the most famous African-American entertainers of the 195s and 1960s. At the same time, he spent most of his career surrounded by controversy and ridicule - over his affairs with white film stars, his marriage to Swedish actress May Britt, his conversion to Judaism and problems with drugs and alcohol. Contains strong language. TB 13681.
Hancock, Sheila
The two of us: my life with John Thaw. 2004. Read by Frances Jeater, 10hours 35minutes. TB 14445.
When John Thaw, star of The Sweeney and Inspector Morse, died from cancer in 2002, a nation lost one of its finest actors. Sheila Hancock lost a beloved husband. In this unique double biography she chronicles their lives - personal and professional, together and apart. When they married in 1974, Sheila was already the star of the TV series The Rag Trade and went on to become the first woman artistic director at the RSC. Theirs was a sometimes turbulent, always passionate relationship, and Sheila describes their love - weathering overwork and the pressures of celebrity, drink and cancer - with honesty and piercing intelligence. Contains strong language. TB 14445.
Harris, Rolf
Can you tell what it is yet? my autobiography. 2001. Read by Nigel Graham, 13hours 38minutes. TB 13788.
After nearly fifty years on stage and screen, Rolf Harris is a widely respected and well-loved figure in the world of British showbusiness. In this account of his life he traces his roots to the dusty streets of Bassendean, West Australia. Contains strong language. TB 13788.
Hunniford, Gloria
Next to you: Caron's courage remembered by her mother. 2005. Read by Maggie Cronin, 11hours 45minutes. TB 14823.
Caron was 41 when she died, leaving behind two sons, Gabriel and Charlie. A few weeks after Gabriel was born - and her own father died - Caron found a lump in her breast. Gloria knew at that moment, that all their lives would change for ever. Written by Gloria, but with extracts from Caron's own diary, this is a story about an unbreakable mother/daughter bond. Contains strong language. TB 14823.
Leaming, Barbara
Bette Davis: a biography. 1992. Read by Helen Horton, 17hours 2minutes. TB 9436.
Bette Davis has always aroused controversy, with her legal battle with Warner Brothers, her four husbands and the book by her daughter B.D. Until now, though, she has always been seen as the heroine. Here is the dark side of a woman whose power destroyed others, her family and herself; a story of abandonment, alcoholism, domestic violence, obsessive-compulsive behaviour, religious fanaticism and insanity passed from generation to generation. TB 9436.
Lee, Christopher
Lord of misrule: the autobiography of Christopher Lee. 2003. Read by Nigel Graham, 16hours 20minutes. TB 13971.
Christopher Lee's remarkable film career has delighted and terrified fans young and old alike but his life has proved just as strange as his films. Lee's family was descended from papal nobility, and an unusual home life was counterbalanced by his conventionally English education, as public school was followed by the RAF and dramatic wartime experiences. Contains strong language. TB 13971.
Lipman, Maureen
Lip reading. 2000. Read by Maureen Lipman, 9hours 5minutes. TB 12644.
In this latest collection of humorous stories, Maureen Lipman reveals how she found herself trussed up backstage in Birmingham, ponders the more peculiar aspects of cricket terminology and explores the miracle of plastic tablecloths. TB 12644.
Monkhouse, Bob
Crying with laughter: my life story. 1993. Read by Jon Cartwright, 12hours 22minutes. TB 10021.
Hooked from the age of seven after seeing George Formby, Bob took to writing jokes and sending them to leading variety stars. Finally he won the admiration of Max Miller who gave him a masterclass in comic technique. One of this country's most successful comedians, Bob's confessions combine the wit of his public image with the revelation of his private tragedies and will come as a shock to those who see him only as the self-assured TV host and cabaret star. Contains strong language. TB 10021.
Peel, John
Margrave of the marshes. 2005. Read by Johnathan Oliver, Joan Walker and Peter Kenny, 12hours 40minutes. TB 14768.
The first half of the book, written by John describes his early life, from child to man, including his school and National Service. The second section written by his wifeShelia, completes the story, providing an intimate portrait of the man and his music, and the highs and lows of everyday life at their home in Suffolk. Contains strong language. TB 14768.
Secrest, Meryle
Somewhere for me: a biography of Richard Rodgers. 2001. Read by Liza Ross, 16hours 45minutes. TB 13371.
The life of composer Richard Rodgers encapsulates the very essence of New York and London high society during the first half of the twentieth century. His twenty-five-year collaboration with Lorenz Hart gave rise to songs that will live forever such as 'The Lady is a Tramp' and 'Blue Moon'. Later he collaborated with Oscar Hammerstein II and together they wrote musicals such as 'The Sound of Music' and 'South Pacific'. TB 13371.
Sykes, Eric
If I don't write it, nobody else will. 2005. Read by Stephen Thorne, 18hours 44minutes. TB 14691.
The story of one of Britain's greatest comic legends. Sykes reveals his extraordinary life working alongside a generation of legendary comedians and entertainers, despite being dogged by deafness and eventually virtual blindness. His essential core of warm humanity and genuine creative genius has won him a place in so many hearts. TB 14691.
Taylor, Roberta
Too many mothers: a memoir of an East End childhood. 2005. Read by Roberta Taylor, 7hours 17minutes. TB 14462.
A bittersweet memoir of Roberta Taylor’s early life and the extended family that brought her up. It is a portrait of an embattled family who embrace petty crime, romance, blackmail, adoption and even murder. TB 14462.
Titchmarsh, Alan
Trowel and error: notes from a life on earth. 2002. Read by John Mayes, 9hours 4minutes. TB 14575.
Alan Titchmarsh has had a passion for gardening for as long as he can remember. Aged eight, he announced to friends that he was going to be the next Percy Thrower, although he thought it was no more than a dream. Here, he tells his own story from Ilkley Moor to Pebble Mill and to the final realizing of his dream of becoming TV's favourite gardener. Along the way, the cast of characters includes everyone from Auntie Ethel to Nelson Mandela and the Queen. TB 14575.
Wogan, Terry
Is it me? Terry Wogan: an autobiography. 2000. Read by John Cormack, 10hours 5minutes. TB 13583.
Wogan brings to the reader a wry take on everyday life, mixed with a self-deprecating humour, as he describes his whole life, both personal and professional. TB 13583.
Authors and Journalists
Adie, Kate
The kindness of strangers: the autobiography. 2004. Read by Kate Adie, 16hours 4minutes. TB 13469.
Kate Adie, reporting from the world's trouble spots, is so familiar to us that we all recognise her, but this book reveals much more about her eventful life. Raised in post-war Sunderland, where life was "a sunny experience, full of meat-paste sandwiches and Sunday school". Kate has courageously reported from all over the world since she joined the BBC in 1969. These memoirs encompass her reporting from, inter alia, Northern Ireland, the Middle East, Tiananmen Square and, of course, the Gulf War of 1991. Unsuitable for family reading. TB 13469.
Bayley, John
Iris: a memoir of Iris Murdoch. 1998. Read by Michael McStay, 6hours 50minutes. TB 11905.
Dame Iris Murdoch, philosopher and novelist and her husband, John Bayley, Professor of English, literary critic and novelist, have exercised a joint influence in university circles and in the world of letters. Their life together was cruelly interrupted when it became clear that Dame Iris was suffering from Alzheimer's disease, paralysing for a thinker and writer of such creative distinction. TB 11905.
Booth, Martin
Gweilo: memories of a Hong Kong childhood. 2004. Read by Christopher Oxford, 11hours 33minutes. TB 13885.
In this memoir of his colonial childhood in Hong Kong in the 1950s, Martin Booth writes from his child's perspective of the years where he was able to roam freely around the streets of Hong Kong. Filled with an enormous curiosity about the exotic and colourful world around him, Martin quickly gains a grasp of pidgin-Cantonese and uses it to roam the streets and gain access to some of the most colourful parts of Hong Kong, including opium dens, the headquarters of ruthless criminals and a leper colony. Contains strong language. TB 13885.
Hastings, Max
Going to the wars. 2001. Read by Peter Barker, 15hours 29minutes. TB 13051.
Max Hastings grew up with romantic dreams of a life amongst warriors. But after an embarrassing false start as a parachute soldier in 1963, he became a journalist and a war correspondent instead. He learned his trade as a correspondent in race riots in America and amid Northern Ireland's first big clashes in 1969, but his greatest moment came in 1982 when he walked alone into Port Stanley, ahead of the British landing force, in pursuit of a last great scoop. Contains strong language. TB 13051.
Gardner, Frank
Blood and sand: love, death and survival in an age of global terror. 2006. Read by Alistair Petrie, 11hours 56minutes. TB 14677.
On 6 June 2004, Frank Gardner and cameraman Simon Cumbers were in a quiet suburb of Riyadh, filming a piece on Al-Qaeda when they were confronted by Islamist gunmen. Simon was killed instantly. Frank was brought down by a shot in the shoulder, then the leg and four bullets at point blank range. This story follows how he survived what should have been death. Unsuitable for family reading. TB 14677.
Mortimer, John
Where there's a will. 2003. Read by Peter Barker, 6hours 6minutes. TB 13662.
Following the bestselling 'Summer of a Dormouse', Sir John Mortimer - playwright, novelist, octogenarian and erstwhile QC - offers up more lessons in living and growing old disgracefully. What would we like to leave to our descendants? Not a third-rate painting of our PEPs, according to Sir John, but a love of Shakespeare, a taste for alcohol, the ability to defeat boredom, the importance of never locking the lavatory door, and so on. Contains strong language. TB 13662.
Sage, Lorna
Bad blood. 2001. Read by Charlotte Strevens, 9hours 25minutes. TB 12824.
The author's memoir of childhood and adolescence brings to life her eccentric family and somewhat bizarre upbringing in Hanmer, on the border between Wales and Shropshire. The period as well as the place is evoked with the crystal clarity: from the 1940s, dominated for Lorna by her dissolute but charismatic vicar grandfather, through the 1950s, where the invention of fish fingers revolutionised the lives of housewives like Lorna's mother, to the brink of the 1960s, where the community was shocked by Lorna's pregnancy at sixteen. TB 12824.
Simpson, John
Strange places, questionable people. 1999. Read by Steve Hodson, 24hours 27minutes. TB 13589.
For over thirty years John Simpson has travelled the world to report to the significant events of recent years. Here the BBC World Affairs Editor tells of his eventful career. TB 13589.
Slater, Nigel
Toast: the story of a boy's hunger. 2004. Read by Nigel Slater, 6hours 2minutes. TB 13641.
The book looks at the author’s memories of childhood through food. Whether relating his mother's ritual burning of the toast, his father's dreaded Boxing Day stew or such culinary highlights of the day as Arctic Roll and Grilled Grapefruit (then considered something of a status symbol in Wolverhampton), this memoir vividly recreates daily life in sixties suburban England. Contains strong language. TB 13641.
Smith, Sean
J K Rowling: a biography. 2002. Read by Nigel Carrington, 7hours. TB 13100.
J.K. Rowling's rise to superstardom status is the stuff of tabloid legend - how she would spend hours in a cafe in Edinburgh, nursing a single coffee and a glass of water while she wrote the Harry Potter novel that would bring her fame and fortune. This is the life-story of this popular author. TB 13100.
White, Peter
See it my way. 1999. Read by Peter White, 10hours 16minutes. TB 11932.
Unsentimental and humorous autobiography by the BBC's disability affairs correspondent, the second blind son born to sighted parents. The text covers Peter White's childhood, his experiences at special schools, the shock of 'real life' - of the problems of coping with seemingly ordinary, everyday living away from home or at a special school, his career with the BBC, marriage and parenthood, his love of sport, his occasional rage at the attitudes of 'normal' people, and his sometimes volatile relationship with his father. TB 11932.
Artists and Musicians
Bergreen, Laurence
Louis Armstrong: an extravagant life. 1997. Read by Jeff Harding, 22hours 33minutes. TB 12264.
A biography of the jazz and blues master, using new material from the Louis Armstrong archive. Louis Armstrong was a character of epic proportions - married four times, a life-long advocate of marijuana, who took his music from the streets of New Orleans to Hollywood, Europe and South America. TB 12264.
Bocelli, Andrea
Andrea Bocelli: the music of silence. 1999. Read by Peter Barker, 9hours 14minutes. TB 12878.
Andrea Bocelli is one of the world's most successful male singers, selling 20 million recordings world-wide. He has become the popular face of classical music. Yet behind his extraordinary success lies a story of personal triumph. Andrea Bocelli was blinded at the age of twelve. Undeterred, he continued to pursue his childhood dream to sing, using Braille musical scores and lyric sheets. This is Bocelli's true story, told in his own words for the first time. He talks frankly about his blindness, the importance of his family, his stage fright, and the pressures of international stardom. TB 12878.
Callow, Philip
Lost earth: a life of Cezanne. 1995. Read by Robert Gladwell, 24hours 42minutes. TB 11302.
In recent years, an exhibition of the early work of Cezanne has revealed a young genius whose imagination was violent and troubled. Drawing on contemporary sources, the author charts the twists and turns of Cezanne's life, outwardly uneventful but full of inner anguish. He examines Cezanne's relationship with Emile Zola with whom he later quarrelled, and reveals a man who, despite his own weakness and despair, became an exemplar of artistic commitment. TB 11302.
Crawford, Alan
Charles Rennie Mackintosh. 2002. Read by Robert Kirkwood, 5hours 45minutes. TB 13489.
Charles Rennie Mackintosh's finest work dates from about a dozen intensively creative years around 1900. His buildings in Glasgow are more complex and playful than anything in Britain at that time. His interiors are both spare and sensuous, creating a world of heightened aesthetic sensibility. Finally, during the 1920s, he painted a series of watercolours which are as original as anything he had done before. This book investigates Mackintosh and his achievements, revealing a designer of extraordinary sophistication and inventiveness. TB 13489.
Du Pre, Piers
A genius in the family: an intimate memoir of Jacqueline Du Pre. 1998. Read by Peter Wickham and Rosalind Shanks, 15hours 23minutes. TB 11886.
From the moment Jacqueline du Pre first held a cello at the age of five, it was clear that she had an extraordinary gift. At sixteen, when she made her professional debut, she was hailed as one of the world's most talented and exciting young musicians. Ten years later, she stopped playing virtually overnight when multiple sclerosis removed the feeling in her hands just before a concert. It took fourteen years for the crippling disease to kill her. TB 11886.
Dylan, Bob
Chronicles. 2004. Read by John Chancer, 9hours 57minutes. TB 13951.
This is the first volume of the autobiography of a musical and political icon. Circa 1965, arguably the high point of his creative genius, Bob Dylan writes on the beginnings of his music career, his loves - including his very first date - and offers a very personal, anecdotal view of this time of great creativity, innovation and music history. TB 13951.
Ferrier, Kathleen
Letters and diaries of Kathleen Ferrier. 2003. Read by Peter Barker, Joan Walker and Diana Bishop, 16hours 29minutes. TB 13933.
Fifty years ago, Kathleen Ferrier, the greatest lyric contralto Britain has ever produced, lost her battle with breast cancer. Until now she has been a voice, but through these letters and diaries we get to see the person. Her correspondents include composer Benjamin Britten, conductors John Barbirolli and Bruno Walter, her accompanist John Newmark, her agents John and Emmie Tillet, as well as friends, family and fans. Her letters not only illuminate the musical life of Britain, Europe and America but also detailed the organisation involved in programming, touring, and performing in the very different arenas of concerts, recitals, opera, broadcasting and recording. TB 13933.
Fischer-Dieskau, Dietrich
Echoes of a lifetime. 1989. Read by Peter Barker, 13hours 25minutes. TB 8198.
"Echoes of a Lifetime" offers a self-portrait rather than a traditional autobiography, almost a photograph-album in prose. He vividly recalls his young years in Hitler's Germany and the military service that interrupted his musical training and took him to an American prisoner-of-war camp in Italy. Back home in Berlin in 1947, the tumultuous applause that greeted his debut as Posa in Verdi's "Don Carlos" launched one of the truly great careers of musical history. TB 8198.