The History of the Adventures of Joseph Andrews and his Friend Mr Abraham Adams

Henry Fielding’s first full-length novel, published in 1742, The History of the Adventures of Joseph Andrews and of his Friend Mr. Abraham Adams was also one of the first English novels. Fielding was melding and parodying the two major forces battling for control of the fiction of the time – the mock heroic, neo-classical tradition as practiced by Pope and Swift and the popular and populist fiction of the new novelists such as Defoe and Richardson. Richardson’s Pamela had just taken Britain by storm and following on the success of Fielding’s parody of the novel Shamela the story of Joseph Andrews follows Pamela’s brother in his journey as footman to the rather dippy Parson Adams. In style and form it imitates Cervantes Don Quixote, with the servant and master undertaking their major journey together, but the sexual adventures of the young Joseph Andrews and his sorely tested chastity provide the real meat of the book’s plot.

Described by Fielding as ‘a comic-romance’ Joseph Andrews is a bawdy and merry book, but it is also wrought through with Fielding’s devotion to the Greek and Roman classics, and with his social conscience which shines through in its fresh approach to the stifling moral hypocrisies of the day.

Rufus Sewell’s extraordinary reading of this riotous but challenging book is made that much more special by, as he said “being able to really relish the language!”

click here to download this audio bookTitle Detail Silksoundbooks

Stars take classics to a digital generation

Readings of great literature will be available on a download rival to iTunes

David Smith, technology correspondent
Sunday June 3, 2007
The Observer

Bill Nighy, the award-winning actor, is among a host of West End stars taking on the multi-million-pound digital download market with a website that offers new readings of classic literature for the iPod generation.

In an unusual move, Nighy and several other actors - including Lindsay Duncan, Edward Fox, Richard E Grant, Greta Scacchi and Fiona Shaw - have waived half or all their performance fees in favour of taking shares in Silksoundbooks, the first made-for-download audiobooks service of its kind. If the company enjoys a fraction of the success of Apple's iTunes site, they could each be sitting on a goldmine.

With a handpicked acting company, Silksoundbooks plans to do for novels, short stories and poetry what iTunes has done for music. It could also sound the death knell for the books on tape which have been a favourite of long car journeys and mobile libraries for the elderly.

Joel Rickett, deputy editor of The Bookseller magazine, said: 'The digital revolution that has changed the music industry so much is about to do the same for audiobooks. Traditionally they were for retired people or travelling salesmen in their cars. They were at the back of the bookshop and a bit of a sideshow for the industry. But what we've seen with iPods and podcasts means there's a whole new potential market and publishers are getting very excited. They can already see sales taking off.'

The Silksoundbooks.com site goes live today with an initial offering of 60 downloads, including Judi Dench and her daughter Finty Williams reading Fanny Burney's Evelina, Toby Stephens reading Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, Rufus Sewell reading Henry Fielding's Joseph Andrews, and a collection of nursery rhymes read by Jane Horrocks. Each has been recorded unabridged for the site and can be downloaded in an average of 20 minutes at a price of Ł7.95, and then transferred to an iPod or another MP3 player.

Nighy, seen recently in the Pirates of the Caribbean films and Notes on a Scandal, was the first actor to join the venture. He spent a day in New York recording The Dupin Mysteries by Edgar Allan Poe. 'I love books and the idea of reading them out loud,' he told The Observer. 'I passionately support the idea of recording great books at a very cheap price. The idea that you can download a major novel and have it read to you in the car is sweet. It introduces literature in an entertaining way, and the idea that these wonderful books are being spread across the world thrills me.'

Nighy, who plans to read his favourite book, Parade's End by Ford Madox Ford, said that the acting challenge was considerable. 'It's quite hard reading a book, as you have to do all the voices. I have been told I do women quite well. 'I read War and Peace once - I only had two days to get the hang of all those names. I also read one where the narrator was a Native American who went to North Korea, then Siberia with lots of Russian tribes, then Japan - I thought, "God almighty, why me?"' The actor - who owns an iPod, but not a computer - said that he believes in the ethos of the new venture and added: 'There is an actors' company atmosphere, and I like the idea of being a shareholder. I've never had shares in anything before.'

The boom in digital music sales has alerted publishers to the potentially lucrative market for audiobooks. Silksoundbooks faces competition from established sites such as Audible.com, which offers over 35,000 titles, and the iTunes store itself, which has 27,000 audiobooks. Each audiobook costs around Ł9,000 to produce and takes an average of three or four days. Silksoundbooks' co-founder Brian Mitchell said: 'Audiobooks and downloads are not new, but taking classic works and casting them very carefully is new.

'For example, when we decided on Joseph Andrews we asked ourselves who would be the ideal voice for that and we approached Rufus Sewell, who sounds exactly right. He added: 'Terry Jones is a well-known Chaucer expert and has done his own translation, which he has then read. We're bringing the idea of performance to classic works.'

The History of the Adventures of Joseph Andrews and his Friend Mr Abraham Adams:

Stars take classics to a digital generation