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Some History on Audio Books

It’s really amazing that you can get the exact value listening to an audio book while doing your normal chores as you would reading it.

Certain experts even say information sinks in more when we are not paying direct attention to them.

But when did this audio book phenomenon really start? In other words, what’s the history of audio books?

From all indications, audio books look like a very recent invention, right?

WRONG!

It is very easy to make the assumption that audio books are a recent invention because of the mention of CDs, downloadable digital formats, MP3s, PDAs and other technological jargons each time audio books are discussed. But audio books started a long time ago.

To know how long audio books have been, it is pertinent to understand exactly what audio books are.

Forget about any other jargon you have heard, audio books are simply books that are recorded to be heard, instead of read.

That being the case, such recordings of books in audio formats have been around for a very long time. If you want to be specific, it is safe to say they were first introduced over half a century ago.

It could even be longer, if you include the Library of Congress recordings made especially for the American Foundation for the Blind and distributed free throughout the U.S.

However, according to Robin Whitten, the editor and founder of the only magazine which is dedicated solely to the audio book industry

Audiofile, Caedmon (now a subsidiary of Harper Collins Publishers) can be credited to have started the recordings of literature as far back as 50 years ago.

Going further, he said Caedmon was just a small company way back then in New York, which started recording the audio of great authors and poets of the 1950s. Specifically, he said one of the earliest recordings were by greats such as Dylan Thomas, T.S. Eliot, Fitzgerald and Robert Frost.

What happened then was that they were simply recorded while doing their own works and made as vinyl records.

But these early recordings can arguably pass off for the first collection of audio books ever.

However, the transition of these book recordings into audiocassette tapes didn’t happen until the late 1970s up to the 1980s. From thence, it blossomed until audio books in audiocassette tapes came to be accepted by all and sundry.

For whatever reason however, the audio book phenomenon didn’t really kick off until the 1990s.

And with the transition from audiocassette technology into CDs, more people have become interested in audio books.

With the advent of the Internet and its paraphernalia, audio books have now transited from vinyl records, audiocassette taps and CDs into downloadable digital formats that can be listened to with a desktop computer, laptop computer, PDAs, etc.

If you are still interested in “going back in time” you can get the original book recordings that started this audio book industry.

Impossible?

Not really.

Some of those early 1950s analog recordings by Caedmon which were performed by the greats of those days can be purchased today on the Internet.

For example, recently I was able to browse the Internet thoroughly and found the original recording of “The Lord of the Rings” as read by J.R.R. Tolkien.

You can find that classic you have always dreamt of in audio book format if you search hard enough on the Internet.

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An audio book club is a shopping club for book lovers. But how is it different from a normal book library? In simple terms, an audio book club provides books in audio format – they could be burned on a CD, could be on tape, or could be simple downloadable audio files.

The great advantage here is that you can read, or rather listen to, and enjoy any book even while you are engaged in any other work. Audio books make reading a pleasure, and place less demands on one of the most precious things in modern society: time.

The audio books are more portable than the paper versions: you can download the audio books directly into your computer and then burn it on a CD or store it in any portable device, such as your iPod. Yes, it is much like listening to music on your iPod! So how about turning on an audio book when you are waiting in a line? Or when you are driving, or cooking, or mowing the lawn? You could never do that with a traditional book, could you?

The audio book clubs provide a collection of audio books in CD, cassette, and/or secure digital download formats. The average file size of a downloadable audio book is about 100-150 megabytes. You can buy or rent an audio book from an audio book club.

Now, audio books could be spoken-word adaptations of a book or any other other literary work. These could be in the author’s own voice or could be dramatic readings by one or more actors. Some could even feature sound effects.

There are both abridged and unabridged audio versions of literary works and other books in the audio book clubs. An unabridged audio book is a complete book while an abridged version is one that has been edited and only includes a portion of the complete work. You can usually find out from the audio book club’s web listing whether a particular book is available in abridged or unabridged format. The audio book club catalogue should give you a list of different formats available under each title.

If there is a title that is not available in the audio book club’s inventory, you can even request for a copy, much like in an offline library. When the book comes in, you will be informed automatically. An audio book club usually provides many works from an author, but not all.

The fast-paced modern life has made audio books highly popular. This has led to many authors and publishers putting their works into the audio book format. The audio book clubs offers many fantastic savings. They usually offer discounts of up to 20 per cent on new releases and up to 10 per cent on the other works in their collection.

A huge advantage of the audio book clubs is convenience: the online audio book clubs are open 24/7, enabling members to log in, search and download audio books at any time they choose, from any part of the world! You can select and listen to any type of books such as literature, science, sports, travel, technology, health, history, etc., at the audio book clubs. You can enroll in and cancel your membership in audio book club anytime you wish to.

At some audio book clubs you can get a monthly subscription and listen to as many audio books as you can! Also, anyone can log in and buy the audio books, just as you would walk into a book store and purchase a book. The first time you buy an audio book from an audio book club, you need to create an account. The audio books can be paid for using credit cards, just as in any other electronic transaction.