# Stories you MUST read out loud
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [January 11, 2003, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025 "2003-01-11T22:20:20Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Eutychus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eutychus)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2003, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/1 "2003-01-11T22:20:20Z")
I was going to post this in the "favorite science fiction story thread but the answer I was going to give made me think of another aspect of favorite stories; stories that simply _beg_ to be read out loud. The one I was thinking of for the other thread was **“Repent Harlequin,” said the TickTockMan** by Harlan Ellison. That lead me to thinking of another one which was written by him and (IIRC) Avram Davidson called **Up Christopher to Madness**. Both sound wonderful read aloud.
Any others?
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### Author:  [@Loneraven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loneraven)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2003, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/2 "2003-01-11T22:24:05Z")
All the **Just So Stories** by Rudyard Kipling, IMHO. Something about the phrase “Best beloved” that screams to be read aloud…
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### Author:  [@Lissla\_Lissar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissla_Lissar)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/3 "2003-01-12T00:55:15Z")
All the “Winnie-The-Pooh” stories. A close friend recommended that you _never_ read the Illiad and the Odyssey silently- Mr. Lissar and I are looking for suggestions on the best translation so we can read it aloud.
_Anne Of Green Gables_ is good aloud, too, and I think _My Name Is Asher Lev_ would be great, although I haven’t read it aloud, yet.
Almost all poetry should be read aloud.
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### Author:  [@Eutychus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eutychus)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/4 "2003-01-12T01:00:29Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Lissla Lissar \*
> \*\*All the “Winnie-The-Pooh” stories. A close friend recommended that you _never_ read the Illiad and the Odyssey silently- Mr. Lissar and I are looking for suggestions on the best translation so we can read it aloud. \*\*
Try the Robert Fagel’s translations. I started reading them silently to myself and actually found myself beginning to read them out loud.
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### Author:  [@Fornit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fornit)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/5 "2003-01-12T01:09:29Z")
“The Raven” By Edgar Allen Poe
helps if there’s thunder in the background.
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### Author:  [@HDS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HDS)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/6 "2003-01-12T03:22:59Z")
The Hobbit.
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### Author:  [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/7 "2003-01-12T03:24:18Z")
Jim Theis’ “The Eye of Argon” (a truly horribly piece of “writing”) is unreadable, but hilarious when attempted out loud.
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### Author:  [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/8 "2003-01-12T04:05:12Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Fornit \*
> \*\*“The Raven” By Edgar Allen Poe
>
> helps if there’s thunder in the background. \*\*
Hey, I was just going to suggest “The Tell-tale heart” 🙂
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### Author:  [@ElwoodCuse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElwoodCuse)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/9 "2003-01-12T04:09:03Z")
Any Herbert Kornfeld column on The Onion. Makes it twice as funny.
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### Author:  [@JessEnigma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JessEnigma)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/10 "2003-01-12T04:33:12Z")
Almost any play. Of course, they are meant to be seen and not read, but T.S. Eliot’s _Murder in the Cathedral_ is particularly fantastic. I had great fun reading that one aloud to myself when I read it for school.
Most poetry begs to be read aloud. I pick most of my favorite poems that way – the ones that sound nicest. John Donne is one of my favorites almost solely for that reason. Goodness knows I rarely understand half of what he writes.
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### Author:  [@kung\_fu\_lola](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kung_fu_lola)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/11 "2003-01-12T05:43:24Z")
_Missing Angel Juan_, by Francesca Lia Block
_Blood Memory_, by Martha Graham
and, best of all;
_The Prophet_, by Kahlil Gibran
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### Author:  [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/12 "2003-01-12T06:30:17Z")
I once started to read _The Hobbit_ to a girlfriend of mine, but she wasn’t all that into it. It was fun, but we only got a little past the trolls. I’d like the oportunity to read it aloud some more, though.
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### Author:  [@crinklebat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crinklebat)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 7:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/13 "2003-01-12T07:16:09Z")
This is a ridiculous proposition to most people, but I read the Lord of the Rings trilogy aloud to my little sister (voices, accents, foreign words, everything) and found that it really made the book for her. Of course, doing pages of Gandalf’s voice made me lightheaded, and I could only do Gollum when I had a cold, but it was still quite an experience. Tolkien writes in a very read-aloud-able style.
Also, epic poems, for obvious reasons.
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### Author:  [@Master\_Wang-Ka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Master_Wang-Ka)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/14 "2003-01-12T07:30:51Z")
“The Double Shadow,” by Clark Ashton Smith.
Terrifyin’.
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### Author:  [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 7:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/15 "2003-01-12T07:56:33Z")
Second _Just So Stories_– beautifully rythmic. Attend, and listen, o best beloved: the phrase “On the banks of the great grey-green greasy Limpopo River, all set about with Fever-trees,” is wondrously therapeutic for both tongue and ear.
And James Joyce must be read aloud to extract the full measure of Joy-- but only when there there’s no one else about and the house is as otherwise as silent as death.
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### Author:  [@Superdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superdude)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/16 "2003-01-12T08:11:12Z")
_Rage_ by **Richard Bachman** , the pen name of Stephen King. I don’t consider him a literary genius, but this story always appealed to me in this manner.
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### Author:  [@Master\_Wang-Ka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Master_Wang-Ka)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 8:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/17 "2003-01-12T08:14:07Z")
Quite so, good story. Not to mention timely, and ahead of its time.
Were you aware that Stephen King has taken it out of circulation, and no longer permits it to be published? It’s out of print.
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### Author:  [@Master\_Wang-Ka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Master_Wang-Ka)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 8:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/18 "2003-01-12T08:15:40Z")
Gee, that sounded snide. Sorry. Copies of The Bachman Books can still be had at used bookstores, and yes, it’s a very good story.
I was just kind of surprised when I heard he’d yanked the story from publication. Never have gotten much of an explanation, but I can guess…
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### Author:  [@Shana](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shana)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 9:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/19 "2003-01-12T09:03:53Z")
Sometimes I wish I had children or knew of some child that would suffer through me reading the Hobbit to them.
I think it’s incredibly neat that Crinklebat read Tolkien to her little sister - and with voices no less! What a cool sister!!
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### Author:  [@raisinbread](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raisinbread)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2003, 9:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-you-must-read-out-loud/148025/20 "2003-01-12T09:06:26Z")
Goodnight Moon
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