Silent Film: A Very Short Introduction

· Tantor Media Inc · Narrated by Emily Beresford
Audiobook
3 hr 47 min
Unabridged
Eligible
Ratings and reviews aren’t verified  Learn More
Want a 22 min sample? Listen anytime, even offline. 
Add

About this audiobook

Encompassing the thirty-five year span between the initial development of film technology in the mid-1890s and the adoption of synchronized sound in the late 1920s, the cinema's silent era is both one of the most important epochs of film history and one of the most misunderstood within the popular imagination. In this brief, engaging account, these formative decades come vividly to life. Covering the full scope of the silent era-from the invention of motion pictures to the rise of the Hollywood studios-and touching on films and filmmakers from every corner of the globe, Silent Film: A Very Short Introduction offers a window into film's first years as a worldwide entertainment phenomenon. From groundbreaking early shorts to the masterpieces of the cinema's classical era, from street-corner nickelodeons to grand movie palaces, from slapstick to the avant-garde, the silent era's artistic abundance and global variety are here put on full display. In the story of silent film, we see not just the origins of a new culture industry but also a legacy of imagination and innovation that continues to profoundly influence the cinema even to this day.

About the author

Donna Kornhaber is associate professor of English at the University of Texas at Austin. She is the author of Nightmares in the Dream Sanctuary: War and the Animated Film, Wes Anderson: A Collector's Cinema, and Charlie Chaplin, Director.

Audiobook narrator Emily Beresford has been nominated for an Audie Award by the Audiobook Publishers Association and has received an Earphones Award from AudioFile magazine. She works for several major publishers and records books for many bestselling authors. Emily lives in the Midwest with her beautiful, fun family.

Rate this audiobook

Tell us what you think.

Listening information

Smartphones and tablets
Install the Google Play Books app for Android and iPad/iPhone. It syncs automatically with your account and allows you to read online or offline wherever you are.
Laptops and computers
You can read books purchased on Google Play using your computer's web browser.