Acclaimed audiobook narrator Alison Larkin will read from Pride and Prejudice and lead a 45-minute discussion at Shakespeare & Company on Saturday, Dec. 16 at 5 p.m. – Pride and Prejudice: Then & Now, centered on Austen’s most famous characters and the parallels with how we live – and love – today.
Larkin has narrated more than 250 audiobooks, including the #1 best-selling Jane Austen audiobook in the world – The Complete Novels of Jane Austen. She is also the narrator and host of The Jane Austen Podcast with Alison Larkin from Realm.FM, a recent Sunday Times Pick of the Week. The love story in Larkin’s bestselling autobiographical novel, The English American, was inspired by Pride and Prejudice.
“Narrating the novels of Jane Austen reminded me that no matter how much the world changes, human nature never does,” Larkin said.
This free, ticketed event will be held in the Jane Iredale Lobby at the Elayne P. Bernstein Theatre, and coincides with Austen’s birthday weekend as well as Shakespeare & Company’s costumed reading of Georgiana and Kitty: Christmas at Pemberley, staged Friday, Dec. 15 through Sunday, Dec. 17. The play is an imagined sequel drawn from the pages of Pride and Prejudice, part of a trilogy written by Lauren Gunderson and Margot Melcon and directed by Ariel Bock.
In celebration, Larkin is offering an exclusive discount offer for attendees to purchase an audiobook of Pride and Prejudice with Songs from Regency England read by Alison Larkin for $10 (normally priced at $23). Cake will also be served along with a full cash bar and concessions for purchase.
Four performances of Georgiana and Kitty will be presented on the Elayne P. Bernstein Theatre stage at Shakespeare & Company, including prior to and following Larkin’s appearance, on Friday, Dec. 15 at 7 p.m., Saturday, Dec. 16 at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m., and Sunday, Dec. 17 at 2 p.m. Show tickets are $28 for general admission and $18 for students; $5 EBT Card to Culture pricing is also available for up to four tickets per EBT Card.
For more information regarding either event, visit shakespeare.org, or call the Box Office at (413) 637-3353.
About Alison Larkin
Alison Larkin is a comedienne, award winning audiobook narrator/producer, screenwriter, actress, the bestselling author of The English American, a novel. She is also the narrator of over 250 audiobooks including The Complete Novels of Jane Austen, currently the #1 bestselling Austen audiobook in the world.
As an actress she appeared on Broadway in Stanley at the Royal National Theater and Off Broadway with the Royal Shakespeare Company. As a stand-up she headlined at the Comic Strip in NY and the Comedy Store in LA.
Her audiobook company Alison Larkin Presents has produced over 100 audiobooks and won 14 AudioFile Earphones awards for excellence, including for Alison’s own narration of Pride and Prejudice with Songs from Regency England, Sense and Sensibility, The Secret Garden and Jane Eyre. Her audiobook production of Moby Dick, read by Jonathan Epstein was an Audie award finalist in Literary Classics and Fiction.
Alison’s most recent audiobook tour-de-force, The Civil War: In Their Own Words by Abraham Lincoln, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Harriet Beecher Stowe and Clarence, a 15-year-old soldier features an All-Star cast and is receiving rave reviews worldwide.
An early version of Alison’s new solo show, Grief…a Comedy was performed at the Great Barrington Public Theatre in June 2022. The show just played to sold out houses at the Soho Theatre in London in November 2023 and will begin a world tour in August 2024, when Alison will be appearing at the Edinburgh Festival. Alison’s new book, Grief…a Comedy, the book which springs from the show will be published in 2024.
For more information, visit alisonlarkin.com or alisonlarkinpresents.com.
About Shakespeare & Company
Shakespeare & Company was founded in 1978 by Tina Packer and a group of founding theater professionals. Located in the Berkshires of Massachusetts, the Company offers performance, education, and actor-training opportunities year-round, and attracts more than 40,000 patrons annually with a core of more than 150 Company Artists.
