An Excursion to the Lakes in Westmoreland and Cumberland, August 1773: Free Audiobook and Listening Guide

An Excursion to the Lakes in Westmoreland and Cumberland, August 1773, credited to William Hutchinson, is available as a LibriVox volunteer audiobook. This guide identifies the recording, its source summary and its audio tracks.

About the work

The LibriVox catalogue summary, preserved with the recording, reads:

LibriVox recording of An Excursion to the Lakes in Westmoreland and Cumberland, August 1773 by William Hutchinson. Read in English by Phil Benson In the summer of 1773, lawyer and antiquarian William Hutchinson set out from his home in County Durham on a tour of the English Lake District. Accompanied by his brother, George Allan, he travelled by horseback from Bowes to Penrith and Keswick, down through Grasmere and Ambleside to Kendal, and back via Kirkby Stephen to County Durham. When he returned home he wrote what may be the first guidebook to the Lakes. Written in a pre-Romantic era when English writers were just beginning to discover the delights of the scenic view, Hutchinson's account vividly describes a district that would soon be the haunt of literary giants such as Wordsworth, Southey, Matthew Arnold and Harriett Martineau. These recordings were made 'on site' as I followed in Hutchinson's footsteps during the cold and wet early spring of 2018. - Summary by Phil Benson

Recording facts

• Recording title: An Excursion to the Lakes in Westmoreland and Cumberland, August 1773
• Author credits: William Hutchinson
• Language: English
• Original MP3 tracks: 6
• Listed recording duration: 2:26:16

Catalogue topics

• Romanticism
• scenery
• Lake District

Track guide

1. 01 - From Bowes to Appleby — 28:50
2. 02 - From Brougham Castle to Ullswater — 31:51
3. 03 - In and around Penrith — 22:15
4. 04 - Derwentwater — 26:14
5. 05 - Around Keswick — 16:53
6. 06 - Grasmere and home via Kendal — 20:13

Listen to this recording

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Source and rights

This is a record from LibriVox's official Internet Archive collection, with a public-domain licence recorded in its metadata. LibriVox's policy includes its catalogue summaries as well as its recordings. Its public-domain assessment follows United States law; copyright status can differ elsewhere. The summary and track facts are reproduced and reformatted from that record. Dates attached to the archive upload are not treated as original book publication dates.