Jalna: Free Audiobook and Listening Guide

Jalna, credited to Mazo De la Roche, 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 Jalna by Mazo De la Roche. Read in English by Atul Sharma. Jalna is the first book in a series of 16 novels written between 1927 and 1960 by the Canadian writer Mazo de la Roche. It has been adapted for both stage and screen, including Jalna, the 1935 film from director John Cromwell; The Whiteoaks of Jalna, a 13-part mini-series produced in 1972 by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation; and Jalna, a 1994 French-Canadian adaptation in 8 parts. A sprawling family saga that spans the century from 1854-1954, it tells the story of the Whiteoaks family of southern Ontario. Jalna is the name of their fictional manor house on the shore of Lake Ontario, named after a British garrison in the Indian city of Benares (Varanasi). It is modelled after a house in Mississauga, Canada, built in the 1850s for a retired officer of the British army, in which de la Roche lived as a child. Billed as Canada’s answer to The Forsyth Saga, the series recounts the conflicts and romantic entanglements of the wealthy and eccentric Whiteoaks. Beginning with the establishment of Jalna in 1863, the narrative revolves around sharp-tongued Grandma Adeline Whiteoak, the 99-year-old matriarch who dominates the family, and Renny, the eldest grandson, striving to bring order the family’s internecine battles and chronic financial instability. Considered a classic in Canadian literature, de la Roche continued to tell the family’s story through her finale in 1960, Morning at Jalna. The 16 novels do not form a sequence, and each can be read as an independent story with at least 6 prequels preceding the “first” novel, which won the inaugural Atlantic Monthly’s $10,000 Book Award when the author was 48. In addition, de la Roche was a prolific author of children’s stories, plays, short stories, and romantic fiction until her death. Whiteoaks of Jalna Captain Philip Whiteoak (of the British Army) b. 1815; deceased. + m. Adeline Court (of Ireland) b. 1825 Children of Captain Phillip and Adeline Augusta b. 1851, Nicholas b. 1853, Ernest b. 1855, Philip b. 1862 deceased Augusta m. Edwin Buckley (deceased) Nicholas m. Millicent (divorced) Phillip m. (1) Margaret Ramsey (deceased), mother of Meg (b. 1885) and Renny (b. 1887) Phillip m. (2) Mary Wakefield (deceased), mother of -Eden (b. 1902) m. Alayne Archer (b. 1897) -Piers (b. 1905) m. Pheasant Vaughn (b. 1908), daughter of Maurice Vaughn (b. 1885) -Finch (b. 1908) -Wakefield (b. 1916) - Summary by ASharma

Recording facts

• Recording title: Jalna
• Author credits: Mazo De la Roche
• Language: English
• Original MP3 tracks: 26
• Listed recording duration: 10:16:12

Catalogue topics

• romance
• conflict
• family saga

Opening tracks: first 24 of 26

1. 01 - THE RAKE'S PROGRESS — 26:20
2. 02 - THE FAMILY — 38:49
3. 03 - ERNEST AND SASHA — 12:54
4. 04 - NICHOLAS AND NIP — 14:20
5. 05 - PIERS AND HIS LOVE — 26:54
6. 06 - PHEASANT AND MAURICE — 19:01
7. 07 - PIERS AND PHEASANT MARRIED — 15:34
8. 08 - WELCOME TO JALNA — 25:07
9. 09 - EDEN AND ALAYNE — 21:46
10. 10 - ALAYNE AND LIFE — 11:57
11. 11 - BELOVED, IT IS MORN — 13:26
12. 12 - WELCOME AGAIN TO JALNA — 15:52
13. 13 - INSIDE THE GATES OF JALNA — 46:46
14. 14 - FINCH — 14:59
15. 15 - MORE ABOUT FINCH — 17:04
16. 16 - "IN THE PLACE WHERE THE TREE FALLETH" — 36:29
17. 17 - PILGRIM'S PROGRESS — 37:13
18. 18 - IN THE WIND AND RAIN — 23:04
19. 19 - A VARIETY OF SCENES — 39:47
20. 20 - MERRY GENTLEMEN — 38:59
21. 21 - EDEN AND PHEASANT — 11:03
22. 22 - WAKEFIELD'S BIRTHDAY — 29:12
23. 23 - JUNE NIGHT AT JALNA — 24:05
24. 24 - THE FLIGHT OF PHEASANT — 21:15

Listen to this recording

Open the complete recording and player on Internet Archive. The player includes the full track list and available download formats.

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.