Strange Interlude: Free Audiobook and Listening Guide

Strange Interlude, credited to Eugene O'Neill, 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 Strange Interlude by Eugene O'Neill. Read in English by LibriVox Volunteers. Winner of the 1928 Pulitzer Prize, Strange Interlude is a Freudian melodrama that seeks to explore the vast, unfathomable murk of the human unconscious. To accomplish this goal, playwright Eugene O’Neill employed an experimental use of soliloquies, where characters revealed their unvarnished inner thoughts directly to the audience, revealing the psychic turmoil lurking beneath the placid masks of polite society. Following its first exhibitions, Strange Interlude also became a lightning rod of controversy and censorship due to its frank portrayals of topics such as abortion, infidelity, sexual desire, and mental illness. Set in the aftermath of World War I, the play follows the lives of several characters over the span of two decades. Our central character, Nina Leeds, is haunted by the recent death of her fiancé during the war. Her despair and despondency gradually take an inward, self-destructive turn, as she indulges in a number of sordid affairs before tumbling into a loveless marriage. Thus begins a chain of events that will haunt the lives of all who fall within Nina’s orbit. - Summary by ChuckW

Recording facts

• Recording title: Strange Interlude
• Author credits: Eugene O'Neill
• Language: English
• Original MP3 tracks: 9
• Listed recording duration: 8:11:03

Catalogue topics

• expressionism
• freudian
• experimental drama
• freudian melodrama

Track guide

1. 01 - Act One — 54:39
2. 02 - Act Two — 57:14
3. 03 - Act Three — 44:00
4. 04 - Act Four — 58:12
5. 05 - Act Five — 51:21
6. 06 - Act Six — 1:04:18
7. 07 - Act Seven — 50:20
8. 08 - Act Eight — 1:07:45
9. 09 - Act Nine — 43:14

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.