The Windhover: Free Audiobook and Listening Guide

The Windhover, credited to Gerard Manley Hopkins, 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 volunteers bring you 11 recordings of The Windhover by Gerard Manley Hopkins. This was the Weekly Poetry project for March 12, 2017. Read in English by annie70; Bruce Kachuk; David Lawrence; Eva Davis; fshort; Greg Giordano; KyoBlanchett; Lee Ann Howlett; Scotty Smith; Tony Addison and Tomas Peter. "Windhover" is another name for the common kestrel (Falco tinnunculus). The name refers to the bird's ability to hover in midair while hunting prey. In the poem, the narrator admires the bird as it hovers in the air, suggesting that it controls the wind as a man may control a horse. The bird then suddenly swoops downwards and "rebuffed the big wind". The bird can be viewed as a metaphor for Christ or of divine epiphany. Hopkins called "The Windhover" "the best thing [he] ever wrote". It commonly appears in anthologies and has lent itself to many interpretations. ( Wikipedia)

Recording facts

• Recording title: The Windhover
• Author credits: Gerard Manley Hopkins
• Language: English
• Original MP3 tracks: 11
• Listed recording duration: 17:28

Catalogue topics

• litereature
• nature
• religion
• hunting
• birds
• falcon

Track guide

1. 01 - The Windhover - Read by AF — 1:43
2. 02 - The Windhover - Read by BK — 1:48
3. 03 - The Windhover - Read by DL — 1:27
4. 04 - The Windhover - Read by ED — 1:46
5. 05 - The Windhover - Read by FS — 1:31
6. 06 - The Windhover - Read by GG — 1:34
7. 07 - The Windhover - Read by KB — 1:29
8. 08 - The Windhover - Read by LAH — 1:38
9. 09 - The Windhover - Read by SWS — 1:29
10. 10 - The Windhover - Read by TA — 1:25
11. 11 - The Windhover - Read by TP — 1:38

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.