Showing results by publisher "Bookstream Audiobooks" in Satire

"The Man That Was Used Up", sometimes subtitled "A Tale of the Late Bugaboo and Kickapoo Campaign", is a short story and satire by Edgar Allan Poe. It was first published in August 1839 in Burton's Gentleman's Magazine. The story follows an unnamed narrator who seeks out the famous war hero John A. B. C. Smith. He becomes suspicious that Smith has some deep secret when others refuse to describe him, instead remarking only on the latest advancements in technology. When he finally meets Smith, the man must first be assembled piece by piece.

As it is well known that the "wise men" came "from the East," and as Mr. Touch-and-go Bullet-head came from the East, it follows that Mr. Bullet-head was a wise man; and if collateral proof of the matter be needed, here we have it — Mr. B. was an editor. Irascibility was his sole foible; for in fact the obstinacy of which men accused him was anything but his foible, since he justly considered it his forte. It was his strong point — his virtue; and it would have required all the logic of a Brownson to convince him that it was "anything else.

Let me introduce you to Signora Psyche Zenobia. An adopted name of course, but for someone so flamboyant, appropriate. The good signora has aspirations. She would like to be a writer. At present she is the corresponding secretary to an interesting group of notables in Philadelphia which goes by a lengthy name with the initials of P.R.E.T.T.Y. B.L.U.E. B.A.T.C.H.! But how to get published? She travels to Edinburgh to meet with the esteemed proprietor and editor of 'Blackwood Magazine.' A real publication of the 1830s.

"Animal Farm" is Orwell's classic satire of the Russian Revolution - an account of the bold struggle, initiated by the animals, that transforms Mr. Jones's Manor Farm into Animal Farm - a wholly democratic society built on the credo that All Animals Are Created Equal. But are they?

Chesterton demonstrates his intense distrust of power and "progressives," railing against Prohibition, vegetarianism, theosophy, and other "dreary and oppressive" forces of modernity. In a spirited response to the government's attempt to curtail alcohol sales, Humphrey Pump (called Hump) a pub owner in the fishing village of Pebblewick takes to the road in a donkey cart. Accompanied by Captain Patrick Dalroy, a crimson-haired giant with a tendency to burst into song, Hump provisions the cart with a cask of good rum, a giant round of cheese, and the signpost from his pub, The Flying Inn.

Nikolai Gogol was one of the first to use the technique of the grotesque. According to Viktor Shklovsky, Gogol's strange style of writing resembles the "ostranenie" technique of defamiliarization. His early works, such as Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka, were influenced by his Ukrainian upbringing, Ukrainian culture and folklore. HOW THE TWO IVANS QUARRELLED: A fine pelisse has Ivan Ivanovitch! splendid! And what lambskin! deuce take it, what lambskin! blue-black with silver lights. I'll forfeit, I know not what, if you find any one else owning such a one.

With the onset of Prohibition, the Sheehan Billiard Room in Chicago became a sordid haunt for hard drinkers. A certain Old Bugs, a mature man corroded by vices but capable of showing, at long intervals, the typical sensitivity of educated people works as a kitchen cleaner. When the young Alfred Trever, initiated by his friend Pete Schultz on the way of drinking, arrives at the Sheehan's tavern, Old Bugs will try to convince him not to make the same mistake as he did.