War of the Worlds

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Audiobooks
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Description

Opening narration from War of the Worlds

Vocal Characteristics

Language

English

Voice Age

Senior (55+)

Accents

British (General) British (Received Pronunciation - RP, BBC)

Transcript

Note: Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and may contain errors.
No one would have believed in the last years of the 19th century that human affairs were being watched from the timeless worlds of space. No one could have dreamed we were being scrutinised. As someone with a microscope studies creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water, few men even consider the possibility of life on other planets. And yet across the Gulf of space, minds immeasurably superior to ours regarded this earth with envious eyes. And slowly and surely they drew their plans against us. At midnight on the 12th of August, a huge mass of luminous gas erupted from Mars and sped towards Earth across 200 million miles. Avoid invisibly hurtling to orders came the first of the missiles that were to bring so much calamity to earth. As I watched, there was another jet of gas. It was another missile starting on its way. Unanswered how it wass for the next 10 nights, a flare spurting out from Mars, bright green, drawing a green mist behind it, a beautiful but somehow disturbing sight. Ogilvy, the astronomer assured me we were in no danger. He was convinced there could be no life on that remote forbidding planet. Then came the night the first missile approached Earth. It was thought to be an ordinary falling star, but the next day there was a huge crater in the middle of the common. Ogilvy came to examine what lay there a cylinder 30 yards across, glowing hot with faint sounds of movement coming from within. Suddenly, the top began moving, rotating, unscrewing, and Ogilvy feared there was a man inside trying to escape. He rushed to the cylinder, but the intense heat stopped him before he could burn himself on the metal. It seems totally incredible to me now that everyone spent that evening as though it were just like any other. From the railway station came the sound of shunting trains ringing and rumbling, softened almost into melody about the distance. It all seemed so safe and tranquil. Next morning, a crowd gathered on the common hypnotised by the unscrewing of the cylinder, two feet of shining screw projected when suddenly the lid fell off. Two luminous, disc like eyes appeared above the rim. A huge, rounded bulk, larger than a bear rose up slowly, glistening like wet leather. It's Lipa's mouth, quivered and slathered on DH, snake like tentacles writhed as the clumsy body heaved and pulsated. A few young men crept closer to the pit. A total funnel rose, then an invisible ray of heat let from man to man. And there was a bright glare as each was instantly turned to fire every tree and Bush became a mass of flames. At the touch of his savage, unearthly heat, Ray people clawed their way off the common on Iran, too. I felt I was being toid, that I was on the very verge of safety, fearful that this mysterious death would leap after me and strike me down. At last, I reach in a Berryhill, and in the dim coolness of my home, I wrote an account for my newspaper. Before I sank into a restless, haunted to sleep, I woke to alien sounds of hammering from the pit and hurried to the railway station to buy the paper around me. The daily routine of life working, eating sleeping was continuing serenely, as it had for countless years on horse willkommen. The Martians continued hammering and staring sleepless, indefatigable at work upon the machines they were making now and again, a light like the beam of a warship's searchlight swept the common on the heat Ray was ready to follow. That afternoon, a company of soldiers came through and deployed along the edge of the common to form the cordon. That evening there was a violent crash, and I realised with horror that my home was now in range of the Martians hatred. At dawn, a falling star with a trail of green mist behind it landed with a flash like summer lightning. This was the second cylinder.