Selected Shorts: A Celebration of the Short Story
Symphony Space, Audio CD, $28
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Short stories offer boundless opportunities, coming alive in multiple ways. Hearing, rather than reading, a wonderful story — even one as familiar as Shirley Jackson’s “Country Lovers” or Richard Ford’s “The Communist” — makes it fresh and new when performed by such actors as William Hurt and Robert Sean Leonard. Recorded live for the long-running “Selected Shorts” radio series, many performances are available on CD or as audio downloads; they also are broadcast on public radio stations, so check your local listings or the Public Radio International Web site (pri.org/selected-shorts.html). Isaiah Sheffer hosts the short-story buffet, a genial guide in this remarkable series.