Portfolio 2 Columns

11-year-old actor Eden Giuliano presents a brand new line of exciting children’s stories from Icon! This is the handwritten book that Carroll wrote for private use before being urged to develop it later into Alice in Wonderland. It was generously illustrated by Carrol and meant to entertain his family and friends. When a sick child in a hospital enjoyed it so much, the mother wrote him saying it had distracted her for a bit from her pain and led eventually to Carroll expanding the story. The Reverend Charles Lutwidge Dodgson and the Reverend Robinson Duckworth rowed in a boat, on 4 July 1862, up the Isis with the three young daughters of Henry Liddell, (the Vice-Chancellor of Oxford University and Dean of Christ Church) : Lorina Charlotte Liddell (aged 13, born 1849); Alice Pleasance Liddell (aged 10, born 1852); Edith Mary Liddell (aged 8, born 1853). The journey began at Folly Bridge near Oxford and ended five miles away in the village of Godstow. During the trip the Reverend Dodgson told the girls a story that featured a bored little girl named Alice who goes looking for an adventure. The girls loved it, and Alice Liddell asked Dodgson to write it down for her. He began writing the manuscript of the story the next day, although that earliest version no longer exists. The girls and Dodgson took another boat trip a month later when he elaborated the plot to the story of Alice, and in November he began working on the manuscript in earnest. We know you will enjoy this very special series from Icon Audio Arts hosted by young Eden Giuliano!

The Great Gatsby is a 1925 novel by American writer F. Scott Fitzgerald. Set in the Jazz Age on Long Island, the novel depicts narrator Nick Carraway’s interactions with mysterious millionaire Jay Gatsby and Gatsby’s obsession to reunite with his former lover, Daisy Buchanan. A youthful romance Fitzgerald had with socialite Ginevra King, and the riotous parties he attended on Long Island’s North Shore in 1922 inspired the novel. Following a move to the French Riviera, he completed a rough draft in 1924. He submitted the draft to editor Maxwell Perkins, who persuaded Fitzgerald to revise the work over the following winter. After his revisions, Fitzgerald was satisfied with the text, but remained ambivalent about the book’s title and considered several alternatives. After its publication by Scribner’s in April 1925, The Great Gatsby received generally favorable reviews, although some literary critics believed it did not hold up to Fitzgerald’s previous efforts and signaled the end of the author’s literary achievements. Despite the warm critical reception, Gatsby was a commercial failure. The book sold fewer than 20,000 copies by October, and Fitzgerald’s hopes of a monetary windfall from the novel were unrealized. When the author died in 1940, he believed himself to be a failure and his work forgotten. After his death, the novel faced a critical and scholarly re-examination amid World War II, and it soon became a core part of most American high school curricula and a focus of American popular culture. Numerous stage and film adaptations followed in the subsequent decades. Gatsby continues to attract popular and scholarly attention. The novel was most recently adapted to film in 2013 by director Baz Luhrmann, while contemporary scholars emphasize the novel’s treatment of social class, inherited wealth compared to those who are self-made, race, environmentalism, and its cynical attitude towards the American dream.

Nicholas Nickleby is a young Devonshire man of nineteen, handsome and hot headed, devoted to his sister Kate and his parents. Following the death of Nicholas’s father, they find themselves penniless, and travel to London to seek help from his uncle, Ralph Nickleby, a heartless, cunning rogue. He grudgingly finds employment for Nicholas in Dotheby Hall, a school in Yorkshire run by the brutal Mr. and Mrs. Wackford Squeers. Appalled at the condition and treatment of the school children, Nicholas rebels, escaping with Smike, a young man/child who has become devoted to him. Nicholas, in search of employment, first tutors children of the Kenwigs family. Later he meets the flamboyant Mr.Vincent Crummles, and along with Smike, joins his theatrical troupe, with a band of hilarious actors. Among his many tasks,

Once again the Old Gray Goose delivers a collection of funny, heartwarming tales perfected over six decades of campfires and thousands of enthusiastic young campers as part of his amazing lifelong work with the YMCA. Here is the definitive collection of down-home songs and stories for children of all ages, affectionately told by a compassionate man who genuinely cares about young people.

Once again the Old Gray Goose delivers a collection of funny, heartwarming tales perfected over six decades of campfires and thousands of enthusiastic young campers as part of his amazing lifelong work with the YMCA. Here is the definitive collection of down-home songs and stories for children of all ages, affectionately told by a compassionate man who genuinely cares about young people.

Once again the Old Gray Goose delivers a collection of funny, heartwarming tales perfected over six decades of campfires and thousands of enthusiastic young campers as part of his amazing lifelong work with the YMCA. Here is the definitive collection of down-home songs and stories for children of all ages, affectionately told by a compassionate man who genuinely cares about young people.

Once again the Old Gray Goose delivers a collection of funny, heartwarming tales perfected over six decades of campfires and thousands of enthusiastic young campers as part of his amazing lifelong work with the YMCA. Here is the definitive collection of down-home songs and stories for children of all ages, affectionately told by a compassionate man who genuinely cares about young people.

Now here is a children’s interview with master storyteller The Old Gray Goose truly worth its weight in gold! Goose’s own renarkable story in his own words. For Goose’s longtime fans or first-time Gooselings, here is the real live Goose, just for you!