ODD-TIME BOOK READING

It is believed that book reading has become much rarer nowadays. In the meantime, conventional paper books are being replaced with their electronic analogues that can be read on the screens of phones, tablets and e-readers. In light of such digital representations, audio books are becoming increasingly popular.

"Blast from the past"

Audio books have been in existence for a long time, ever since they were recorded on vinyl discs. There were times when discs with fairy tales and radio dramas could be found in every household. Today this genre is enjoying a renaissance - people can listen to audio books while riding in the subway or buses or sitting in traffic in their own cars or jogging in the morning and housewives can engross themselves in romantic prose while going through their usual business. Thus, we have seemingly revived audio books in our pursuit of diversions at odd moments. This fashion has already reached us too - audio books have begun to be "published" in Azerbaijan.

The Sesli Kitab project, which was launched by Gular Qasimova in September 2013, is geared towards voice imaging of the world famous classics. "I have been working on this idea for a long time. I felt there was demand for and interest in this phenomenon," Qasimova says. "Audio books are very popular in Europe, Turkey and Russia. There are professional studios in those countries involved in the production of audio books." Earlier, following Soviet traditions by inertia, it was common to dispassionately read the text over the radio in the announcer-like monotonous voice. Classic masterpieces presented in such a dull manner were unimpressive. Today, the quality of audio books is evaluated by their appeal to the readers which largely depends on how well and with what emotions an actor or a group of actors have read a particular text.

"It all started with great difficulty and not very professional since I read the first stories myself and posted them on social networks on a specially created page," the project manager says. "And then I discovered that my work was in great demand: about 3,200 people subscribed to my page just within a few months."

Qasimova recalls that the project began as an amateur undertaking - a group of friends recorded stories read out loud, created a website (seslikitab.az) and started to fill it with content. Within six months, as many as 30 recognized masterpieces of world literature were vocalized with the help of the fund.

Among the authors whose works can be heard on the Sesli Kitab website are Albert Camus, James Joyce, Hermann Hesse, Ryunosuke Akutagawa, Yasunari Kawabata, Haruki Murakami, Jorge Luis Borges, and many others. The site also contains a section of children's audio books.

"We are all amateurs, we have neither professional equipment nor professional actors, but we try to do everything at a good level," Qasimova says. "Keeping a studio and professional staff requires financial support, which we, unfortunately, do not have." A shortage of material in the Azerbaijani language is another problem. Certain stories and novels had to be translated by the project participants themselves.

Absolutely free

All books included in the Sesli Kitab project are distributed free of charge through the official website and social networks. Another similar project is a collection of audio stories prepared by the Baku's Fiction literary club. "I would like to emphasize that this product will be the first collection of science fiction stories in the audio book format on the Azerbaijani market," says Natalia Qaraxanova, one of the founders of the club. "Therefore, the first and foremost task of the club is to release a quality product which is in no way inferior to the best examples of this format on the foreign market."

Huge editorial work is being carried out and professional actors and sound engineers working with professional equipment have been invited. The collection will include stories of Azerbaijani science fiction writers who are regular contributors to the club as well as stories of foreign writers which caught fancy of Baku readers on the club's website or were specially written for this collection. Furthermore, the stories of Azerbaijani classics of science fiction such as Heinrich Altov, Maqsud Ibrahimbayov, Evgeny Voiskunsky, Isai Lukodianov and some others will be vocalized. The collection will be accompanied with a review of the Azerbaijani science fiction made by our writer Alexander Khakimov.

"At present, very few high-quality fiction works appear on the market," Qaraxanova says. "Therefore, I would like to introduce the greatest possible number of people to stories that are different in essence but equally good in quality, which were written by authors of different generations. And the audio book can help make it faster and in a more interesting way."

"Today, books of this kind are really very popular, I would even say in great demand," she continues. "People have less time for leisure which limits their possibility to read paper or electronic books, though the craving for reading has not vanished in fact; it just took on a different form."

Thus, according to the creator of the project, presently it is difficult to find a more current source of both self-education and simply interesting pastime than the audio book.