The Mysterious Death on the Underground Railway | Emma Orczy | A Bitesized Audiobook
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Published 2022-04-06
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A lady travelling in a first class carriage of an underground train, alongside several other passengers, is found dead at the end of the line. Could it be suicide, or a most ingenious murder?
00:00:00 Introduction and biographical notes, written and read by Simon Stanhope
00:02:51 The Story begins
00:49:03 Credits and thanks
Emma (Emmushka) Orczy (1865–1947) was born Emma Magdolna Rozália Mária Jozefa Borbála Orczy de Orci, to an aristocratic family in Hungary. Her father was the composer Baron Félix Orczy de Orci, her mother Countess Emma Wass de Szentegyed et Cege, and her grandparents on both sides included senior politicians and royal councillors. The family fled their country estate in Tarnaörs when Emma was two years old, following a local peasant uprising, and her childhood was spent travelling through Europe, including periods in Budapest, Paris and Brussels, before eventually settling in London when she was 14. Emma's early ambition was to be a painter and she attended art school, where she met her future husband Henry George Montagu MacLean Barstow. They married in 1894 and were together for almost 50 years until Henry's death in 1942. They had one child, John, born in 1899.
It was after John's birth that she took up writing and her first success was a series of detective stories submitted to the Royal Magazine in 1901, featuring the character of the Old Man in the Corner. The old man is an "armchair detective" who sits in the corner of a tea room and – while tying and untying knots in a piece of string – unravels unsolved mysteries which have baffled the police, for the benefit of his regular listener, Miss Polly Burton, a "lady journalist". He is not a conventional detective as he doesn't work with the police, and very often sympathises with the criminals, so that even after he has explained the mystery he doesn't alert the authorities. The stories are also notable for their indirect style of narration: while they are told in the third person, the majority of the words are actually narrated by the Old Man talking to Polly. After his 1901 debut the Old Man went on to feature in regular magazine stories through the early 1900s, and his adventures were collected in book form in three volumes: The Case of Miss Elliot (1905), The Old Man in the Corner (1909, but chronologically the first stories) and Unravelled Knots (1925).
In 1903 Baroness Orczy created her most famous character, for which she is best remembered today: Sir Percy Blakeney, the Scarlet Pimpernel. This character established the idea of a dashing and daring figure who hides behind a meek disguise, so Orczy was in effect the originator of an enduring trope which was later followed by the creators of Superman, Batman and many others. In the same year the Pimpernel appeared in print, the character also became a huge stage hit in London, and the play (co-written by Emma and her husband) ran for over four years, a record-breaking run at that time. She was very proud of her Pimpernel stories, to the exclusion of most of her other work: her memoirs, published just weeks before her death, are dominated by the character, whereas she barely mentions the Old Man in the Corner at all. Baroness Orczy died at Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, in November 1947, aged 82.
'The Mysterious Death on the Underground Railway' first appeared in the Royal Magazine in July 1901. It later appeared in book form as part of the 1908 collection 'The Old Man in the Corner'. The story takes place on the Metropolitan Railway, in the days when steam trains still operated at the turn of the 20th century (as opposed to the electric "tube" trains which had been introduced on the new and deeper underground lines a decade or so earlier). Those who know the London transport system will be aware that the Metropolitan Line is still part of the wider Underground network, although some of the stations have closed or been renamed. In this story there's a reference to Aldersgate Street Station, which is now known as Barbican.
The title card shows a detail from an illustration by Samuel J. Hodson (1831–1908) depicting a steam train on the Metropolitan Railway c.1863, in the newly built tunnel at Praed Street junction near Paddington station.
Recording © Bitesized Audio 2022.
All Comments (21)
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If you enjoyed this story, you may like to visit my Bandcamp page where you can listen for free to my narrations of many more classic stories. You can also purchase and download an mp3 (or another format of your choice) of this or any of my other recordings: bitesizedaudio.bandcamp.com/ Listener support on Bandcamp helps me to keep producing new content like this. I also have a Patreon page: www.patreon.com/bitesizedaudio Or for occasional one-off support, you can Buy Me a Coffee here: www.buymeacoffee.com/bitesizedaudio Thanks for listening. Simon Stanhope (narrator) Timestamps: 00:00:00 Introduction and biographical notes, written and read by Simon Stanhope 00:02:51 The Story begins 00:49:03 Credits and thanks
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Dear Youtube mods and community managers, Simon is a audiobook narrator and voice actor - and we love him. Both of those roles he is doing are real jobs that creatives make serious money from - no matter WHAT they read. Famous actors voice act characters in animated movies like Shrek, Toy Story, Monsters Inc, etc. Audiobook narrators are a whole class of professionals that make Audible the multi-million dollar a year success that it is too. They're all paid very well for what they do - and Simon does a little bit of both with these stories he reads here. These are old, classic tales - classics that you'll find in anthologies such as the Oxford Collection of English Ghost stories and countless other academic and famous literary collections. These are major pieces of literary history, and he is keeping them alive for generations to come. Please rethink your stance with this channel. He deserves to be rewarded for the hard work he puts in selecting, reading, and voice acting these tales. -A concerned classic literary community
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What immeasurable value you bring to these old tales.
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It is so much effort at your end Simon. The narration to begin with must be extremely difficult and now to add to it you have the new intro. Appreciate your effort immensely and it would be completely understandable for your upload frequency to go-down given the new additions.
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Oh, perfect! Not only a new performance, but lots of additional details about the author and story. No other channel provides quite what you do, thank you so so much Simon!
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Hi Simon , glad everything is back to normal , you reading me a story . Life is good again 👍
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Keep rocking it, Simon. Your work is unique. 🎙
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So happy to see you again Simon, excellent presentation as always, and love the added information and selection of photographs and artwork. Absolutely wonderful!
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Perfect timing! A new Simon story for a dreary afternoon. I'm going to make some coffee 😊🥰 Also, love the new intro! I hope it helps youtube understand what you do 🙂
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So happy to see you uploading again!
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❤️❤️❤️ oh Simon so good to see you again. This will be my night’s treat. As you know I love everything you do xx❤️ long may it continue. Hope you are all well xx
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Loving the spoken biographical notes!
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Thank you, Simon. YOU perform these readings in YOUR own brilliant, eloquent and entertaining style. YOUR voice acting is top-of-the-class. And YOU put in so much work to curate, edit, layout and perform those wonderful stories. I am a big fan of YOUR work since my boy was born almost 4 years ago. He did not sleep... well 🥴.. for the first two years and your stories helped me through many sleepless nights, calming and entertaining me. So, thank YOU so much for YOUR work and hopefully some person at YouTube sees this comment and many more like it from other fans. It seemed so very unfair that they question and trouble your work. Youtube, this person does magic and hard work alike, please stop bugging him 🙏
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You and your channel are a treasure. It is infuriating that some dolt felt they were justified in demonetizing you. If anyone were deserving of a backwards leg sweep, it's them. Thanks for all of your artistry. There's a whole bunch of us rooting for you.
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Hello, so nice to meet our fantastic "time-traveler" narrator! Your was the first ghost and ghoulies channel I first subscribed too. For me the grandeur of well written and well narrated English, plus how you capture an "antique" sound- I hope I don't sound a fool, can't express myself as well as I should like. I recommended your channel to friends who love ghost stories and the Victorian and Edwardian Eras. I feel like I am on the Orient Express traveling in fantasy time accompanied by a great teller of tales, long into the night. Your voice is one of the most unusual I've ever heard and you've educated me by exposing me to many new authors and or stories. Thank you from a fan from Canada.
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Stellar. Such extraordinary excellence and such loving care is so rare for YouTube which unfortunately seems to have a monopoly in the area of self-produced creative content. The concept of YouTube is a wonderful thing on its face, but as we all know, some of the more current policies lack the same clarity and intelligence that the original notion certainly holds. You have created something so wonderful here, Simon, and I believe those of us who have discovered you and your no less than perfect narration of these singular, elegant old stories, have discovered a gift we never expected in life. You and what you have created here is truly that unique and that special. And without hyperbole I think I can claim that most of us feel there's no way we can adequately thank you or express our gratitude. Suffice to say, we are fans for life. With affection and much appreciation, Deah~ Connecticut, US
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v thankful you’re able to post again!!!
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It’s so good to have a new story from you Simon. You’ve helped me through many sleepless nights😊 with your wonderful stories and excellent voice acting. YouTube is a little misguided ( in my humble opinion) in thinking you didn’t add value. Your new format is even more “added value”. A grateful Canadian fan.
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Have YouTube finally seen sense? You seem to be doing more work, and adding even greater value. Bravo, Simon. Bravo!
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Absolutely fabulous! Lady author.... lady journalist! Normally from that period the female author mostly had male character’s I found so I am really exited about this! Great choice Simon! We appreciate your amazing talent so much on this channel! This story is exactly my cup of tea! Thank you 🙏
