Audiobooks narrated by Michael Walsh

Last Stands: Why Men Fight When All Is Lost

Award-winning author Michael Walsh celebrates the masculine attributes of heroism that forged American civilization and Western culture by exploring historical battles in which soldiers chose death over dishonor. In our time, men are increasingly denied their heritage as warriors. A survival instinct that's part of the human condition, the drive to wage war is natural. Without war, neither the United States nor any other country would exist. The technology that has eased manual labor, extended life spans, and become an integral part of our lives and culture has often evolved from wartime scientific advancements. War is necessary to defend the social and political principles that define the virtues and freedoms of America and other Western nations. We should not be ashamed of the heroes who sacrificed their lives to build a better world. We should honor them. The son of a Korean War veteran of the Inchon landing and the battle of the Chosin Reservoir with the US Marine Corps, Michael Walsh knows all about heroism, valor, and the call of duty that requires men to fight for something greater than themselves to protect their families, countrymen, and most of all their fellow soldiers. In Last Stands, Walsh reveals the causes, outcomes, and lasting legacies of more than a dozen battles in which a small fighting force refused to surrender to a far larger force, often dying to the last man. From the Spartans' defiance at Thermopylae and Roland's epic defense of Charlemagne's rear guard at Roncevaux Pass, through Santa Anna's siege of the Alamo-defended by Davy Crockett and Jim Bowie-to the clash at the Little Big Horn between Crazy Horse's Sioux Nation and George Armstrong Custer's Seventh Cavalry, to the Soviets' titanic struggle against the German Wehrmacht at Stalingrad, and more, Walsh reminds us of the debt we owe to heroes willing to risk their lives against overwhelming odds-and how these sacrifices and battles are not only a part of military history but also of our common civilizational heritage.

Michael Walsh (Author), Michael Walsh (Narrator)

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Who’s Afraid of Opera?: A Highly Opinionated, Informative, and Entertaining Guide to Appreciating Op

For anyone who has been intimidated, overwhelmed, or just plain confused by what they think opera is, Who’s Afraid of Opera? offers a lively, readable guide to what author Michael Walsh describes as “the greatest art form yet invented by humankind.” From opera’s origins in Renaissance Italy to the Who’s rock odyssey “Tommy,” and Stephen Sondheim’s “Into the Woods,” Walsh explores what opera is and what it’s not, what makes a great singer, and why it takes Tristan so long to die. So, curtains up! It’s time to settle into your seat, close up your program, and watch the house lights go down. Get ready for the musical ride of your life.

Michael Walsh (Author), Michael Walsh (Narrator)

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White Cargo: The Forgotten History of Britain's White Slaves in America

White Cargo is the forgotten story of the thousands of Britons who lived and died in bondage in Britain's American colonies. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, more than 300,000 white people were shipped to America as slaves. Urchins were swept up from London's streets to labor in the tobacco fields, where life expectancy was no more than two years. Brothels were raided to provide "breeders" for Virginia. Hopeful migrants were duped into signing as indentured servants, unaware they would become personal property who could be bought, sold, and even gambled away. Transported convicts were paraded for sale like livestock. Drawing on letters crying for help, diaries, and court and government archives, Don Jordan and Michael Walsh demonstrate that the brutalities usually associated with black slavery alone were perpetrated on whites throughout British rule. The trade ended with American independence, but the British still tried to sell convicts in their former colonies, which prompted one of the most audacious plots in Anglo-American history. This is a saga of exploration and cruelty spanning 170 years that has been submerged under the overwhelming memory of black slavery. White Cargo brings the brutal, uncomfortable story to the surface.

Don Jordan, Michael Walsh (Author), Michael Walsh, Roger Clark (Narrator)

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The Fiery Angel: Art, Culture, Sex, Politics, and the Struggle for the Soul of the West

Without an understanding and appreciation of the culture we seek to preserve and protect, the defense of Western civilization is fundamentally futile; a culture that believes in nothing cannot defend itself, because it has nothing to defend. The past not only still has something to tell us, but it also has something that it must tell us. In this profound and wide-ranging historical survey, Michael Walsh illuminates the ways that the narrative and visual arts both reflect and affect the course of political history, outlining the way forward by arguing for the restoration of the Heroic Narrative that forms the basis of all Western cultural and religious traditions. Let us listen, then, to the angels of our nature, for better and worse. They have much to tell us, if only we will listen.

Michael Walsh (Author), Michael Walsh (Narrator)

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The Devil's Pleasure Palace: The Cult of Critical Theory and the Subversion of the West

In the aftermath of World War II, America stood alone as the world's premier military power. Yet its martial confidence contrasted vividly with its sense of cultural inferiority. Still looking to a defeated and dispirited Europe for intellectual and artistic guidance, burgeoning trans-national elite in New York and Washington embraced not only the war's refugees but many of their ideas as well, and nothing has proven more pernicious than those of the Frankfurt School and its reactionary philosophy of "critical theory." At once overly intellectualized and emotionally juvenile, Critical Theory-like Pandora's Box-released a horde of demons into the American psyche. When everything could be questioned, nothing could be real, and the muscular, confident empiricism that had just won the war gave way, in less than a generation, to a central-European nihilism celebrated on college campuses across the United States. In The Devil's Pleasure Palace Michael Walsh looks at how Critical Theory took root in America and came to affect nearly every aspect of American life and society-and what can be done to stop it.

Michael Walsh (Author), Michael Walsh (Narrator)

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Audiobooks Narrated by Michael Walsh