I’ve been to readings and talks given by writers such as Margaret Atwood, Neil Gaiman, and Malcolm Gladwell. Author events aren’t a new phenomena - these have been popular for decades. In fact, I’ve read that Charles Dickens was one of the first author celebrities and did speaking tours that were highly attended. The book that discussed this topic also mentioned that prior to Dickens most authors had few public events or speaking engagements. It just wasn’t a “thing.”

Recently I’ve come across a number of videos and recordings of authors who have passed away. I’ve enjoyed hearing these authors read their works or catching a glimpse of their personalities through their speaking patterns. What’s often interesting for me is how sometimes the sound of an author’s voice or their speech patterns don’t match what I had imagined.

It’s been fun to get to know some of these authors through video or audio clips.
Here are a few that I like:

Virginia Woolf  Ernest Hemingway David Foster Wallace  Roald Dahl

And here's an audio recording of Sylvia Plath reading her poem Tulips.
Try doing a YouTube or Internet search for some of your favorite authors and see if you can find any recordings. But don’t forget - the written word has been around for thousands of years, while sound recordings are just over 100 years old. So you won’t find recordings of authors who weren’t alive during the past 120 years. Enjoy discovering new ways to connect with some of your favorite authors!