[73巻] Urashima Taro（うらしま太郎・英語版）: きいろいとり文庫　その73

きいろいとり文庫 その73

By: YellowBirdProject

Narrated by: Kay Shibatani

子どものころに聞いたあのお話しを、オーディオブックでお楽しみください。

原作：日本の昔話「海辺の村に母と二人で住んでいる太郎は、ある日漁の帰りに、砂浜で子どもたちにいじめられている、一匹のかめを見つけました・・」
別売りのイラスト付き電子書籍に対応。合わせてご購入いただければ、言語学習用にも最適です。公式サイト　http://yellow-bird.info

※BGMなし版もセットで収録されています。
※当コンテンツに含まれている言語は『英語』のみです。他言語版をお求めの方は、別途お買い求めください。©YellowBirdProject

Wonderful short story ruined by robotic narration

This has been one of my favorite Japanese folk tales for thirty-plus years, and finding English-language versions has become incredibly difficult. I was excited to find this version and played it immediately upon purchase.

And that was my mistake.

The fifteen-minute length is for the entire title; the story has two versions - with and without intro and exit music. Not a huge deal, but it is a bit misleading. The actual story clocks in at around the seven-minute mark. To be completely honest, seven minutes felt too long. I struggled to finish this, telling myself that I love this story and it couldn't be that bad, right? No, wrong. It really is that bad.

Most of the narration is flat and robotic; I wouldn't be surprised to find out that this is an AI recording. The only thing that leads me to believe that this is a human voice actor is the small changes in voice to reflect different characters; unfortunately, the voices aren't fun or engaging to listen to. When there are significant changes in inflection, they seem to come at random.

Because the book didn't cost much, I'm more than happy to eat the tiny loss for the possibility of transcribing it into text for myself. I wouldn't recognize anyone else make the mistake that I've made.