1993 The Tortoise & the Hare CD-ROM. Production Manager George Fleischman. Produced in USA. Interactive Publishing Corporation. $10 at the Omaha Computer Swap Meet, May, '98.
This is a simple presentation of TH on cartoon slides with the text on the screen highlighted phrase by phrase while it is read. A listener can also click on any word to have it said or on any object to see and hear the word. The reading is enhanced with simple musical background and some sound effects. The speed of the presentation is so slow that it is burdensome to any but those who are learning to read. The text is copyrighted by National Textbook Company, the producers of Tina la Tortuga y Carlos el Conejo/Tina the Turtle and Carlos the Rabbit (1972/90). An audio cassette is included with the same sound track (listed separately under 1993) and so are crayons to color the printable black-and-white slides. To get the CD-ROM running, I followed the sequence Start/Run/D:/OK and double-clicked on the "go.bat" icon. Richie and Tina are very good friends, but Richie wakes up one day in a very bad mood and cannot stop taunting Tina with the things she cannot do while he can. Tina gets angry and demands a race. Throughout these interchanges there is a great little frog observer. There is also a wonderful expression on Richie's face after the lost race. Tina announces to him: "You go far little by little."
1993 The Tortoise & the Hare. Production Manager George Fleischman. Produced in USA. Interactive Publishing Corporation. $10 from Omaha Computer Swap Meet, May, '98.
This audio cassette reproduces the narrative of the CD-ROM of the same name, year, and manufacturer. See my notes there. The reading is enhanced with simple musical background and some sound effects. The text is copyrighted by National Textbook Company, the producers of Tina la Tortuga y Carlos el Conejo/Tina the Turtle and Carlos the Rabbit (1972/90). Richie and Tina are very good friends, but Richie wakes up one day in a very bad mood and cannot stop taunting Tina with the things she cannot do while he can. Tina gets angry and demands a race. Tina announces to him: "You go far little by little."
Written by Brian Gleeson. Told by Ben Kingsley. Music by Ravi Shankar and others. Drawings by Kurt Vargö. Boxed with an accompanying story poster. Rowayton, CT: Rabbit Ears Productions. $5.98 somewhere before May, '02.
A lively disk. The accompanying poster has the whole text on its back. As on the audio cassette tape from the same project, both the voice and the music are strong. Kingsley adopts various voices well, especially for the jackal. The sound track of some 25 minutes seems to be followed by an individual instrumental track of each episode without voices. Well done! The package was on sale, reduced from $12.95.
1991 The Tiger and the Brahmin. Written by Brian Gleeson. Told by Ben Kingsley. Music by Ravi Shankar. Boxed for use with an accompanying book of the same title published in 1992. Rowayton, CT: Rabbit Ears Productions. $20 by mail from Elaine Woodford, Haddonfield, NJ, Oct., '97.
A lively tape to go with a very lively book. Both the voice and the music are strong. Kingsley adopts various voices well, especially for the jackal. Both the book and the tape are very well done. See also the compact disk and poster from the same project.
