Master Georgie

The Crimean War is the backdrop for the story of Master Georgie, told in turn by a physician, a photographer and the girl who loved him. As if relating the intense remembrance of his own war experience, Paul McGann gives a compellingly personal and intimate reading of the text. The brutality of that war is made more hideous by his even reading and by the innocent quality of his voice. Some of the characters are given personas that offer a change of tempo. Now and then, McGann injects a feminine range and a lighthearted speed. But the three characters who speak are not different in voice from each other, and the listener has the burden of differentiating among them. J.P. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine