The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith
Naxos, 6 CDs, £19.99

To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
Naxos, 6 CDs, £19.99

Adam Smith is now the darling of the dog-eat-dog post-Keynesian economic climate, but Hugh Griffith, the abridger and introducer of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations (Naxos, 6 CDs, £19.99, offer £17.99 inc p&p from 0870 1608080 or timesonline.co.uk/booksfirst) is frank about the difficulties of the legendary 1776 roadmap of market economics. “Like Marx's Capital, it is long, tough and dense...one of those eternal classics of human thought that hardly anyone reads”.

He is, however, persuasive about its virtues: “The hallmark of genius is not constructing things that are complex but seeing the significance of things that are simple”. As soon as the listener gets past the daunting table of contents, Smith's genius for vivid phrases and everyday examples becomes apparent. “The real price of everything is the toil and trouble of acquiring it.”

There is also a historical fascination in hearing how pin factories operated, and that furniture, as well as houses, was once rented out by the week. Griffith's discerning abridgement combined with the precise immediacy of Sean Barratt's suitably north British narration make this production the perfect way of getting acquainted with the writings of a man who will make you think more clearly about getting and spending.

Virginia Woolf's To The Lighthouse (Naxos, 6 CDs, £19.99, offer £17.99) is the latest unabridged modern classic in a series that is shaking up the image of audiobooks. Vague and lovely, Mrs Ramsay is at the hub of her family's holiday on Skye, understanding and subtly influencing her gaggle of children, her insensitive philsopher husband and his oddly assorted acolytes.

This is a book that builds up its effects with many to-be-explained-later details. I wasn't sure that it would work, but it does: thanks largely to Juliet Stevenson, a natural choice as narrator. Her husky, unhurried voice and skilful breathing copes effortlessly with Woolf's fondness for sentences that wind endless as ivy down the page.

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