PowerShell/Scripts/speak-english.ps1

<#
.SYNTAX       speak-english.ps1 [<text>]
.DESCRIPTION  speaks the given text with an English text-to-speech (TTS) voice
.LINK         https://github.com/fleschutz/PowerShell
.NOTES        Author: Markus Fleschutz / License: CC0
#>

param($Text = "")
if ("$Text" -eq "") { $Text = read-host "Enter the text to speak" }

try {
	$Voice = new-object -ComObject SAPI.SPVoice
	$Voices = $Voice.GetVoices()
	foreach ($OtherVoice in $Voices) {
		$Description = $OtherVoice.GetDescription()
		if ($Description -notlike "*- English*") { continue }
#		write-progress "$Text"
		$Voice.Voice = $OtherVoice
		[void]$Voice.Speak($Text)
#		write-progress -complete "$Text"
		exit 0
	}
	write-error "Sorry, no English text-to-speech (TTS) voice found"
	exit 1
} catch {
	write-error "ERROR: line $($_.InvocationInfo.ScriptLineNumber): $($Error[0])"
	exit 1
}