D. Ratner
My blogs
| Occupation | Teacher, Writer, Tai-Tai, Bon Vivant, Raconteur |
|---|---|
| Location | Shanghai, China |
| Introduction | I'm the luckiest man in the world. Possibly I mean the most blessed. Can I be both? Let me get back to you . . . |
| Interests | Nature of the universe, riddle of existence, uses for jello |
| Favorite movies | The Battleship Potemkin, Johnny Stecchino, They Shoot Horses Don't They, Wayne's World, Dr. Strangelove, Manhattan, Being There, Down By Law |
| Favorite music | Green Day, Cake, Gilberto Gil, Stevie Wonder, Barry White, The Clash, Buddy Guy, Aretha Franklin, John Lennon, Norah Jones, Beck, Damien Rice, Elvis Costello, Etta James |
| Favorite books | Partial list:, The Sentimental Education, Breakfast of Champions,The New York Trilogy (Auster), The Periodic Table (Levi), Tropic of Cancer, The Handmaid's Tale,The Confidence Man: His Masquerade (Melville), Shizuko's Daughter, Haroun and the Sea of Stories (Rushdie), The Yellow Wallpaper, On the Road, Invisible Man, The Narrative of Aurthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket (Poe), Autobiography of Malcolm X, Paradise Lost, Heart of Darkness, Invisible Man, An American Childhood, Doctor Jekyll and Mister Hyde, The Corrections, Seize the Day, The Little Prince, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Remains of the Day, Hard Times, The Idiot (Dostoevsky -- not the how-to series), Leaves of Grass, Puddin'head Wilson, The Complete Works of John Keats, Sense and Sensibility, The Sound and the Fury, King Lear, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, Ficciones (Borges), The Thurber Carnival, Love in the Time of Cholera, The Marrow of Tradition (Chesnutt), The Conjure Tales of Charles W. Chesnutt, A Wrinkle in Time, The Writing Life (Dillard), A Glossary of Literary Terms (M. H. Abrams), The Trial of Socrates (I.F. Stone), Seven Years in Tibet, The Rough Guide to China, Man and His Symbols, The Selected Poems of Rainer Maria Rilke (Translated by Stephen Mitchell), The Red and the Black, Moby Dick, Lolita, Vanity Fair (Thackeray), The Awakening, When We Were Orphans, Red Azalea, The Great Gatsby, Wise Children (Carter), The Life of Pi, The World According to Garp, Anna Karenina, Our Dumb Century . . . |
For your birthday, your aunt gave you a maple syrup dispenser shaped like a rooster. Please write her a thank-you note:
Auntie, The rooster is JUST what I wanted! Finally I have a worthy repository for the Grade B syrup you sent me in the foil pouches, which I have been keeping in the planter Uncle Bink made. How do you guys always know? xxoo, Your affectionate nephew, David