MS Maven
My blogs
Blogs I follow
| Gender | Female |
|---|---|
| Industry | Education |
| Occupation | Adjunct Professor |
| Location | Beautiful Downtown Johnson City, by way of Columbus, OH and Clemson, SC, Tennessee, United States |
| Introduction | I'm a coffee-drinking, New York Times-reading Maven w/ a passion for teaching, film, the written word, and jazz. And And you ain't read nothin' yet! |
| Interests | Literature, film, jazz, beer, media, politics, civil liberties, education, Oscar prognostication, politics, sports, Ohio State football, Clemson anything (my alma mater Master'swise), UNC hoops, Dodgers, Indians, Cubs, Saints, Browns, Bears, Niners, Lakers, Cavs, Red Wings, shall I go on? |
| Favorite Movies | I'm the Film Whore. Thus, this list will probably change constantly: The Directors: This is my Mount Rushmore: Robert Altman (though I wouldn't wish Quintet on my worst enemy), PT Anderson (Robert Altman's natural heir to the throne), John Sayles (more a writer than a filmmaker, but still), and Martin Scorsese (through Goodfellas only and half of The Departed, so chisle down those damned eyebrows a bit to symbolism his awful, awful 90's inperfections) The others, still important: Werner Herzog, John Cassavetes, Ingmar Bergman, Federico Fellini, Spike Lee, Clint Eastwood, Quentin Tarantino, Krzysztof Kieslowski, John Huston, Francois Truffault, The Coen Brothers, Akira Kurosawa, Woody Allen, Michelangelo Antonioni, Roman Polanski, Sidney Lumet, Steven Soderbergh The Films: The Master List--These films have continued to have a major impact on the way I think, teach, and see the world around me: Nashville, McCabe and Mrs. Miller, Short Cuts, Raging Bull, Chinatown, Magnolia, Five Easy Pieces, Fellini's Amarcord, Wild Strawberries, Lone Star, The Apostle, Do the Right Thing, Singin' in the Rain, Citizen Kane, The Deer Hunter, Hoop Dreams, 8 1/2 But wait, there's more: Fargo, Limbo, Pulp Fiction, The Apostle, Pollock, Aguirre The Wrath of God, Last Tango in Paris, Sling Blade, The Bicycle Thief, American Splendor, Million Dollar Baby, The Last Waltz, Coffy, Shaft!, Jackie Brown, Broadcast News, The Hustler, You Can Count on Me, Round Midnight, Fat City, Fanny and Alexander, The Decalogue, The 400 Blows, Vertigo, Atlantic City, The Conversation, Once, The Silence of the Lambs, There Will Be Blood, The Dark Knight, The Times of Harvey Milk, 3 Women, Jerry Maguire, A Woman Under the Influence, Cold Mountain, The English Patient, The Thin Red Line, Annie Hall, Boogie Nights, Apocalypse Now (The original only), The Godfather Part II |
| Favorite Music | Jazz: Bebop all the way--Ornette Coleman, Sonny Rollins, Bud Powell, Randy Weston, Dexter Gordon, Max Roach, Anthony Braxton, Cecil Taylor, John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk, Booker Ervin, Clifford Brown, Art Farmer/Benny Golson/Jazztet, Pharoah Sanders, Horace Parlan, Brad Mehldau, Charles Mingus, Roy Haynes, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Art Blakey, Jackie McLean, Abbey Lincoln, Archie Shepp, Dizzy Gillespie, Andrew Hill, Sonny Stitt, Bobby Timmons, Nicholas Payton, Eric Dolphy, and many more. Everything else, quite eclectic: Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Springsteen, Stevie Wonder, Van Morrison, The Beastie Boys, U2, Radiohead, Aimee Mann, Leonard Cohen, Neil Young, The White Stripes, The Band, The Beatles, The Fugees, Wu Tang Clan, Emmylou Harris, Lyle Lovett, Troy "Trombone Shorty" Andrews, Wilco, Uncle Tupelo, Outkast, The Roots, ABBA, Rebirth Brass Band, Donna Summer, Randy Newman, some really bad 70's songs. |
| Favorite Books | Please, I teach English. Wait til I have about two hours to do this... But, just to tide you over, here are just a few of the books that have shaped who I am: Individual Works: Leaves of Grass--Walt Whitman, Franny And Zooey--J.D.Salinger Underworld--Don DeLillo Invisible Man--Ralph Ellison The Adventures of Augie March--Saul Bellow Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man--James Joyce Ulysses--James Joyce 2666--Robert Bolano The Sheltering Sky--Paul Bowles The Emigrants--WG Sebald The Poets: Langson Hughes, Walt Whitman, Allen Ginsberg, TS Eliot, Yusef Komunaaka, Willliam Carlos Williams, Jonathan Williams, Robert Creeley, Seamus Heaney, Frank O'Hara, Elizabeth Alexander, to be continued... The Prose: Don DeLillo, Philip Roth, Samuel Beckett, Wendell Berry, David Foster Wallace, Tom Robbins, James Joyce, Saul Bellow, Ralph Ellison, WG Sebald, Roberto Bolano, John Updike (short stories and poetry more than novels), Paul Bowles, to be continued... |