• Top 10 Composers

    According to the number of plays in my iTunes for all my music categorized under Classical, here are my Top 10 Composers: John Cage Karol Szymanowski Kevin Volans Samuel Barber Krzysztof Penderecki Arvo Pärt Henryk Górecki Witold Lutosławski Vladimir Martynov… more ›

  • Monday Mix 011617: Lingua franca

    I’ve studied language for most of life, even before I declared at the age of 10 that I wanted to be a writer. But decades later I’m unable to list all the languages I’ve studied, both formally and informally. My… more ›

  • Monday Mix 01092017: Bowie

    A year ago David Bowie died. It broke my heart. Though I never met him or saw him perform live, he helped define the context of my life and thinking, especially concerning the musical, the artistic, from an early age.… more ›

  • Monday Mix 01022017

    I stopped writing. I stopped posting things on my lovely blog. But now I’ve decided to get back at it. To this end, I’ll be posting a mix of various things every Monday. Yes: just because of the alliteration. “Monday… more ›

  • Books Read in 2016

    The very few books I was able to read in 2016. Maybe the first two don’t really count: the first is the Polish text for my translation, which is the second. Only one book from local Deep Vellum Publishing. But… more ›

  • Electioneering

    Note: I was working on this list-cum-manifesto during the recent elections in the U.S. and found it now in my draft folder. Because of the results of that election, I think this post, albeit incomplete and unfinished, is still necessary.… more ›

  • Love Letter

    I sent a love letter to the DNC this morning: After 30 years of voting almost entirely for Democratic candidates on local, state, and national ballots I will no longer be able, in good conscience, to support a party that… more ›

  • Taking Out the Trash

    Apparently there are writer-translators who either write or translate at one time. I don’t have much of a problem finding a balance between the two. Although I do find my attention pulled away from one toward the other all the… more ›

  • All Apologies

    Any time an apology is issued, we need to ask why. Just who exactly is she apologizing to? Can you apologize to the dead?Or is this merely an exercise in hypersensitivity? We thin-skinned queers were offended by something she said,… more ›

  • In the Name of David

    Back when I collected personalities the way other kids collected trophies–dissociative identity disorder, for those in the know–there were two who went by the name of David. I’ve always liked the name David. For the first few years of my… more ›