Tuesday, November 18, 2014

Reinaldo Creagh

Singer -- via worldmusiccentral.org.

Ann Soyars

Hostess -- via the Tennessean.

Brian Griffith

Guitarist -- via thespec.com.

Jack Keenan

Old-time radio show host -- via Albany Times-Union.


Richard Duardo

Printmaker -- via the L.A. Times.

Ken Takakura

Iconic actor -- via Variety. AKA Goichi Oda. A hugely popular performer in Japan, he is known in America only for roles in such films as "The Yakuza" and "Black Rain." He typified the strong, silent an of action in films such as "The Yellow Handkerchief," "The Railroad Man," and "Abashiri Prison."




Monday, November 17, 2014

George "Buddy" Catlett

Bassist -- via the Seattle Times.

Hannes Hegen

Cartoonist and illustrator -- via mdr.de. AKA Johannes Eduard Hegenbarth. Best known for his cretion of the comic book Mosaik and its lead characters, the Digedags.


Zeinab El-Mahdy

Activist -- via ahramonline.com.

Jan Jones

Drummer -- via the Tennessean.

Soane Filitonga Watkins

DJ and music producer -- via 3news.co.nz.

DEATHCETERA: A weekly reader of stories from around the world on death and dying

TOP STORIES

Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips on living with the awareness of death – interview with Jennifer van Evra, animated by Blank on Blank – via Boingboing

Ask a Mortician: Can we compost the dead? – via Caitlin Doughty at the Order of the Good Death

“Don’t Lose the Body: 8 Tips to Plot a Funeral” from Elaine Ambrose in the Huffington Post


DEATH




10 Things Bodies Can Do After Death – from Confessions of a Funeral Director


FUNERALS

Ebola concerns reshape funeral practices in U.S. – via Andrew Meacham, Tampa Bay Times

Ice Age funeral site discovered by archaeologists – via Laura Geggel at Fox News

Another “drive-thru” funeral home – from Lauren Fluker at WHLT


OBITUARIES
Finding the right words for an obituary for a beloved aunt – from John Walsh in the Providence Journal




Troy Nabors

Mary-Edith Schreiber

Actress -- via westernboothill.blogspot.com.

Anne Cluysenaar

Writer and poet -- via the Independent.

Caroline Houseman Helms

Former actress -- via legacy.com. AKA Mary Blake.

Fumiko Hayashida

Sunday, November 16, 2014

Milan Rozsa

LGBT activist -- via gaystarnews.com.

Alexander Grothendieck

Mathematician -- via the New York Times.

Kajetan Kovic

Poet, writer, and translator -- via rtvslo.si.

Meesai Murugesan

Actor and musician -- via the International Business Times.

R.A. Montgomery

Writer -- via the Toronto Sun.

Bob Hicks

Morteza Pashaei

Musician, composer, and singer -- via Radio Free Europe.

Bruce Killeen

Poet and painter -- via the Guardian.


Gus Vlahavas

Restaurateur -- via the New York Times. He ran Tom's in Brooklyn!


Jerry Alan

Stuntman -- via the Daily Mail.

Saturday, November 15, 2014

Glen A. Larson

TV writer and producer -- via the Hollywood Reporter. He was the creator of a remarkable string of hits, including "Knight Rider," the original "Battlestar Galactica," "Quincy," "B.J. and the Bear," "Magnum, P.I.," "The Fall Guy" . . . and "Manimal." Larson was expert at retooling winning concepts, usually from feature films, for TV.

Fun fact: he started off in show biz as a singer and songwriter with the Four Preps -- their big hit "26 Miles (Santa Catalina)."



Friday, November 14, 2014

Ernest Kinoy

Writer for radio, TV, film, and stage -- via Variety. He joined NBC as a staff writer in 1948; he worked on shows such as "Dimension X," "Rocky Fortune," and "NBC Prsents: Short Story." In TV, he wrote for "Studio One," "Playhouse 90," "The Defenders," "Naked City," "Route 66," and much more. Films: "Buck and the Preacher," "Leadbelly," "Raid at Entebbe." Awards won for "The Defenders," "Roots," and "Skokie."

Little Joe Washington

Bluesman -- via the Houston Press.

Ravi Chopra

Film director and producer -- via NDTV Movies. Best known for his direction of the rpic Indian TV series, "The Mahabhrata."

Mike Burney

Saxophonist -- via thejazzbreakfast.

Carlos Emilio Morales

Jazz guitarist -- via Prensa Latina.

FRIDAY REVIEW: 'Being Mortal' -- America's End-of-Life Challenge


Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End
Atul Gawande
Henry Holt and Company
2014
New York

 Review by BRAD WEISMANN

Dr. Atul Gawande is a model writer of non-fiction, a game-changing analyst of the medical scene, and an honest and appealing narrator. In his fourth book, he details his investigations and experiences in the land medicine can’t touch – mortality and death.

With a huge bulge of 64 million Baby Boomers (myself included) in America destined for geriatric status and death in the next few decades, a corresponding upswing in interest in end-of-life decision-making, death, and what was known as ars moriendi, the art of dying, is taking place. This movement is beginning to counter a long-standing cultural abhorrence of aging and death, and the decades-long relocation of the elderly and the dying from the home to medical facilities.

“Being Mortal” is the most effective examination of the problem I have read to date. Gawande explores the problems and frustrations of a system that institutionalizes the elderly, because it has no viable alternative mandate. Gawande illustrates his conclusions with several threads of narrative – persons failing and succeeding at achieving a “good death,” and includes his own story, of his father’s passing, in clear-eyed but heart-rending detail.

Along the way, we are given illuminating historical context. Modern medicine’s life-saving technologies made the hospital the logical destination for the dying in the 20th Century (most people died at home until after World War I). However, by 1954, the chronically ill and elderly were taking up all the hospital beds, and “custodial units” were created by mandate. These morphed into nursing homes.

For those of us who remember some of the places in which our ancestors and relatives were warehoused, the idea that no real planning went into their creation is transparent. Additionally, the resources and knowledge to help the aging simply doesn’t exist.

“I asked Chad Boult, the geriatrics professor, what could be done to ensure that there are enough geriatricians for the surging elderly population. ‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘It’s too late.’”

But Gawande is not content to bemoan the state of things. First, he cites the stories of many innovators who bucked the system to create new living systems and concepts that provide the elderly with purpose, choice, community, information, and autonomy. People such as Bill Thomas and Keren Wilson, and places such as NewBridge on the Charles and Peter Sanborn Place, and groups such as Eden Alternative and Beacon Hill Villages, all of whom/which have developed viable alternatives that actually extend participants’ lives, improve their heath and sense of well-being, and, ironically, cost less to boot. (He even includes Chad Boult’s solution to the dearth of geriatricians – have them train all doctors and nurses in elderly care!)

These aren’t theories. They are proven methods, spelled out in a practical and they radiate out from the central concern of humanizing the medical process. Gawande neatly summarizes the medical profession’s aversion to acknowledging death – to it, death signifies failure. He outlines his own painful lack of experience in discussing unavoidable death, or the more excruciating task of helping patients evaluate when to stop requesting medical procedures that might prolong life, but at a debilitating and painful cost.

He comes up with essential questions: “What is your understanding of the situation and its potential outcomes? What are your fears and what are your hopes? What are the trade-offs you are willing to make and not willing to make? And what is the course of action that best serves this understanding?” (Again, cited studies in the text demonstrate that discussing the inevitable improves health and prolongs life.)

Despite the plethora of proactive benefits to be reaped from reading “Being Mortal,” the real pain and dismay of families forced to face an impending loss, the agonizing change of dynamics as the children become caregivers for parents, is not avoided or minimalized. However, in contrast to much of the challenging material I plow through in my efforts to understand and communicate on this subject, here is sense of hope and achievable positive change.

And in the broadest sense the book reminds me that the elements enumerated as essential to quality of life at its end is equally valid for all ages. “Human beings . . . have a need for both privacy and community, for flexible daily rhythms and patterns, and for the possibility of forming caring relationships with those around them.” At the end at always, we need not just safety and protection, but worth and freedom, meaning and purpose, what Gawande calls “shaping our stories,” within the limitations imposed by our bodies and the dimensions of human life.


The perils and possibilities are still there, but “Being Mortal” gives us some tools with which to work.

Leigh Chapman

Screenwriter and actress -- via the Hollywood Reporter. She was in a lot of '60s television, but moved on to writing scripts. She's best known for writing "Dirty Mary Crazy Larry," "The Octagon," and other action films, as well as many TV episodes.

Valery Senderov

Dissident and human rights activist -- via Radio Free Europe.

Daniel B. Meltzer

James Erb

Composer, arranger, musicologist, and conductor -- via the Richmond VA Times-Dispatch.

Manoel de Barros

Poet -- via http://www1.folha.uol.com.br.

Thursday, November 13, 2014

Alvin Dark

All-Star, pennant- and Series-winning former MLB shortstop and manager -- via the Sporting News. AKA Al, Blackie, the Swamp Fox. Won the '54 Series with the old New York Giants; won the '74 Series as manager of the A's. His service in WWII might have kept him out of the Hall of Fame, according to Bill James. He was accused of racist comments in 1964, but was defended by Willie Mays and Jackie Robinson. His autobiography bears a title that is testimony to his coaching career: "When in Doubt, Fire the Manager."




Harry Pearson

Journalist and audiophile -- via the New York Times. He founded the magazine Absolute Sound, and crusaded against the playback limitations of CDs.

Raleigh Trevelyan

Writer and historian -- via the Telegraph.


Oriel Malet

Writer -- via the Telegraph. AK Lady Auriel Rosemary Malet Vaughan.




Kelvin Moore

Former MLB player -- via the San Jose Mercury News.

Christiane Minazolli

Actress -- via purepeople.com.


Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Carol Ann Susi

Actress -- via The Wrap.

Allen Ripley

Former MLB pitcher -- via the Attleboro Sun Chronicle.


Warren Clarke

Actor -- via the Mirror.

Rebekah Gibbs

Actress -- via the Independent.

David Watson

Actor -- via hollywood.com.