By Donald A. Ranard
The man who knew more languages than anyone else in the world—he was fluent in forty-eight, including three extinct ones, and proficient in another six —spent his final years alone in a third-floor walk up.
“I tried and I tried,” his fourth ex-wife said. “But the man just didn’t know how to communicate.”
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Donald A. Ranard’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, New World Writing Quarterly, Vestal Review, The Los Angeles Review, 100 Word Story, The Best Travel Writing, and many other publications. In 2022, his award-winning play, ELBOW APPLE CARPET SADDLE BUBBLE, was performed by Veterans Repertory Theater (now Savage Wonder) in Cornwall, New York. The son of an American diplomat, he grew up in Japan, Malaya, and Korea and after college studied Chinese in Taiwan, taught English on a Fulbright grant in Laos, and worked in refugee assistance programs in Southeast Asia.