Essayist, actor, humorist and frequent contributor to This American Life, David Rakoff (Half Empty) died in 2012, at age 47, after a public, on-again, off-again struggle with lymphatic cancer. But "what a fabulous accessory," he thinks after coaxing a beautiful man at a party to feel the pea-sized lump in his neck. In "My Sister of Perpetual Mercy," which opens The Uncollected David Rakoff, he is just 20 years old, working for a publisher in Tokyo, and must return home to Canada, where there await family, doctors, chemo treatment and the long journey toward recovery--none of it tolerable without the patience and care of his sister, Ruth.
Timothy G. Young has collected playful, friendly and touching essays Rakoff wrote over the years. In "The Love That Dare Not Squeak Its Name," written for Salon, Rakoff drolly queers the text of Stuart Little by suggesting that the boy who looked like a mouse seemed "somewhat like myself, pretty gay," with his tiny costumes and props, feeble and ill-fated love affairs, and iconic work as a sailor. Amid the heaping irreverence, the catharsis of the essay offers a tender look at what it can be like to grow up different.
Rakoff's strength has always been his sincere blend of humor and pathos, on brilliant display in his short novel Love, Dishonor, Marry, Die, Cherish, Perish, which is reproduced in its entirety here.
A heterogeneous collection of essays, journal entries, blog posts, radio transcripts and fiction, The Uncollected David Rakoff presents a full, shining complement from a jack of many trades. It's hard to accept that it will be the last. --Dave Wheeler, associate editor, Shelf Awareness