All-Time Dinner Guests

This started out as my top ten all time dinner guests, but you know what? It kept on growing. Oh well, I'm not the "stay within the lines" type of guy. I hope you don't stay within the lines either. If you could invite a group of people or select individuals to dinner (they can be real or ficitional) from ancient or contemporary history, who would they be? This question is a great ice breaker and it lets you know a bit about the person who answers. Keep in mind that your significant other, family, and friends are a given. Send me Your Top 10 or Top 25 or ever Your Top 100 All-Time Great Dinner Guests List. Have fun with this, that's the whole point. My humble selections are listed below. If ANY of the links are broken, please Notify Me :).
  1. Jesus - I would have a ton of questions for him, and besides, he'd keep me and all the other dinner guests (especially Frankenstein) in line.
  2. Someone witty like Mark Twain , Oscar Wilde , Voltaire , Jim Carrey, or Robin Williams - Hey, there would have to be some levity at this dinner. Just think of all of these guys together -- what a blast.
  3. A reformer of some sort, either Bartolome De Las Casas, Martin Luther King Jr., Gandhi, or Malcolm X - The last three you probably know about, Bartolome De Las Casas was a pre-Reformation Spanish Dominican priest (circa early 1500's) who protested and actively fought vs. Spain's exploitation of the Indians.
  4. Emmanuel Swedenborg - Talk about a great, visionary mystic and eclectic mind. Wow!
  5. A great historical female, either Sacagewea, Margaret of Navarre, Mary Wollstonecraft, Madame de Stael, or Simone de Beauvoir - Sacagewea seemed to have a great soul and I'd want to ask her why she married a worthless idiot like Charboneau. Margaret of Navarre was a French queen noted for her independent thinking and religious tolerance at a time when independent thinking from a woman and religious tolerance of any kind were not known (early 16th Century). The latter three were philosophers. I admire these women for their minds! Shock of shocks! You mean a man can admire a woman for her mind! Yeap, pretty cool, huh?
  6. Dynamic authors - Adventurous Ernest Hemingway , Visionary Jules Verne, Humourous, eloquent Sherman Alexie, and Insightful Henri David Thoreau.
  7. Peter Lorre - Hey don't knock it, he's my favorite actor -- arguably, he was the greatest character actor of all-time..
  8. Shakespeare and Francis Bacon - I'd want to ask them, "OK, who really wrote all those plays?"
  9. Albert Einstein or Nikolai Tesla - Talk about brilliant, seminal thinkers.
  10. Philosophers - Either Soren Kierkegaard, Socrates, Plotinus, Jean Paul Sartre, Albert Camus, Marcus Aurelius, Pythagoras, Lao Tzu, Friedrich Nietzsche, or Baruch Spinoza - The conversation would be riveting and fascinating.
  11. Johann Heinroth - This guy was supposedly the founder of Psychiatry one century before Freud! Yet, little is known about him. This is the ONLY Heinroth link I could find -- it's a foreign language link and the image of Heinroth is down :(. If you find a better link, please Let Me Know.
  12. Ts'ai Lun - Ts'ai Lun was an official in the Chinese Imperial court circa 100 A.D.. Most people know nothing about this man, for example, he invented paper (bet you didn't know that).
  13. Either Alfred Adler, Viktor Frankl, Thomas Moore, Carl Rogers, or Carl Jung. - I love Psychology and I greatly respect all of these men. No link for Thomas Moore yet, if you find one please Let Me Know.
  14. Kokopelli or Eris - Just for the Hell of it.
  15. Adam and Eve - Before the Fall. Might be hard getting clothes on them. Would the dinner conversation corrupt them?
  16. Karl Marx and Frederick Engels - I'd want Marx & Engels to provide commentary about their writings. Throw in Michael Moore & Jim Hightower to make it complete.
  17. Michael Harrington - An absolutely brilliant man and prolific writer on Socialism, economics, Sociology, and American culture/politics. I was surprised and saddened to learn about his recent passing.
  18. Leonardo Da Vinci - He could paint a massive mural of all of us gathered at this dinner.
  19. Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson - Forget that they were Presidents, I'd want to pick their brains.
  20. Classical Music Composers - Mozart, Beethoven, Bach, Handel, and Vivaldi - Let them argue about who's the greatest.
  21. Steve Allen - This list is entirely his fault (I remember watching "Meeting of the Minds" TV show when I was a kid). Mr. Allen is definitely an eclectic, modern day "Renaissance Man."
  22. Various favorite athletes Bruce Lee, Joe Frazier, Muhammad Ali , Sugar Ray Robinson, or Prefontaine.
  23. Frankenstein - Imagine trying to teach him to eat with chopsticks.
  24. King Solomon - This guy had it all wisdom, unmatched wealth, power, authority, spirituality, etc. I'd want to ask him, "Considering that you had it all, how could you blow it?"
  25. Various Babe-ra-hams - Only with my wife's permission that is (What? Do you think I'm crazy?). I'm thinking of Cheryl Ladd, Betty Weider, Angie Dickinson, Cybill Shepherd, Ann Margaret, Julie Newmar, Sally Kirkland, or Queen Kong. The only problem would be if the other guests starting hittin' up on them. Sally Kirkland is almost perfect (beautiful, spiritual, intelligent, eclectic -- jeez, no fair). I've always been a fan of Queen Kong. Recently, I sent an email to her and she responded very promptly with a nice message -- I'm a Queen Kong fan forever.
  26. Merriwether Lewis and William Clark - Can't have one without the other, you know.
  27. Yes, Louis Armstrong, Diana Krall, Bob Marley, Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin, and Frank Sinatra - Have 'em take turns in performing.
  28. The Nicholas Brothers - Do yourself a favor, go rent the the 1940ish version of the movie "Stormy Weather." In the last couple minutes of this film, the Nicholas Brothers perform the most amazing dance routine I've ever seen. Lets just say my jaw hit the floor in disbelief. Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Gregory Hines, and Savio Glover suck in comparison. The Nicholas Brothers were the best.
  29. Shah Jehan and Mumtaz Jehan - Shah Jehan was the Emperor responsible for the beautiful Taj Mahal and Mumtaz Jehan was the woman who inspired the creation of the Taj Mahal.
  30. Nostradamus - OK, what in the heck did he say or not say?
  31. Marcion - My favorite heretic.
  32. Zoroaster (also known as Zarathushtra) - Fascinating prophet. Did he or did he not exist?
  33. Robert L. Ripley - Of "Believe It or Not" fame. He'd have intersting tales to tell.
  34. Ed Leedskalnin - How in the heck did he build Coral Castle by himself without any machinery?
  35. Dr. Joe Bell - He was the real life inspiration for Arthur Conan Doyle's "Sherlock Holmes." Supposedly, Dr. Bell could deduce a person's habits, characteristics, and profession by merely looking at them. No link for Dr. Bell yet, if you find one please Let Me Know .
  36. St. Thomas "the doubter" - I can relate.
  37. Sisyphus - Boy, can I relate.
  38. A Cameraman or Photographer - To get this dinner on film.
  39. Translators - We'd need a bunch of 'em.
  40. Security - We'd need it (Ali vs. Frazier, Queen Kong vs. Frankenstein, Cybill Shepherd vs. Jesus, Bruce Lee vs. everyone -- the possibilities are endless).
  41. Oprah Winfrey or Bill Gates - Someone would have to pay for this dinner.



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