Need Simple List/Link Theme for Text-Heavy Blog

I think this is my fifth try in about as many years to find a suitable, high-efficiency, low-waste theme for the essay & external-link site I want to put up. No joy before…so let’s change that!

Take a look at the famous/infamous cryptome.org page.

I would like to have something like this as an index page with a one-line, one-column description of each article (the filename column on the left is unnecessary and I would rather have one longer linked description line instead) that links to either an external site or to an internal essay I’ve written — in other words a true index page.

I’d like a few more features — an site search, categories, etc. — with horizontally-arranged buttons beneath a header graphic, perhaps.

I realize that this may be too simple for people to wrap their heads around, but the closer I can get to this ideal the better it will serve my purpose and the less user time it will waste.

Many thanks for any help!