>>12
I've mostly used Enlightenment in the past, and am presently learning fvwm (which is incredibly featureful, but all the options are set in config scripts - there are *no* GUI menus). Fluxbox and Openbox are pretty popular, but I don't have much experience with them.
As for utilities, I'm a minimalist. I still use tin for USENET, for instance. Mail has been an ongoing issue of finding a program I'm really happy with: elm, PINE, etc., are dated, and I don't particularly like Thunderbird. I've been meaning to try out a little-known mailer called mahogany. There are lots of options out there if you look, though - there are even some lightweight graphical file managers if you don't like Midnight Commander. Also, remember that just because one doesn't run GNOME or KDE doesn't mean one can't install the associated libraries so that GTK- and Qt-based programs will work. There are relatively few such programs that depend on GNOME or KDE actually running (and most of what DOES is the bloated stuff - like Evolution, for instance - that I was trying to get away from anyway).