Contact:
leegolit [at] gmail.com
Or leave a voicemail for me at +1 917 512 5054
Bio

Born in Melbourne, Australia in 1973, Lee Bob Black is an emerging writer who has lived on four continents. He interviews authors and writes book reviews for fun, however his serious work consists of novels, short stories, essays, short plays, business writing, and IT writing. He’s currently editing for Big Think (BigThink.com) and consulting for Canteen Magazine (CanteenMag.com). Previously he's worked with One Story (One-Story.com) and other literary magazines. He's based in Brooklyn, NYC, and virtually at LeeBobBlack.com.

Now I'll switch back to first person.

Click the menu links to read some of my stories, interviews, etc. Check me out at Shelfari.com/LeeBobBlack and Facebook.com/LeeBobBlack and YouTube.com/LeeBobBlack. Or just continue reading my "Lee's Literary Life: News, Events, Propaganda, and Shameless Self-Promotion." 




Embarrassing Poetic Video Experiments [Dec 2009]


Reading some of my own poems:



Reading poems and songs written by wordsmiths such as Corey Taylor, Charles Bukowski, Allen Ginsberg, and Ani DiFranco:






Literary Criticism!  Bookslut published my Paul Hoffman book review [Dec 2009]

December 4, 2009 

Read my book review of Hoffman's King's Gambit: A Son, A Father, and the World's Most Dangerous Game, which was published by Bookslut.com.



Continue reading at bookslut.com/nonfiction/2009_12_015461.php.



Five stars? One star? Books I read in 2009 that I rated five out of five, or one out of five [Dec 31, 2009]


Lee's Hit List! Five out of five stars:

  • The Braindead Megaphone -- George Saunders.
  • When You Are Engulfed in Flames -- David Sedaris.
  • The Post-Birthday World -- Lionel Shriver.
  • Story: Substance, Structure, Style and The Principles of Screenwriting -- Robert McKee.
  • CivilWarLand in Bad Decline -- George Saunders.
  • Blackwater: the Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army -- Jeremy Scahill.
  • Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close -- Jonathan Safran Foer.

Lee's Shit List! One out of five stars:

  • Five Skies -- Ron Carlson.
  • Tender Buttons -- Gertrude Stein.
  • Zimzum -- Gordon Lish.
  • Anil’s Ghost -- Michael Ondaatje.
  • Drinking Coffee Elsewhere -- ZZ Packer.
  • Burning in Water, Drowning in Flame -- Charles Bukowski.
  • Valparaiso: a play in two acts -- Don DeLillo.
  • Pricksongs & Descants: Fictions -- Robert Coover.
  • Vernon God Little -- DBC Pierre.
  • Interpreter of Maladies -- Jhumpa Lahari.
  • Just So Stories -- Rudyard Kipling.
  • 45 Master Characters -- Victoria Schmidt.
  • Double Fault -- Lionel Shriver.

 



Video by Jireh [Nov 2009]

Our magical friend, Jireh Hinton (aka Grover Watts), filmed Tara DePorte and I in our Brooklyn home . . . 


More from this artist: YouTube.com/JirehHinton and MyPoresAreReallySmall.com and GroverWatts.tumblr.com




Tango Mano-A-Mano [Aug 2009]

I wrote an article, Tango Mano-A-Mano: How Dancing With Other Men Challenged My Heterosexuality, for Big Think (BigThink.com). Here's the first paragraph:

In the late nineteenth century, large-scale immigration dramatically increased the population of Buenos Aires.  Most migrants were men; one figure even suggests a ratio of ten men for every woman.  Continue reading.



How Greene is Gelb? [June 2009]


I wrote an article for Big Think (BigThink.com) about power and:
  • Leslie Gelb, author of Power Rules: How Common Sense can Rescue American Policy (HarperCollins, 2009).
  • Robert Greene, author The 48 Laws of Power (Viking Press, 1998).

 
The article's at bigthink.com/LeeBobBlack/power-rules-versus-laws-of-power



Canteen and StreetSquash Creative Writing Workshops [June 2009]

June 5, 2009

Who knew that using the power of creativity to motivate and educate children would be so much fun? My friends and I have just finished our second creative writing workshops, as organized by Canteen Magazine (CanteenMag.com) and StreetSquash (StreetSquash.org), an after-school youth enrichment program.

Our second issue of canTeen: Youth On The Page: Writing And Art By Seventh Graders is now viewable and downloadable from issuu.com/CanteenMag/docs/canteen_student_writing_and_art_spring2009_issue_2.

A million thanks to the writers/teachers/photographers who volunteered for this: Stephen Pierson, Amy Braunschweiger, Daniel Christensen, Cezara Russo, Garth Risk Hallberg, JJ Sulin, Marion Duvet, Molly A. Rosen, and Porochista Khakpour.

A billion thanks to our students for this group: Alejandro C, Alvin H, Barbara H, Chamoy G, Chrishtian B, Christina M, Daniel R, Ebbria J, Gabrielle T, Hawa B, Oluwaseun D, Richard S, Sunen D, Taina P, Taylor C, and Travone W.



P.S. After our last class this semester, Laura of StreetSquash had this to say ...

"I want to say thank you so much for all of your hard with the students this year.  I can tell you really enjoy working with children, and that makes all the difference in the world.  I truly believe that because of you and all of your amazingly talented friends, the students will approach writing with more curiousity and creativity...which is the whole point, isn't it?  So, thank you, and please extend our gratitude to all of the volunteers who made this work!"



I interviewed Amy Braunschweiger! [May, 2009]

Amy Braunschweiger’s book, Taxi Confidential: Life, Death and 3 a.m. Revelations in New York City Cabs, is coming out in September. In this interview, Amy discusses pothead speed demon cabbies, learning journalism by being one of the few women in a room filled with men, learning how to write a nonfiction book by accepting a book deal rather than doing an MFA, assuaging her flirtatious nature while working, renting a cubicle to get out of her apartment, erring on the side of too much information, and vomiting ideas onto the page. 

  Photo: Amy Braunschweiger.  Photo credit: Jason Gardner, from NYTimes.com

Amy's booksite is www.TaxiConfidentialBook.com

Her blog is NYCTaxiConfidential.blogspot.com

My print interview will be published in the future.  Below is a short video interview of Amy. 

Amy Braunschweiger talks about "Taxi Confidential"




I interviewed Alberto Ferraras! [Mar, 2009]

An extensive and amazing (if I do say so myself) interview I did with Alberto Ferreras, author of B as in Beauty (2009), is viewable at AlbertoFerreras.com (and here on my site).

In this interview, Alberto Ferreras talks about overemphasizing the future, unglamorous jobs and happiness, sexy obese women, how Borges’s Aleph is Google Earth, café culture, vampires, how he was born a New Yorker even though he was born in Madrid, and his novel, B as in Beauty.


Photo: Alberto Ferreras.  Photo credit: Michael Wakefield. 



Canteen and StreetSquash Creative Writing Workshops [Feb 2009]


Feb 13, 2009.

For the past five months, I've had the privilege of teaching creative writing each week to seventh graders (11-13 years old) in Harlem. It was the first time I'd ever taught kids (though, come to think of it, I have taught numerous classes and topics for corproations ....), and I have Stephen Pierson to thank--he asked me to join the program and believed in me even when I doubted myself. 

More importantly: Our students were so awesome!  And we've got poems and presidential acceptance speeches and six-word memoirs and stories about superheroes to prove how inventive our students were!  To read a professionally-bound anthology of their work, canTeen: Youth On The Page: Writing And Art By Seventh Graders, go to issuu.com/CanteenMag/docs/canteen_student_writing_and_art_issue_1

Our creative writing workshops were made possible by Stephen Pierson of Canteen Magazine (CanteenMag.com) and our dedicated friends at StreetSquash (StreetSquash.org), an after-school youth enrichment program that combines academic tutoring, squash instruction, college preparation, community service, and mentoring.

Massive personal thanks to the following brilliant and generous writers/teachers/photographers who volunteered for these workshops: Stephen Pierson, Daniel Christensen, Garth Risk Hallberg, James J. Williams III, JJ Sulin, Mia Lipman, Porochista Khakpour, and Todd Zuniga. If you're keen to volunteer for our next group, write to info@canteenmag.com

And of course thanks to our students: Angel F, Armando A, Darquell C, Divine W, Elhadji M, Lamont P, Marcus C, Mawa B, Nasean C, Oumar T, Ronnie G, Tosin E, and Wandy V.  You all rock. 

 


Five stars? One star? Books I read in 2008 that I rated five out of five, or one out of five [Dec 31, 2008]


Lee's Hit List!  Five out of five stars:
  • The English Patient -- Michael Ondaatje.
  • Checkpoint -- Nicholson Baker.
  • The Name of the World -- Denis Johnson.
  • No One Belongs Here More Than You -- Miranda July.
  • Dave Barry’s Greatest Hits -- Dave Barry.
  • God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything -- Christopher Hitchens.
  • The Savvy Convert’s Guide To Choosing A Religion -- Anonymous.
  • We Need To Talk About Kevin -- Lionel Shriver.
  • The Believer Book of Writers Talking to Writers -- edited by Vendela Vida.
Lee's Shit List!  One out of five stars:
  • The Dharma Bums -- Jack Kerouac.
  • After Dark -- Haruki Murakami.
  • Snakes and Earrings -- Hitomi Kanehara.
  • Haunted: A Novel of Stories -- Chuck Palahniuk.
  • Rant: An Oral Biography of Buster Casey -- Chuck Palahniuk.
  • Revolt in 2100 & Methuselah's Children -- Robert A. Heinlein.
  • Important Things That Don't Matter -- David Amsden.
  • A Girl Becomes A Comma Like that -- Lisa Glatt.
  • The Everlasting Story of Nory -- Nicholson Baker.
  • The Little Prince -- Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.
  • Islands of Silence -- Martin Booth.
  • The Industry Of Souls -- Martin Booth.
  • Everyman -- Philip Roth.
  • Kiss Me, Judas -- Will Christopher Baer.



Barack Obama wins, Brooklyn ignites, Lee Bob Black gives strangers shoulder rides [Nov 04, 2008]


After Barack Obama won, hundreds of us spontaneously started dancing and yelling and celebrating on the corner of Bedford Avenue and North 7th Street, Williamsburg. During the euphoria, I gave people shoulder-rides, including the flag guy in the following photo taken by Ryan Muir (www.RyanMuir.com) The photo also appeared on the front cover of the printed edition of The Brooklyn Paper (www.BrooklynPaper.com). The riot police watched for an hour or two, then shut our euphoria down.




I'm judging at a Literary Death Match, NYC [Sep 27, 2008]


As part of Lit Crawl NYC (co-curated by Opium's Todd Zuniga), the Literary Death Match will feature its first-ever Lightning Edition on September 27 at 8:30 p.m. in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. You’ll see Ben Greenman (New Yorker) judging literary merit, Cicily Janus judging performance, and me judging intangibles--we'll be judging writers reading from various literary publications.

Litquake's Lit Crawl is a massive, one night literary extravaganza in NYC on September 27. The madcap concept, created in 2004 in San Francisco, will kick-off in the Lower East Side at 6 p.m., wander up to the East Village for 7:15 readings (with Canteen Magazine and NY Tyrant starring) then over the bridge to Williamsburg for delights at 8:30 p.m. (where Opium's Literary Death Match and BOMB Magazine will be in the spotlight).  This Google map has all the venues.

Photo: Tim Mucci reading, Bob Greenman judging literary merit, Cicily Janus judging performance, Lee Bob Black judging intangibles. Photo credit: Tim Mucci

Photo: Ben Greenman, Timmy Waldren, Jensen Whelen, Todd Zuniga, Lee Bob Black, Cicily Janus.



I interviewed Hannah Tinti! [Aug 2008]


Aug 7th, 2009.

Brooklyn, NYC. 

Today I interviewed Hannah Tinti (HannahTinti.com), author of The Good Thief. It was a wild interview--she discussed approaching writing her novel as a short story writer, using her emotions and spirituality to write, the un-holiness of the Vatican, how her agent stealthily confirmed that she wasn’t crazy before representing her, and how as a writer you have to stop fighting your characters on the page and accept them as they are. (This interview will be published in the future.)

The Good Thief is a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, recipient of the American Library Association's Alex Award, and winner of the John Sargent Sr. First Novel Prize. Animal Crackers, Tinti’s short story collection, was a runner-up for the PEN/Hemingway award. Tinti is co-founder and editor-in-chief of One Story (One-Story.com), for which she won the 2009 PEN/Nora Magid award. 

Photo: Lee Bob Black and Hannah Tinti at the One Story offices, Brooklyn. 
 
Photos: Hannah Tinti.



I'm reading at an Opium Magazine and Envoy Gallery "Litstravaganza", NYC [Aug 2008]


Where: a bar called Home Sweet Home.
131 Chrystie St, between Broome St and Delancy St, Manhattan, NY; map.
212.226.4555 office@envoygallery.com

Subway: B D train to Grand St.
F train to 2nd Ave or Delancey St.
J M Z to Bowery.

When: Sunday Aug 3, 2008; 6:30 pm to 9 pm.

Here's the official write up about the event:

In conjunction with Envoy Gallery and the Thorstein Foundation, Opium's thrilled to present a Sunday evening litstravaganza. Hosted via satellite (aka iChat) by Opium founding editor and Literary Death Match co-creator Todd Zuniga, onlooker will hear Americans Greg Sanders and Amy Lemmon live from NYC, Lee Bob Black, an Australian, tape delayed from NYC, and Nick Royle taped delayed one second via iChat (aka satellite) from Manchester, UK. Plus, everyone who reads will be interviewed in lightning fashion. Excitements galore!

Envoy Gallery presents "Happy Sundays," a weekly performance and multimedia event every Sunday this summer. Located at Home Sweet Home below the gallery, Happy Sundays is an afternoon of loose but provocative live performances, readings, and music that bring together the downtown arts community, literati, bowery bums, and fancy pants.

Update: At the event, I read a short fiction piece called "Sexpot Vignette #4: Racecars Crash" to about 25 people in the audience.



What are six of my top short story collections? [July 2008]


I'm glad you asked . . . well on One Story's blog, I read two “my top ten short story” lists, one by Chris (one-story.com/blog/?p=389) and another by Elliot Holt (one-story.com/blog/?p=390). I've never thought about maintaining such a list for myself. But it intrigued me, so I racked my brain and came up with my top six story collections. They're in no particular order.
  • No One Belongs Here More Than You - by Miranda July.
  • Jesus’ Son - by Denis Johnson.
  • The Informers - by Bret Easton Ellis.
  • How We Are Hungry - by Dave Eggers.
  • Girl With Curious Hair - by David Foster Wallace.
  • This Is Not Chick Lit: Original Stories by America's Best Women Writers - edited by Elizabeth Merrick.



Consider submitting to Opium Magazine's "Network of Writers Experiment" [July 2008]


Opium Magazine (OpiumMagazine.com), a print and online journal of "literary humor for the deliriously captivated," rocks, straight up. Todd Zuniga is seeking submissions to a "What I Learned" network that'll be in the mag's next print edition, Opium7. So, if you're keen, read the following, which I sourced from opiummagazine.com/Index.aspx?storyid=1731, and submit.
Photo credit: HTMLGIANT.com.
We're putting together a series of quotes about what authors have learned from other authors (or other sources)—something another writer once said to you that's really stuck in your head and encouraged or influenced your work. Mine, for instance is: "I write one story at a time. It's my way, it's not the only way." --Tobias Wolff. While my quote came from an e-mail exchange nine years ago, yours could be something that occurred while reading an author's work, from having a verbal exchange, or from something they said while teaching at an MFA program. Anything really.

So give it a shot! Write a sentence or two on what you learned from another writer and send it to opiumwritersexperiment@gmail.com with the email topic "Opium Network of Writers Experiment Entry".

The goal is to create a sort of "What I Learned" network that we'll be featuring over a sixteen-page section in Opium7, which will hit in October 2008.

The goal is to be succinct, a one or two sentence quote. You'll have a back story for your quote, but resist the urge, and just spill what can fit into the quotation marks. And because of the network-based idea of this (we want to get gobs of writers involved), after you have your quote, do the daring thing and chase down the writer you're quoting, even if they're hard to find. Invite them to do the same (trust us on this, so far the response has been amazing).




The first three chapters of a novel I was working on .... [July 2008]


Between 2001 and 2003, I wrote a novel called In Lieu Of Lovability. Click here for the first three chapters, slightly updated in 2008.




Fair and honest appraisal of your appearance .... [June 2008]


Gill Bumby (myspace.com/gillbumby) had a few things to say about me.  Click the image to read what he typed onto the card. 

  
  


I posted another short play of mine . . . [April 2008]


I posted a new short play: Tsunami Survivor Conserves Energy Via Escapism, Or, Between God And A Hard Place.



My first poetry reading in years . . . [March 2008]


When: March 08, 2008.

Where: Ponta Negra, Natal, Brasil.

Tonight I read the following five poems at Tara DePorte's art exhibition Sonhos Intensivos (Intense Dreams):
  • Before After
  • Afraid To Remember
  • Guiltless
  • Why do some women cry after sex?
  • My Name
An Englishman named Doug said that my poetry was: "Vulgar, yet tasteful"!

More info about Tara's art: www.TaraDePorte.com





Benjamin Kunkel! I met another one of my Lit Gods! [March 2008]


March 31st, 2008.
Manhattan, NYC.

Today I met Benjamin Kunkel at a reading for the second issue of Canteen Magazine (CanteenMag.com) at Housing Works Café in SoHo, Manhattan. I read Kunkel's novel Indecision in 2006 and rated it 4 out of 5 stars.

Photo: Lee Bob Black and Benjamin Kunkel. 

I also met writer Todd Zuniga. He's not one of my lit gods (I haven't read any of his stuff, yet), but he read a hilarious piece, so here's a photo of us being dorks:

Photo: Todd Zuniga Lee Bob Black.




Five stars? One star? Books I read in 2007 that I rated five out of five, or one out of five [Dec 31, 2007]


Lee's Hit List! Five out of five stars:

  • Strange Harvest: Organ Transplants, Denatured Bodies, and the Transformed Self -- Lesley A. Sharp.
  • Bodies, Commodities, And Biotechnologies: Death, Mourning, And Scientific Desire in the Realm of Human Organ Transfer -- Lesley A. Sharp.
  • Letter To A Christian Nation -- Sam Harris.
  • The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich -- Timothy Ferriss.
  • The Quiet American -- Graham Greene.
  • The End Of Faith: Religion, Terror, And The Future Of Reason -- Sam Harris.

 

Lee's Shit List! One out of five stars:

  • Reader’s Block -- David Markson.
  • The Suicide Academy -- Daniel Stern.
  • The Art of Project Management -- Scott Berkun.
  • The Crying of Lot 49 -- Thomas Pynchon.
  • The Faith Of A Writer: Life, Craft, Art -- Joyce Carol Oates.
  • The Laws of Simplicity: Design, Technology, Business, Life -- John Maeda.
  • Kafka Americana -- Jonathan Letham and Carter Schol.z



Prodigious? Talented? Moi? [Nov 2007]


November 23, 2007.
NYC.

Today a friend of mine, a published novelist no less, emailed me to tell me that he'd read some of my stories on LeeBobBlack.com, and that he thought I was "prodigiously talented." It's just his opinion, but I'm all for it!



Who are my favorite writers, spoken word artists, and performance poets (so far)? [Nov 2007]


This is a tremendously difficult question to ask. Here's my tentative answer ....

My Favorite Writers:
  • Don DeLillo
  • Bret Easton Ellis
  • Dave Eggers
  • Chuck Palahniuk
  • Denis Johnson
  • Alex Garland
  • Gore Vidal
  • Ayn Rand
  • Salman Rushdie
  • Nicholson Baker
  • Charles Bukowski
  • Jay McInerney
  • Charlie Kaufman
  • Christopher McQuarrie
  • Mike Patton
  • Umberto Eco
  • Susan Faludi
  • Jim Dodge
  • Jonathan Franzen
  • Zadie Smith
  • Susan Sontag
  • Paul Auster
  • John Cameron Mitchell
  • Italo Calvino
  • Joan Didion
  • Milan Kundera
  • Robert M Pirsig
  • Dave Barry
  • Will Self
  • Ernest Hemingway

My Favorite Spoken Word Artists, Performance Poets:
  • Tom Waits
  • Philip Norton
  • Henry Rollins
  • Emilie Zoey Baker
  • Dana Bryant



Two of my articles were included in the “Grassroots Academy” newsletter/blog for the 2007 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (CSD-15) [Apr 2007]


What? Huh? That's right--two short articles of mine were published by the Lower East Side Ecology Center (LESEC; www.LESEcologyCenter.org):

Climate, Energy & Air Pollution Panel & Networking Session

Grassroots Experiences: Sharing Our Knowledge

These were published in a newsletter, "Grassroots Academy, Volume 1, Issue 1; for the 2007 United Nations (UN) Conference on Sustainable Development (CSD-15)."



Mama Gena and Sister Goddesses and Lee Bob Black [Jan 2007]


Jan 13th, 2007.
Manhattan, NYC.

Last night I attended an event called, “Mama Gena Gives It Up To Your Men,” which was part of Mama Gena's Womanly Arts Mastery Program. All I’ll say is that it was wild (check MamaGenas.com for more details or this YouTube bit). Okay, I’ll say one more thing. There were 100+ women (“Sister Goddesses”), the majority of who were wearing just lingerie.

Today I was as a discussion panelist for Mama Gena's Womanly Arts Mastery Program, held at the Roosevelt Hotel, Manhattan. There were ~10 men on the stage (including actor Roy Scheider, incidentally), and 100+ women in the audience. There’s no way I can accurately summarize what we talked about for over an hour, but I’ll politely say that we discussed sensuality and sexuality.

Update: Check out this YouTube clip of Mama Gena:






Five stars? One star? Books I read in 2006 that I rated five out of five, or one out of five [Dec 31, 2006]

Lee's Hit List! Five out of five stars:

  • Anthem -- Ayn Rand.
  • Adrift in the Oceans of Mercy -- Martin Booth.
  • Indecision -- Benjamin Kunkel.
  • The God Delusion -- Richard Dawkins.

 

Lee's Shit List! One out of five stars:

  • A Haunted House and other stories -- Virginia Woolf.
  • Rain on the River: poems -- Jim Dodge.
  • The Atrocity Exhibition -- J G Ballard.
  • Eleven Minutes -- Paulo Coelho.
  • The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith -- Peter Carey.
  • Is Sex Necessary? Or Why You Feel The Way You Do -- James Thurber and E. B. White.
  • Vox -- Nicholson Baker.
  • The Elementary Particles (Atomised in the UK) -- Michel Houellebecq.
  • On Beauty -- Zadie Smith.



LeBoBla [sic] does his first NaNoWriMo [Nov 2006]


NYC.

I just finished "competing" ("participating"?) in the 2006 National Novel Writing Month (www.NaNoWriMo.org). It was my first year, and it kicked my ass. Fuck knows if I'm going to do it next year, or ever again for that matter.




Also, a photo of me appears in Phyllis Korkki's article, "Cherishing words, just for words' sake," about National Novel Writing Month; International Herald Tribune; Dec 5, 2006.


Here's the first two paragraphs of Korkki's article:

The secret to writing a novel in a month is just to do it - and it's a good idea to accept from the start that, barring miracles, it will be very, very bad.

This year about 80,000 people - most from the United States, but also from countries like France, New Zealand, Kenya and Japan - embraced that principle and agreed to try to write a 50,000-word novel in 30 days. They did not need to begin with a plot, characters, setting or any writing experience. What they did need was to commit to writing an average of 1,667 words a day in November, which was National Novel Writing Month.

Read the full article at the International Herald Tribune: http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/12/05/features/amateur.php



The Impeachables: About Our Campaign [Aug 2006]


Press Release: Aug 2006.

The Impeachables (www.impeachables.org) is a political awareness campaign associated with the movements to impeach politicians George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Tony Blair, and John Howard.

It consists of mock personal profiles of these political leaders, each written in first person, highlighting information such as ...

... how Bush, Cheney, Blair, Howard, and the US, UK, and Australian governments:

  • Manipulated and concealed information vital to public discussion and informed judgment concerning Iraq’s acts, intentions, and possession of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) in order to falsely create a climate of fear and destroy opposition to an illegal US-led invasion of Iraq.

  • Used the unconscionable doctrine of preemptive defense / first strike, which promotes wars of aggression (not wars of self-defense) that are contrary to the UN Charter, and are therefore war crimes.

... how George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and the Bush administration:

  • Unleashed a massive unconstitutional wiretap and spying operation against US citizens.

  • Usurped powers of the UN by rejecting treaties, committing treaty violations, and frustrating compliance with treaties in order to destroy any means by which international law and institutions can prevent, affect, or adjudicate the exercise of US military and economic power.

  • Stripped US citizens of their constitutional and human rights.

  • Declassified information for political purposes.

  • Set up a worldwide network of secret prisons, torture, and assassinations.

  • Abused presidential signing statements.

... how Tony Blair:

  • Made 28 statements about Iraq's weapons that were unsupported by British intelligence assessments and UN evidence available to him, including seriously misrepresenting statements by UN inspectors.

  • Committed Britain’s support to the US for an invasion of Iraq without the consent of the Cabinet, Parliament, or the people of the UK.

  • Used two dossiers to justify Britain’s involvement in the invasion of Iraq: ‘Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction: The Assessment of the British Government’--this dossier plagiarized from various unattributed sources; and, ‘Iraq: Its Infrastructure of Concealment, Deception and Intimidation’--this dossier included forged documents that ‘proved’ Iraq’s uranium purchases from Niger.

... how John Howard:

  • Misrepresented intelligence to support the case for Australia's contribution to the invasion of Iraq.

  • Ensured that the powers of Australia’s Commission of Inquiry into the UN Oil-for-Food Program were restricted--the Commission was only allowed to investigate the legality of the Australian company AWB Ltd paying the single largest illicit "kickback" to the Iraqi regime; the Commission was barred from investigating the role Howard and his ministers played.

The mock personal profiles also ‘poke fun’ at the politicians. For example, according to the ‘More About What I Am Looking For’ section of Bush’s profile, he wants a woman to talk dirty in bed, saying things such as “Who’s the champion of freedom and democracy? You are Bushy! Who squandered the largest federal surplus in history and created the largest national debt in history? Who’s the War President? You are Bushy!” Another example is Blair’s profile. In the ‘Fill in the blank: _____ is sexy; _____ is sexier’ part of the profile, the Prime Minister wrote, ‘Government-by-cabinet is sexy; government-by-cabal is sexier!” Another example is a reference in Howard's profile to how he admits to employing the “Sergeant Shultz defense.”


SyBaRa: About Us

SyBaRa created The Impeachables (www.impeachables.org). We are a group of activists, cyberguerillas, artists, alienated voters, and peacemongers. We feel that claims that a “war on terror” will lessen the risks of terrorist attacks are unwise, and that prevailing in the global fight against terrorism by embarking upon pre-emptive wars in 'defense' of freedom surely leads to a destruction of freedom. Human values cannot be defended by unprovoked violence. War only leads to war, more war, and more war.

We feel that many of the actions and policies of the Bush, Blair, and Howard governments since 9/11 to be repressive, unjust, immoral, and illegitimate. We not only believe that the three men leading these governments, and several of their principal officials in Washington, London, and Canberra, should be held accountable for their actions in order to restore faith in the democratic process, but we also believe that they are threats to world peace, human rights, and economic justice.

Too many questions remain unanswered, and we have been deceived and betrayed time and time again--this conduct cannot continue to go unchecked. Those who lead us cannot mislead us and then remain in office. With our hearts and minds, we are taking a stand against criminal wars on foreign countries, torture, the violation of human rights, detentions without trial, contempt for international law, and labeling whole countries as ‘evil.’

We have drawn inspiration from Americans working to bring the impeachment of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney to the floor of the House of Representatives (which has the sole power to vote for impeachment), and then on to the Senate (which would determine guilt or innocence).

We have drawn inspiration from British Members of Parliament who in November 2004 tabled a motion to impeach Tony Blair, and who, considering the potential lack of it’s viability, redrafted the motion in favor of a parliamentary enquiry to examine the conduct of ministers before and after the Iraq war.

We have drawn inspiration from Australians working towards holding John Howard accountable for his war crimes, the children overboard affair, the AWB Ltd controversy, and his manipulation of the Australian electorate.

Each of the members of SyBaRa acted on his or her own accord. We did not receive support or endorsement from other individuals or organizations working towards the impeachment of Bush, Cheney, Blair, or Howard. In fact, before launching The Impeachables, we only discussed the campaign with our boyfriends and girlfriends (and in one case, a mother).

Our name SyBaRa is a portmanteau of Sybil, Banksy, and Rainbow. It’s homage to:

  • Operation Sybil. In 2004, four activists hung a 60-foot banner from NYC’s Plaza Hotel with a backward-pointing arrow titled ‘BUSH,’ and a forward-pointing arrow titled ‘TRUTH.’ The group named themselves after the Greek oracle, Sybil, whose role was to expose truth to humankind.

  • Banksy, a subversive graffiti artist whose message is often anti-war, anti-capitalist, anti-establishment, or pro-freedom.

  • The Rainbow Warrior. In 1985, France conducted nuclear tests in Oceania, particularly in Mururoa Atoll. The Rainbow Warrior, a Greenpeace support vessel, traveled to New Zealand to lead a flotilla of yachts protesting these nuclear tests. The ship was sunk by the French foreign intelligence agency in Auckland harbor.


SyBaRa welcomes all comments, criticisms, etc., regarding The Impeachables. Please contact us at leegolit [at] gmail.com



I interviewed Julia Guez! [July 2006]


July 30, 2006.

Check out: "Verisimilove in Buenos Aires? Lee Bob Black Interviews Writer Julia Guez."

Photo: Julia Guez writing her book, in a cafe in Buenos Aires, May 2006.



I've posted a new essay [June 2006]


Check out my new essay, "Without Words: An Australian-American in Argentina."



I interviewed T. M. Rives! [June 2006]


June 12, 2006.
Manhattan, NYC.

Today I interviewed T. M. Rives, author of the novel Le Serpent des blés. I interviewed him in my West Village apartment. Here's a photo of Rives typing in my bedroom!

Photo: T.M. Rives.

Update: Read the interview "If Warriors Had iPods: Lee Bob Black Interviews T. M. Rives".



Five stars? One star? Books I read in 2005 that I rated five out of five, or one out of five [Dec 31, 2005]


Lee's Hit List! Five out of five stars:

  • The Flash of Lightning Behind the Mountain -- Charles Bukowski.
  • The Complete Idiots Guide To A Smart Vocabulary -- Paul McFedries.
  • Still Pumped After All These Years: A Dilbert Book -- Scott Adams
  • How We Are Hungry -- Dave Eggers.
  • Writing in Flow: Keys to Enhanced Creativity -- Susan K. Perry.

 

Lee's Shit List! One out of five stars:

  • Where I Was From -- Joan Didion.
  • The Da Vinci Code -- Dan Brown.
  • Ratner’s Star -- Don DeLillo.
  • Invisible Cities -- Italo Calvino.
  • Drop City -- T.C. Boyle.



Bookslut published my Edwin John Wintle interview! [July 2005]


Read my interview of Ed Wintle (www.EdwinJohnWintle.com), author of Breakfast With Tiffany: An Uncle’s Memoir.




Malcolm Gladwell! I met another one of my Lit Gods! [July 2005]


July 8th, 2005.
Manhattan, NYC.

Today I randomly ran into Malcolm Gladwell (www.Gladwell.com), author of The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference (2000) and Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking (2005), at Snice Cafe in the West Village.

He was laptopping two tables to my side while I edited a huge printout of my second novel (see the stalker photo below). As he was leaving, I approached him, thanked him for his SUV article ("Big and Bad: How the SUV ran over automotive safety"), and shared how it was instrumental in helping me form my ideas about the perception of safety versus actual safety. He asked me my name. I said if I published my novel, I’ll send him a copy.

   Photos: Malcolm Gladwell and Lee Bob Black.



I interviewed Bhagavan Das! [May 2005]


May 18th, 2005.
Manhattan, NYC.

Today at my home in the West Village, I interviewed Bhagavan Das (www.BhagavanDas.com), a performer of Indian bhajans and kirtans, a counter-cultural icon, a yogi, and the author of It's Here Now (Are You?): A Spiritual Memoir.

Photos: Bhagavan Das and Lee Bob Black.

After the interview, I stood on an old fire-notification thingy, and took this photo of Bhagavan Das on the corner of Washington Street and Charles Street:



Then Bhagavan Das took this one of me:


Update: Read the interview: The Dharma and Cult of Bhagavan Das: Lee Bob Black interviews Bhagavan Das.



I interviewed Edwin John Wintle! [March and April 2005]


Manhattan, New York City
March 17th and April 2nd, 2005

I just completed a marathon interview (in two parts) of Ed Wintle (www.EdwinJohnWintle.com), author of Breakfast With Tiffany: An Uncle’s Memoir.

Photos of Ed and I from the first half of the interview, at Ed's West Village apartment, March 17th, 2005:


Photos: Lee Bob Black and Edwin John Wintle.



Photos of Ed and I from the second half of the interview, at Ed's West Village apartment, April 2nd, 2005:



Update: Read my interview of Edwin John Wintle here.



I interviewed Max Barry! [Feb 2005]


Kensington, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
February 24, 2005.

I interviewed Max Barry (www.MaxBarry.com), author of novels Syrup (1999), Jennifer Government (2003), and Company (forthcoming in 2006). I conducted the interview at a café called The Corner on Bellair, near Max's house in Melbourne. Here's a photo of Max and I just after the interview:


Photo: Lee Bob Black and Max Barry.

Update: Read the interview "To Finish Writing A Novel, You Need To Be Delusional: Lee Bob Black Interviews Max Barry".


Photo: Max Barry.  Photo credit: Flickr/dejahthoris.



Five stars? One star? Books I read in 2003 and 2004 that I rated five out of five, or one out of five [Dec 31, 2004]

Lee's Hit List! Five out of five stars:

  • The Elements of Style -- William Strunk and EB White.
  • Jesus’ Son -- Denis Johnson.
  • The Tesseract -- Alex Garland.
  • On Becoming a Novelist -- John Gardner.
  • Bret Easton Ellis’s American Psycho: A Reader’s Guide -- Julian Murphet.
  • The Denial Of Death -- Ernest Becker.
  • Taking The Red Pill: Science, Philosophy, and Religion in The Matrix. -- Edited by Glenn Yeffeth.
  • Box of Matches -- Nicholson Baker.
  • White Noise -- Don DeLillo.
  • Cosmopolis -- Don DeLillo.
  • Great Jones Street -- Don DeLillo.
  • Mao II -- Don DeLillo.

 

Lee's Shit List! One out of five stars:

  • Chemical Pink -- Kate Arnoldi.
  • Filth -- Irvine Welsh.
  • Tumble Home -- Amy Hempel.
  • The Man Who Fell In Love With The Moon -- Tom Spanbauer.
  • Fiskadoro -- Denis Johnson.
  • Collected Stories -- Saul Bellow.
  • The Delicious Grace of Moving One’s Hand -- Timothy Leary.
  • Narcissus Ascending -- Karen McKinnon.



I interviewed Toby Thompkins! [Sep 2004]


September 11, 2004.
Manhattan, New York City.

Today I interviewed Toby Thompkins, author of The Real Lives Of Strong Black Women: Transcending Myths, Reclaiming Joy (2004).

 



Here's some photos of Toby and I in his West Village apartment, taken straight after the interview:

   Photo: Toby Thompkins and Lee Bob Black.

Update: Read the interview "What you resist will persist, unless you know it was all a myth in the first place: Lee Bob Black interviews Toby Thompkins."




Literary Criticism!  My Alex Garland book review was published on Bookslut [Aug 2004]


August 10, 2004.

Read my book review of Alex Garland's The Coma, which was published on Bookslut (www.bookslut.com).


Continue reading



Alex Garland! I met another one of my Lit Gods! [June 2004]


June 24th, 2004.
Manhattan, NYC.

I met Alex Garland, author of novels The Beach, The Tesseract, and The Coma. He was reading from his new novel, The Coma, which was published this month. We were at Housing Works Café in SoHo.

Photo: Alex Garland and Lee Bob Black.

Update: Read my book review of Alex Garland's The Coma.



Death essay [April 2004]


My essay, “This Is Not A Death Experience” was published on EmbraceDeathNow.com.




Letter to The Believer [Feb 2004]


I wrote a letter to The Believer (believermag.com). They didn't publish it. But I did.




Craig Clevenger! I met another one of my Lit Gods! [Oct 2003]


Oct 2003.
Brooklyn, NYC.

I attended a reading by Craig Clevenger (www.CraigClevenger.com), author of The Contortionist’s Handbook, at a reading in Brooklyn. Afterward, we went out for some drinks.

Photo: Lee Bob Black and Craig Clevenger.



Chuck Palahniuk! I met another one of my Lit Gods! [Sep 2003]


Sep 12, 2003.
Manhattan, NYC.

I met Chuck Palahniuk (www.ChuckPalahniuk.net) at a book signing!

Photo: Lee Bob Black and Chuck Palahniuk.




Civilians as shields!  The audacity! [Mar 2003]


March 26, 2003. 
Manhattan, New York City. 

Okay, it's been almost a week since the US-led invasion of Iraq ... here are some thoughts ...

How dare the Iraqis defend themselves!  Who do they think they are!  A sovereign nation!  They’ve sunken to a new low!  The audacity!  Putting civilians in Baghdad--that’s despicable!  Civilians--can you imagine how horrible the military leaders are by having civilians in their major cities!  Human shields!  What could they be thinking!  That we--Americans, British, Aussies, the Coalition of the Willing--don’t know how extraordinarily inhuman that is!

How dare they rise up!  How dare they want to live under their own terms!  Don’t they know we’re in Iraq to help!  To free them!  Humanitarian aid is right behind us!  We’re not just mopping up, we’re liberating!  And they’re treating us like the enemy!  They’re calling us the aggressors!  They piss and moan that we don’t have international legitimacy or UN endorsement!  Like that matters!




Peace Rally [Mar 2003]


March 22, 2003. 
Manhattan, New York City. 

Today, along with ~250,000 activists, I marched through the streets of Manhattan, singing and crying and protesting against the US-led invasions of Afghanistan (October 7th, 2001; Operation Enduring Freedom) and Iraq (March 20, 2003; Operation Iraqi Freedom).  I saw the following signs or t-shirts:
  • Informed dissent is more patriotic than blind loyalty. 
  • US - 9/11.  Iraq 24/7. 
  • There is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent children. 
  • Dream peace. 
  • You can bomb the world into pieces, but you can’t bomb it into peace. 
  • No Iraqi children in my gas tank. 
  • War is terrorism with a bigger budget.
  • Love my country, fear my government!
  • Bring home the troops, send the CEOs. 
  • This isn’t the USA I ♥.
  • Turn off the Truth Violator!  Turn on the conscience! 
  • Violence begets violence. 
  • The US media is pumping this war. 
  • Complacency is complicity. 
  • We have guided missiles and misguided men.
  • Next stop: North Korea, Iran, China, Sweden. 
  • Employment not deployment. 
  • Is that ketchup on my freedom fries? 
  • Why do you bomb people into liberation?  And force them to eat Amerikkkan cheese?!
  • I am ashamed.
  • Bomb Texas--they have oil too. 
  • 1,000 cruise missiles: zero civilians.  Wow! 
  • Coalition of the un-willing.
  • Death isn’t freedom. 
  • Peace Monger.
  • Love Iraqi children.
  • Real eyes--realize--real lies. 
  • Nobody wins. 
  • Liberators my ass.
  • Enjoy your freedom, someone has to die for it. 
  • Congress is full of cowards.
  • Bring my husband home. 
  • Shame John Howard.
Signs and t-shirts about George W. Bush:
  • Terror alert: Bush in the area.
  • “Yee-Ha” is not a foreign policy. 
  • President Bush: Repent.
  • Drop Bush, not bombs. 
  • Stop mad cowboy disease.
  • Osama bin Laden wasn’t a threat either.  Wake up NY.  Support Bush. 
  • Elect a madman, you get madness.
  • Buck Fush. 
  • Bush is a WMD. 
  • Bush has Gulf War Syndrome.
Groups for peace; groups against the war:
  • Corporate lawyers against the war.
  • Jews for peace.
  • Religious radicals for peace. 
  • Another dyke for peace. 
  • X101st paratroopers against the war. 
  • Infidels for peace. 
  • Harmonicas for peace. 


Five stars? One star? Books I read between 2000 and 2002 that I rated five out of five, or one out of five [Dec 31, 2002]


Lee's Hit List! Five out of five stars:

  • The Long Hard Road out of Hell -- Marilyn Manson.
  • Zen In The Art of Writing; Essays in Creativity -- Ray Bradbury.
  • Stone Junction -- Jim Dodge.
  • Glamorama -- Bret Easton Ellis.
  • American Psycho -- Bret Easton Ellis.
  • A Sand County Almanac -- Aldo Leopold.
  • Hop on Pop -- Dr. Seuss.
  • A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius -- Dave Eggers.
  • Fountainhead -- Ayn Rand.
  • Choke -- Chuck Palahniuk.
  • Fight Club -- Chuck Palahniuk.
  • The Doors Of Perception -- Aldous Huxley.

 

Lee's Shit List! One out of five stars:

  • Catcher in the Rye -- JD Salinger.
  • Trying To Grow -- Firdaus Kanga.
  • The Art of Falling Apart -- Mark Dawson.
  • The Agony and the Ecstasy -- Irving Stone.
  • Not Fade Away -- Jim Dodge.
  • In Cold Blood -- Truman Capote.



Jim Dodge! I met another one of my Lit Gods! [Sep 2000]


Sep 10th, 2000.
Berkeley, California.

I met Jim Dodge! I met him the Watershed Environmental Poetry Festival in Berkeley, California. While chit-chatting, Jim mentioned his love of poetry. I couldn’t bring myself to say how I’d love to dedicate my life to writing kooky, trippy novels like his novel Stone Junction. And get this, a few months ago, I wrote a poem called "A Lesson In Invincibility" which was based on (plagiarized?) pages 215-227 of Stone Junction--my poem's about the character named Volta, who teaches his pupil how to become invisible/dematerialize. And as it turned out, I had a printed copy of my poem in my back pocket while I was talking with Jim. But did I give it to him? Nope. I wimped out.

When Jim Dodge got up to the microphone, he told a story that was completely unrelated to the Festival. The story was about how his brother’s dog’s nuts got sucked into the drain plug of a bath tub!



Five stars? One star? Books I read in the 1990s that I rated five out of five, or one out of five


Lee's Hit List! Five out of five stars: 

  • The New York Trilogy -- Paul Auster.
  • Zombie -- Joyce Carol Oates.
  • Johnny And The Yank -- John Tully.
  • Reader’s Digest Book of Facts -- Various.
  • To Have Or To Be -- Erich Fromm.
  • Fit for Life -- Harvey Diamond and Marilyn Diamond.
  • What The Butler Saw -- Joe Orton.
  • The Stranger (The Outsider) -- Albert Camus.

 

Lee's Shit List! One out of five stars:

  • Macbeth -- Shakespeare.
  • Hamlet -- Shakespeare.
  • Quiver -- Tobsha Learner.
  • The Bhagavad Gita, As It Is -- Krishna.
  • Leviathan -- Paul Auster.