Mark W. Lee is an American novelist, poet and playwright. He has worked as a war correspondent and some of these real-life experiences have appeared in his fiction.
Lee was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He attended Yale University where he became friends with the Pulitzer prize winning poet and novelist Robert Penn Warren. Robert Penn Warren (April 24 1905 &ndash September 15 1989 was an American poet Novelist, and literary critic and was one of the founders of New Criticism. Lee dedicated his first novel to Warren. [1]
After graduating from Yale in 1973, Lee lived in New York City for several years where he worked as a taxi driver, a language teacher and a security guard. In New York, he became friends with artists Frank Moore and Lillian Mulero. Frank C Moore (1953 &ndash2002 was a New York -based painter winner of the Logan Medal of the arts, who was famous even among those who don't know his paintings His poetry and nonfiction appeared in the Atlantic Monthly, the Times Literary Supplement and a variety of literary journals. The Atlantic (formerly known as The Atlantic Monthly) is an American Magazine founded in Boston in 1857 The Times Literary Supplement (or TLS, on the front page from 1969 is a weekly literary review published in London by News International
Lee has always done elaborate research for his literary work. When writing a long poem about Henry Hudson, he walked alone down the eastern shore of Hudson Bay. Henry Hudson' (1570 &ndash 1611 was an English Sea explorer and Navigator in the early 17th century His poem, Hudson Bay, 1611, was published in The Sewanee Review.
In the early 1980s, Lee traveled to East Africa where he worked as a foreign correspondent for Reuters and the London Telegraph. This article is primarily about Reuters prior to its 2008 merger with Thomson For "The Daily Telegraph" in Australia see The Daily Telegraph (Australia. During the civil war that followed the fall of dictator Idi Amin, he was one of the few western journalists living in Uganda. Idi Amin Dada (mid 1920s &ndash 16 August 2003 commonly known as Idi Amin, was a Ugandan military dictator and the President of Uganda The Republic of Uganda is a Landlocked country in East Africa. After being expelled from the country for writing about military atrocities, Lee returned to the United States. He found that he could no longer write poetry and began writing plays and novels.
His first play, California Dog Fight, was set at an illegal dog fight the Sacramento delta. It premiered at the Manhattan Theatre Club {1985) and went on to an award-winning production at the Bush Theatre in London. The Manhattan Theatre Club (MTC is a theater club in Manhattan, New York. The Bush Theatre is based in Shepherd's Bush, in the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham. Lee's next play, Rebel Armies Deep Into Chad, premiered at New Haven's Long Wharf Theatre in 1989. Long Wharf Theatre started life in a warehouse alongside the harbor of New Haven, Connecticut, in 1965, the brainchild of 2 alumni of Yale University Rebel Armies is about the confrontation between two white journalists and two African prostitutes. It has been performed at many theatres throughout America. [2]
Lee's play, Pirates (1992) premiered at South Coast Repertory in Costa Mesa where it won the American Express California Playwrights competition. South Coast Repertory ( SCR) is a professional Theatre company located in Costa Mesa California. An American Romance (1997) premiered at the Road Theatre in Los Angeles. It won 12 regional theatre awards. Lee's play, Century City (1998), premiered at the WPA Theatre in New York. The Private Room, Lee's controversial play set in the prison cells of Guantanamo, premiered at the New End Theatre in London in 2004. Guantánamo is a municipality and city in southeast Cuba and capital of Guantánamo Province. London ( ˈlʌndən is the capital and largest urban area in the United Kingdom. [3]
Mark Lee's first novel, The Lost Tribe, was published in 1998 by Picador USA. The book describes an epic journey of Africans and Americans looking for the contemporary descendants of the Lost Tribes of Israel. The phrase Ten Lost Tribes of Israel refers to the ancient Tribes of Israel that disappeared from the Biblical account after the Kingdom of Israel was destroyed
In 2000, Lee traveled to East Timor and wrote articles about the civil war for the Atlantic Monthly and the Los Angeles Times. East Timor, also known as Timor-Leste (officially the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste) is a country in Southeast Asia. The Atlantic (formerly known as The Atlantic Monthly) is an American Magazine founded in Boston in 1857 The Los Angeles Times (also known as the LA Times) is a daily Newspaper published in Los Angeles California and distributed
Lee's second novel, The Canal House, was published by Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill in 2003. The critically praised novel describes the dangerous world of war correspondents and aid workers. It is set in Africa and East Timor.
Mark Lee has been deeply involved in freedom of speech and human rights activities for PEN, the international writers' organization. A pen (Latin pinna, feather is a Writing instrument used to apply Ink to a surface usually Paper. He gave speeches and interviews attacking the Patriot Act, traveled to Ethiopia to help imprisoned writers and started the Seattle Chapter of PEN. The USA PATRIOT Act, commonly known as the Patriot Act, is a controversial Act of Congress that U NOTE This intro is the result of careful NPOV work Please do not make potentially controversial edits to it without first discussing on the talk page In 2008, with funding from PEN Center USA, he established "Tibetan PEN in the Classroom" -- a program where exiled Tibetan writers teach students how write poetry and fiction. [4]
His work appears in Politically Inspired a collection of essays and short stories about the Iraq war published by MacAdam/Cage.
Lee currently lives in New York City. He has two children.
References
[1] Biographical information from California Authors
[2] An author interview for a play production at Juilliard in New York City where Lee talks about the relationship between his journalism and writing.
[3] General information regarding Lee's plays.
[4]Information on Tibetan PEN in the Classroom.
External links
- [5] Mark Lee's authorized website
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