Zulu Nation honors ancestor Sam Greenlee, The Spook Who Sat By the Door

Save The Date!

The Universal Zulu Nation Presents:  

"The Spook Who Sat By The Door"

NYC Film Screening & Memorial Birthday Tribute For Novelist, Poet, Activist & Producer, Bro. Sam Greenlee 

Monday, July 14, 2014

6pm - 10pm
(Doors Open at 5:30pm)
 

@ Harlem's National Black Theater

2031-33 Fifth Avenue 

Bet. 126th & 125th Street

$10.00 Suggested Donation

(No One Turned Away For A Lack Of Funds)

Featuring .....
~ Reception & Food/Refreshments at 5:00pm - RSVP Only Please!
~ A Film Screening Of "The Spook Who Sat By The Door"
~ A Live Re-enactment Of The "The Spooks" Martial Arts Scenes
~ Live Cultural Performances In Music, Song, Dance & Poetry
~ Special Guest Celebrity Readings From Sam's Novels & Poetry Books
~ The Signing Of Sam's Books By His Surviving Wife & Daughter
~ Brief Reflections From Sam's Family, Friends & Comrades
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Samuel Elder Greenlee, Jr. (July 13, 1930 – May 19, 2014) was anAfrican-American writer, best known for his controversial novel The Spook Who Sat by the Door, which was first published in London by Allison & Busby^[1] in March 1969 (having been rejected by dozens of mainstream publishers), and went on to be chosen as The Sunday Times Book of the Year. The novel was subsequently made into the 1973 movie of the same name, directed by Ivan Dixon and co-produced and written by Greenlee, that is now considered a "cult classic".

Life and work

Born in Chicago, Greenlee attended the University of Wisconsin (BS, political science, 1952) and theUniversity of Chicago (1954-7). He was a member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity Inc (Beta Omicron 1950). He served in the military (1952-4), earning the rank of first lieutenant, and subsequently worked for theUnited States Information Agency, serving in Iraq (in 1958 he was awarded the Meritorious Service Medalfor bravery during the Baghdad revolution), Pakistan, Indonesia, and Greece between 1957 and 1965.Leaving the United States foreign service after eight years, he stayed on in Greece. He undertook further study (1963-4) at the University of Thessaloniki, and lived for three years on the island of Mykonos, where he began to write his first novel. That was eventually published in 1969 as The Spook Who Sat by the Door, the story of a black man who is recruited as a CIA agent and having mastered the skills of a spy then uses them to lead a black guerrilla movement in the US.

Greenlee co-wrote (with Mel Clay) the screenplay for the 1973 film The Spook Who Sat by the Door, which he also co-produced with director Ivan Dixon and which is considered "one of the more memorable and impassioned films that came out around the beginning of the notoriously polarizing blaxploitation era." In 2011, an independent documentary entitled Infiltrating Hollywood: The Rise and Fall of the Spook Who Sat by the Door was filmed by Christine Acham and Clifford Ward, about the making and reception of theSpook film, in which Greenlee spoke out about the suppression of the film soon after its release.

Other works by Greenlee include Baghdad Blues, a 1976 novel based on his experiences traveling in Iraq in the 1950s and witnessing the 1958 Iraqi revolution, Blues for an African Princess, a 1971 collection of poems, and Ammunition (poetry, 1975). In 1990 Greenlee was the Illinois poet laureate. He also wrote the screenplay for a film short called Lisa Trotter (2010), a story adapted from Aristophanes' Lysistrata.

Death

On May 19, 2014, Greenlee died in Chicago at the age of 83.

Bibliography

Novels

• The Spook Who Sat by the Door, London: Allison & Busby, 1969.
• Baghdad Blues, New York: Bantam, 1976.

Poetry

• Blues for an African Princess, Chicago: Third World Press, 1971.
• Ammunition!: Poetry and Other Raps (introduction Andrew Salkey), London: Bogle-L'Ouverture, 1975.
• Be-Bop Man/Be-Bop Woman, 1968-1993: Poetry and Other Raps, Cambrea Heights, NY: Natiki, 1995.