writer / podcaster / journalist
Expertises
Author
Lee wrote China’s Backstory: The History Beijing Doesn’t Want You to Read. The book looks at the past the most important China-related news stories of today: Taiwan, Xinjiang, the Chinese economy and Hong Kong, and it does so in a cheeky manner meant to make Chinese history less intimidating.
Podcast
Lee is the host of the Chinese Literature Podcast. He has been producing the podcast since 2016. The podcast covers a wide range of topics, from the earliest written texts produced in Chinese to a Song Dynasty fart joke.
Journalism
Lee interned with The Economist in 2016, writing pieces on China, Asia and really anything. He has written about Beijing’s oppression of the Uyghurs, the return of otters to Singapore and even Sikh truckers on America’s roads. To see his full portfolio, check out this page.
Hitchhiker
Rather stupidly, Lee and his friend, Galen Burke, thought it would be a good idea to hitchhike the Chinese-portion of the Silk Road. They won a grant from Outside Magazine for the project, and traveled from Xi’an, China to Almaty, Kazakhstan, all while keeping a blog on the adventure.
Teacher
Lee was an adjunct Professor at the University of Oregon, teaching Chinese and Taiwanese literature and film.
*A brief note: This website is designed by me, Lee, hence the mildly unprofessional look of it all. The odd things you see on the page, like a button curiously labeled “Ignite your creativity,” are a result of a malfunctioning WordPress theme that I have not been able to change. After struggling with it for an hour, I realized it would take a few hours to fix. Rather than wasting my time fiddling with the website, I decided to read a book.