|
Edwin Black is the award-winning,
New York Times and international bestselling investigative author of IBM and the Holocaust (Crown
Publishing and others worldwide 2001), The Transfer Agreement (Macmillan 1984 and Carroll-Graff
2001), War Against the Weak (Four Walls Eight Windows and others worldwide September 2003),
and a novel, Format C: (Dialog Press and others worldwide 1999). His latest book is
Banking on Baghdad (John Wiley & Sons and others worldwide).
In the past several years, Black has won numerous prestigious awards. In 2004, he won the coveted Rockower Award for Investigative Journalism--First Prize from the American Jewish Press Association for his syndicated investigation of the Ford Foundation's systematic funding of hate groups. In 2003, Black received the International Human Rights Award from the World Affairs Council for War Against the Weak. Plus, in 2003, he received the top two editorial awards from the American Society of Journalists and Authors: Best Book of the Year for IBM and the Holocaust and Best Article of the Year for "IBM in Auschwitz" in the Village Voice. Editors have nominated Black for the Pulitzer Prize eight times, the most recently for Banking on Baghdad. In addition, Black received the Carl Sandburg Award for The Transfer Agreement as well as two Folio Awards and a Computer Press Association Award for excellence in magazine publishing. Black's enterprise writing has appeared in numerous newspapers across the United States and Europe, from the Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, New York Daily News and Los Angeles Times to Sunday Times (England), Frankfurter Zeitung (Germany) and Jerusalem Post (Israel). The world's leading magazines have also carried his work, from Playboy and Reform Judaism to Der Spiegel and L'Express. Black's latest book is Banking on Baghdad, which chronicles the tragic and turbulent 7,000-year history of Iraq. Banking on Baghdad is the first history of Iraq from a global stage, as determined by the corporate boardrooms and governmental war rooms of London, Paris, Istanbul, Washington and the other centers of commercial and political power that coveted its geography and geology. Black led a team of thirty researchers in five countries, accessing more than 100 repositories and securing some 50,000 documents. Black was granted access to the corporate archives of numerous oil companies involved in Iraq and the Middle East. Sir Martin Gilbert wrote, "Every hour spent reading Banking on Baghdad will be well rewarded. The historical detail is fascinating; Edwin Black's mastery of it reads like a detective story and thriller combined, and the relevance of the past has seldom been so graphically portrayed. This is a gripping expose... this is fact not fiction, more endlessly intriguing and absorbing than any novel could be." Banking on Baghdad has been nominated for a Pulitzer. More information on the book can be found at www.bankingonbaghdad.com. Edwin Black is probably best known for IBM and the Holocaust, an international bestseller documenting the previously unknown twelve-year strategic relationship between IBM and Hitler's Third Reich. IBM developed custom-made data processing programs, using punch cards, to organize and accelerate all six phases of the Holocaust, from identification, expulsion and confiscation to ghettoization, deportation and extermination. IBM and the Holocaust was simultaneously released in 40 countries in nine languages on February 11, 2001 to international acclaim and worldwide headlines. It immediately became a bestseller on the New York Times list as well as those in many other nations such as Canada, Germany, Italy, and Brazil. The work is now available in 60 countries in 13 languages and 27 editions, and it has been optioned for film. Black has lectured and toured on the topic, from the Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles to the Royal War Museum in London to the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw. The author's writing on the subject has appeared in publications from the Los Angeles Times to Der Spiegel to the Jerusalem Post. His interviews for the book have included scores of network TV and radio shows from NBC's Today Show, Dateline, and NPR to England's BBC, Germany's ZDF, and France's TF-1. In May 2003, IBM and the Holocaust received the American Society of Journalists and Authors top two awards: best nonfiction book of the year; plus an excerpt with additional information about IBM in Auschwitz appearing in the Village Voice received the award as the best newspaper investigative article of the year. The book also received a Pulitzer nomination from Crown Publishing. More information on the book can be found at www.ibmandtheholocaust.com. War Against the Weak chronicles the gripping story of America's decades-long campaign to create a white, Nordic master race through a sham science called eugenics. Some 60,000 Americans were forcibly sterilized in eugenic campaigns organized by American corporate philanthropic organizations such as the Carnegie Institution and the Rockefeller Foundation. The program was then transplanted to Germany where the Rockefeller Foundation and American eugenicists founded and funded Nazi eugenics. To assemble War Against the Weak, Black headed a team of some 50 researchers, working in dozens of archives in four countries, and accumulating some 50,000 documents. Hailed as a “gripping account” by historian Paul Weindling and “astonishing” by Abraham Foxman, War Against the Weak launched September 7, 2003. The New York Times called the book “chilling,” Esquire called it “scary and necessary,” and Library Journal dubbed it a “bombshell.” War Against the Weak received the World Affairs Council's award for Best Book of 2003 for International Human Affairs. More information on the book can be found at www.waragainsttheweak.com. The Transfer Agreement, originally published in 1984, was Edwin Black's first book. It documents the dramatic story of the pact between the Third Reich and Jewish Palestine in which the Zionist Organization agreed to break the worldwide, Jewish-led anti-Nazi boycott in exchange for the transfer of some 60,000 Jews to Palestine along with millions in their assets converted into German merchandise. The Transfer Agreement, operating from 1933 to 1939, helped seed the Jewish State. In April 1998, Black was honored by Spertus Institute at a special ceremony in Chicago for donating the 35,000 archival documents gathered in the original research. Republished continuously, the latest edition was released in 2001 by Carroll & Graf with a special introduction by Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League. Black has written about the Transfer Agreement for a diverse group of publications, from the Washington Post and Chicago Tribune to Reform Judaism and B'nai B'rith Monthly. He has lectured on the topic extensively around the United States. He was interviewed on numerous television shows such as the CBS Morning News and was the subject of a half-hour NBC documentary. The Transfer Agreement won the Carl Sandburg Award for the best nonfiction book of 1984 and was nominated by MacMillan for a Pulitzer; it has been recently optioned for film. More information on the book can be found at www.transferagreement.com. Edwin Black's first novel, Format C:, a kabalistic, technological thriller with echoes from the Holocaust, was met with critical acclaim. The Cleveland Plain Dealer called Format C: a “gripping, fanciful, fast-paced tale.” Kirkus Reviews wrote: “Massively conceived, neatly chiseled... Black throughout shows great smarts and at times displays virtuoso rhetoric.” Bookbrowser called the novel “a brilliant allegorical thriller.” In 1999, the author toured twenty cities and lectured to groups and appeared on media throughout as the millennium approached. More information on the book can be found at www.formatnovel.com Edwin Black began his career as an aggressive enterprise and investigative reporter and editor in the competitive Chicago journalism scene of the late seventies and early eighties. He was editor of the award-winning investigative magazine Chicago Monthly and wrote extensively for all four daily newspapers of the day: Chicago Tribune, Chicago Today, Chicago Daily News and Chicago Sun-Times, as well as the weekly Chicago Reader and Chicago Magazine. Nationally, he wrote for leading magazines and newspapers, such as the Washington Post, Playboy, Journal of the American Bar Association, and Sports Illustrated. An avid movie music reviewer, he has written on soundtracks and music for Chicago Tribune, Chicago Reader, Downbeat, International Musician, and many other publications in America and Europe; he has interviewed such leading composers as Dimitri Shostakovich, Aaron Copland, Jerry Goldsmith and Hans Zimmer. In 1984, Black began “The Cutting Edge,” a weekly enterprise column syndicated to newspapers in 50 cities, first from Chicago and Washington D.C. and then as a foreign correspondent in Jerusalem. “The Cutting Edge” was nominated for two Pulitzer Prizes. His hard-hitting enterprise articles include exclusive interviews with Minister Louis Farrakhan, Bishop Desmond Tutu, and Chicago Mayor Harold Washington. The column was noted for breaking stories on the Skinheads, the Aryan Brotherhood, the Black Hebrews, and Israeli religious strife. Black was the only non-Israeli print journalist to accompany Shimon Peres to his surprise February 1987 summit in Cairo. For the column, Black also accompanied the South Lebanese Army on patrol in Lebanon, and the Jerusalem Bomb Squad during an outbreak of terror bombings. As an investigative journalist, Black has investigated HMOs, the homeless, the Jonathan Pollard spy scandal, corporate misconduct, Microsoft antitrust activities, hate crimes, the infamous Kathy Webb rape case, and the abduction of journalist Terry Anderson. His exclusive investigation of the worldwide Bramson insurance empire led to numerous arrests and convictions as a direct result of his disclosures. His investigation of Minnesota's powerful Senator David Durenberger ultimately led to his indictment. Black often worked undercover. His internationally syndicated investigation of the Ford Foundation financing of Mideast agitation groups, called “Funding Hate,” resulted in Congressional investigations and sea change in American private donations to Palestinian groups. For his articles, Black has appeared on Oprah, America's Most Wanted and numerous other TV and radio shows. For his articles, he has appeared on Oprah, America's Most Wanted and numerous other shows. Edwin Black is represented worldwide by Lynne Rabinoff Associates and B'nai B'rith Lecture Bureau. Awards
Past Nominations
|