Stewart Lee to launch his new book from a barge

Monday 9th September 2019, 2:05pm

Stewart Lee is to launch his book March Of The Lemmings via an event on a barge
He'll give a reading at Regent's Canal floating bookshop Word On The Water on Sunday 15th September at 2pm
He says: "The badly thought out event is sure to cause no end of problems"

Stewart Lee is to launch his new book by staging an event on a barge.

He will read from March Of The Lemmings, which has just been released in shops, from the deck of Word On The Water. The floating bookshop is moored on the Regent's Canal in Granary Square, near London's King's Cross.

He'll be there on Sunday 15th September at 2pm.

Lee says: "As there is no room for listeners on the boat, I will address them as they stand on the shore. I will be like Christ talking from a fishing boat, or a Viking leader making laws from the island of the Icelandic Tingwall parliament."

The reading will be followed by a "raucous" free jazz set from the trio of Alan Wilkinson, Steve Noble and John Edwards, "perched dangerously on the barge's roof."

"The badly thought out event is sure to cause no end of problems, and may set back the cause of the written word, and all jazz, for decades", confessed Lee.

Drawing on three years of newspaper columns, a complete transcript of the Content Provider stand-up show, and Lee's caustic footnote commentary, March Of The Lemmings is described as "the scathing, riotous record the Brexit era deserves."

"Some of the book, which deals almost exclusively with Brexit and was completed in March, now feels irrelevant", says Lee, "but much of it is so prophetic it is as if it was written by an omnipotent God, bending reality to his will, which frightens me to be honest."

Organisers say: "Attendees may want to bring rainwear, and flasks, or money to buy their own food and drink from one of Granary Square's many artisanal delicacy outlets. If anyone has any quality books they want to donate to Word On The Water, they would be gladly received."

"You need to bear in mind that the water is dark, lonely and dangerous," warned Lee. "In fact Paddy, who co-runs the shop, recently fell in the canal and broke his leg."

March Of The Lemmings is available to order now.

Stewart Lee - March Of The Lemmings

As a Metropolitan Elitist Snowflake, Stewart Lee was disappointed by the Brexit referendum result of 2016. But he knew how to weaponise his inconvenience. He would treat all his subsequent writing, until we left the EU, as interrelated episodes of a complete work. The cast of characters include Lemming-obsessed Michael Gove, violent tanning-salon entrepreneur Tommy Robinson and Boris Piccaninny Watermelon Bumboys Letterbox Cake Disaster Weightloss Haircut Bullshit Johnson.

A dramatic chorus is made up of online commenters and Kremlin bots. And Lee himself would play the defeated, unreliable narrator-hero, whose resolve and tolerance would gradually unravel as the horror show dragged on. Until the 29th March 2019, when it would all definitely be over.

Drawing on three years of newspaper columns, a complete transcript of the Content Provider stand-up show, and Lee's caustic footnote commentary, March Of The Lemmings is the scathing, riotous record the Brexit era deserves.

First published: Tuesday 3rd September 2019

Paperback

eBook