Vintage signs ‘electrifying’ 100 Queer Poems

Vintage will publish an anthology of 100 queer poems curated by award-winning poets Andrew McMillan and Mary Jean Chan on 2nd June 2022.

Alex Russell, senior editor at Vintage, bought UK and Commonwealth rights to 100 Queer Poems from Aitken Alexander’s Chris Wellbelove and Emma Paterson.

Spanning poetry from the 20th-century to the present day, the anthology will include classics by the likes of Elizabeth Bishop and Wilfred Owen, contemporary works by Carol Ann Duffy, Mark Doty and Kei Miller, plus “thrilling” voices such as Chen Chen, Richard Scott and Verity Spott. 

Russell said: “Mary Jean and Andrew are literary stars and with 100 Queer Poems they bring us a constellation of truly brilliant poets. It has been exhilarating to see them shape the anthology; this book will, I know, be treasured by many for years to come, and I can’t wait to celebrate its arrival this summer.”

McMillan’s first collection, Physical (Jonathan Cape), was the first poetry collection to win the Guardian First Book Award, also winning a Somerset Maugham Award, an Eric Gregory Award, a Northern Writers’ Award and the Aldeburgh First Collection Prize. His latest collection is Pandemonium (Jonathan Cape).  

Chan’s  collection Flèche (Faber) won the 2019 Costa Book Award for Poetry and was shortlisted in 2020 for the International Dylan Thomas Prize, the John Pollard Foundation International Poetry Prize, the Jhalak Prize and the Seamus Heaney Centre First Collection Poetry Prize.

In a joint statement the pair said: “We are so excited to showcase the great flourishing of queer poetries over the last few decades in the UK, and to place them in conversation with pioneers from previous generations. 

“Since spring 2021, we have gathered over 40 presses and a hundred poets into an anthology which we hope will move, educate and inspire. Language is how we articulate who we are, and poetry is that language at its most distilled and brilliant. We can’t wait to share 100 Queer Poems with you all, and hope it sends you off on a journey to find hundreds more.’