Cleis Press
Encyclopedia
Cleis Press is an independent publisher of books in the areas of sexuality, erotica, feminism, gay and lesbian studies, gender studies, fiction, and human rights. The press was founded in 1980 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, later moved to San Francisco, and is now based out of Berkeley, CA. It was founded by Frédérique Delacoste, Felice Newman
and Mary Winfrey Trautmann who collectively financed wrote and published the press's first book Fight Back: Feminist Resistance to Male Violence in 1981. In 1987, they published Sex Work: Writings by Women in the Sex Industry by Delacoste with Priscilla Alexander.
Over the years, Cleis Press has published nonfiction books by Susie Bright
, Annie Sprinkle
, Edmund White
, Essex Hemphill
, Gore Vidal
, Christine Jorgensen
, Matthue Roth, Patrick Califia
, Violet Blue (author)
, and Tristan Taormino
, among others. Fiction includes works by Achy Obejas
, Stephen Elliott
, Erastes (author)
, reissues of classic lesbian pulp fiction
(including Ann Bannon
's historic Beebo Brinker series), the Nancy Clue series by Mabel Maney
, Virginia Woolf
’s first completed novel, Melymbrosia, and an English-language novel set in North Korea, Jia by Hyejin Kim. Other Cleis Press authors include Lori Bryant-Woolridge
, Cole Riley, Neil Plakcy, Radclyffe
, James Lear, and Richard Labonté.
Cleis Press produces many erotica collections and self-help sex guides, including The Ultimate Guide to Fellatio, The Whole Lesbian Sex Book, and The Good Vibrations Guide to Sex. Some of their collections include Best Gay Asian Erotica, Best Bisexual Women's Erotica, and Best Lesbian Bondage Erotica, and annual anthologies titled Best Gay Erotica, Best Lesbian Erotica, and Best Women's Erotica. In winter of 2010, they began of yearly anthology of bondage erotica, starting with Best Bondage Erotica 2011. Cleis Press also publishes a wide variety of other thematic collections, including Rachel Kramer Bussel
's Please, Ma'am: Erotic Stories of Male Submission, Caught Looking: Erotic Tales of Voyeurs and Exhibitionists and Alison Tyler
's Frenzy: 60 Stories of Sudden Sex.
In 2000, Cleis Press founded Midnight Editions, a human rights imprint that aims to present fiction, nonfiction, and photojournalism from regions where repression and censorship are endangering creative expression. Midnight Editions published The Little School: Tales of Disappearance and Survival in Argentina, a 1986 memoir by former political prisoner and Amnesty International
board member Alicia Partnoy
, as well as The Diary of a Political Idiot: Normal Life in Belgrade, by Jasmina Tešanović
.
Cleis Press has also published a number of books on transgender issues, including Patrick Califia
's Sex Changes: Transgender Politics and Loren Cameron
's Body Alchemy: Transsexual Portraits. More recently, they also published The Transgender Child: A Handbook for Families and Professionals, by Stephanie Brill and Rachel Pepper, a guidebook for the friends and families of transgender and gender nonconforming children, which addresses significant social, legal, and medical issues.
The press has been the recipient of many awards, including several Lambda Literary Awards.
Felice Newman
Felice Newman is an American somatic coach, sex educator, and author. Newman is one of the founders of Cleis Press, the publisher of more than 200 books that survey the contemporary American sexual landscape...
and Mary Winfrey Trautmann who collectively financed wrote and published the press's first book Fight Back: Feminist Resistance to Male Violence in 1981. In 1987, they published Sex Work: Writings by Women in the Sex Industry by Delacoste with Priscilla Alexander.
Over the years, Cleis Press has published nonfiction books by Susie Bright
Susie Bright
Susannah "Susie" Bright is an American writer, speaker, teacher, audio-show host, and performer, all on the subject of sexuality....
, Annie Sprinkle
Annie Sprinkle
Annie M. Sprinkle is an American former prostitute, stripper, pornographic actress, cable television host, porn magazine editor, writer and sex film producer...
, Edmund White
Edmund White
Edmund Valentine White III is an American author and literary critic. He is a member of the faculty of Princeton University's Program in Creative Writing.- Life and work :...
, Essex Hemphill
Essex Hemphill
Essex Hemphill was an American poet and activist. He was a 1993 Pew Fellowships in the Arts.-Biography:Essex Hemphill was born April 16, 1957 in Chicago and died on November 4, 1995 of AIDS-related complications...
, Gore Vidal
Gore Vidal
Gore Vidal is an American author, playwright, essayist, screenwriter, and political activist. His third novel, The City and the Pillar , outraged mainstream critics as one of the first major American novels to feature unambiguous homosexuality...
, Christine Jorgensen
Christine Jorgensen
Christine Jorgensen was the first widely known person to have sex reassignment surgery—in this case, male to female.-Early life:...
, Matthue Roth, Patrick Califia
Patrick Califia
Patrick Califia , born 1954 near Corpus Christi, Texas is a writer of nonfiction essays about sexuality and of erotic fiction and poetry. Califia is a bisexual trans man.-Biography:...
, Violet Blue (author)
Violet Blue (author)
Violet Blue is an American writer and sex educator.Blue wrote a weekly sex column for the San Francisco Chronicle. In her podcast, Open Source Sex, she reads erotica and discusses topics such as fetishes and oral sex. She also has a video blog. Blue wrote a feature about porn for women which was...
, and Tristan Taormino
Tristan Taormino
Tristan Taormino is a feminist author, columnist, sex educator, activist, editor, speaker, and pornographic film director . She graduated Phi Beta Kappa with her Bachelor's degree in American Studies from Wesleyan University in 1993...
, among others. Fiction includes works by Achy Obejas
Achy Obejas
Achy Obejas is a Cuban American writer and journalist focused on personal and national identity issues, living in Chicago, Illinois.-Life and career:Obejas was born June 28, 1956 in Havana, Cuba...
, Stephen Elliott
Stephen Elliott (author)
Stephen Elliott is an American author and activist living in San Francisco who has written and published seven books. He is also the founder of the political action committee LitPAC, which holds readings by authors to raise money for progressive candidates.-Background and education:Elliott grew...
, Erastes (author)
Erastes (author)
Erastes is the penname of a female author who lives in Norfolk, UK. She drew her inspiration to write historical fiction from works such as Gaywyck by Vincent Virga and the novels of Mary Renault. Erastes is the Director of the Erotic Authors Association and a member of the Historical Novel Society...
, reissues of classic lesbian pulp fiction
Lesbian pulp fiction
Lesbian pulp fiction refers to any mid-20th century paperback novel with overtly lesbian themes and content. Lesbian pulp fiction was published in the 1950s and 60s by many of the same paperback publishing houses that other genres of fiction including Westerns, Romances, and Detective Fiction...
(including Ann Bannon
Ann Bannon
Ann Bannon is an American author who, from 1957 to 1962, wrote six lesbian pulp fiction novels known as The Beebo Brinker Chronicles. The books' enduring popularity and impact on lesbian identity has earned her the title "Queen of Lesbian Pulp Fiction"...
's historic Beebo Brinker series), the Nancy Clue series by Mabel Maney
Mabel Maney
Mabel Maney is an artist and author from San Francisco, California known for her lesbian pulp fiction. She is the author of the Nancy Clue series, a lesbian parody of the Nancy Drew, Cherry Ames, and Hardy Boys series. More recently, she is the author of the "Jane Bond" novels, a series of...
, Virginia Woolf
Virginia Woolf
Adeline Virginia Woolf was an English author, essayist, publisher, and writer of short stories, regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century....
’s first completed novel, Melymbrosia, and an English-language novel set in North Korea, Jia by Hyejin Kim. Other Cleis Press authors include Lori Bryant-Woolridge
Lori Bryant-Woolridge
Lori Bryant-Woolridge is an Emmy Award-winning Chinese-American/African-American author in the chick-lit genre.-Writing career:...
, Cole Riley, Neil Plakcy, Radclyffe
Radclyffe
Radclyffe is an American author of numerous lesbian romances. A 2003/04 recipient of the Alice B. award for her body of work as well as a member of the Golden Crown Literary Society, Pink Ink, and the Romance Writers of America, she lives with her partner Lee in Upstate New York...
, James Lear, and Richard Labonté.
Cleis Press produces many erotica collections and self-help sex guides, including The Ultimate Guide to Fellatio, The Whole Lesbian Sex Book, and The Good Vibrations Guide to Sex. Some of their collections include Best Gay Asian Erotica, Best Bisexual Women's Erotica, and Best Lesbian Bondage Erotica, and annual anthologies titled Best Gay Erotica, Best Lesbian Erotica, and Best Women's Erotica. In winter of 2010, they began of yearly anthology of bondage erotica, starting with Best Bondage Erotica 2011. Cleis Press also publishes a wide variety of other thematic collections, including Rachel Kramer Bussel
Rachel Kramer Bussel
Rachel Kramer Bussel is an author, columnist, and editor, specializing in erotica. She previously studied at the New York University School of Law and earned her bachelor's degree in Political Science and Women's Studies from the University of California, Berkeley.-Career:Bussel is currently...
's Please, Ma'am: Erotic Stories of Male Submission, Caught Looking: Erotic Tales of Voyeurs and Exhibitionists and Alison Tyler
Alison Tyler
Alison Tyler is an American author, editor and publisher of erotica, living in Northern California. She has authored over 20 explicit novels, hundreds of short stories and has edited more than 40 erotic anthologies.-Career:...
's Frenzy: 60 Stories of Sudden Sex.
In 2000, Cleis Press founded Midnight Editions, a human rights imprint that aims to present fiction, nonfiction, and photojournalism from regions where repression and censorship are endangering creative expression. Midnight Editions published The Little School: Tales of Disappearance and Survival in Argentina, a 1986 memoir by former political prisoner and Amnesty International
Amnesty International
Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...
board member Alicia Partnoy
Alicia Partnoy
Alicia Mabel Partnoy is a human rights activist, poet, and translator.After Argentinian President Juan Perón died, the students from the left of the Peronist political party organized with fervor within the country's universities and with workers, were persecuted and imprisoned...
, as well as The Diary of a Political Idiot: Normal Life in Belgrade, by Jasmina Tešanović
Jasmina Tešanovic
Jasmina Tešanović is an author, feminist, political activist , translator, and filmmaker....
.
Cleis Press has also published a number of books on transgender issues, including Patrick Califia
Patrick Califia
Patrick Califia , born 1954 near Corpus Christi, Texas is a writer of nonfiction essays about sexuality and of erotic fiction and poetry. Califia is a bisexual trans man.-Biography:...
's Sex Changes: Transgender Politics and Loren Cameron
Loren Cameron
Loren Rex Cameron is an American photographer, author and transsexual activist. His work includes portraiture and self-portraiture which consist of lesbian and transsexual bodies in both clothed and nude form...
's Body Alchemy: Transsexual Portraits. More recently, they also published The Transgender Child: A Handbook for Families and Professionals, by Stephanie Brill and Rachel Pepper, a guidebook for the friends and families of transgender and gender nonconforming children, which addresses significant social, legal, and medical issues.
The press has been the recipient of many awards, including several Lambda Literary Awards.