A Lesbian Media Strategy: This Bridge Called My Back and Persephone Press

This article explores the fraught politics of lesbian-feminist publishing by focusing on the relationship between Gloria E. Anzaldúa and Cherríe L. Moraga’s collection This Bridge Called My Back (1981), its performance history, and its first publisher, Persephone Press. Persephone’s involvement in This Bridge’s overlooked performances in Boston and beyond foregrounds the lesbian media strategy that the press enacted. The press’s strategy was sometimes in line, but often in conflict, with the strategies that contributors to This Bridge performed onstage. Drawing on archival records consisting of scripts, reviews, budgets, and organizing documents, alongside photographs of the performances, this article argues that This Bridge’s performance and labor history enrich how we teach, cite, and discuss this foundational feminist literary work.