Jewelle Gomez
Biography
Born and raised in Boston, Massachusetts, Gomez later lived in New York before relocating to the San Francisco Bay Area. Her career has encompassed literature, theater, public television, philanthropy, and arts administration. She has worked across fiction, poetry, essays, criticism, and playwriting while remaining active as a lesbian/feminist cultural worker and activist.
Gomez's heritage includes Cabo Verdean, Wampanoag, and Ioway ancestry. Her writing frequently draws on family history, Black and Indigenous identity, sexuality, feminism, and the experiences of women and LGBTQ+ communities. Her poetry collection Still Water explores family heritage, identity, sexuality, class, love, grief, friendship, and solidarity.
Her literary work has also extended into theater. Bones & Ash: A Gilda Story, her stage adaptation of The Gilda Stories, was performed by Urban Bush Women in thirteen U.S. cities during 1996–1997. Gomez also served as playwright-in-residence at New Conservatory Theatre Center from 2011 to 2023 and has held leadership roles in arts and LGBTQ+ organizations.
BQW Impact
Jewelle Gomez has played a foundational role in Black lesbian literature and LGBTQ+ literary culture. Her writing places Black lesbian experience, Indigenous and African diasporic heritage, sexuality, feminism, and community at the center of literary and speculative traditions.
The Gilda Stories is particularly significant to BQW cultural history. Its Black lesbian protagonist and reimagining of the vampire tradition created an enduring work of queer speculative fiction that has remained in print since its original publication. The novel received two Lambda Literary Awards and has influenced subsequent generations of LGBTQ+ and speculative writers.
Notable Works
The Lipstick Papers (1980)
An early poetry collection establishing Gomez's literary engagement with women's experiences, identity, and sexuality.
The Gilda Stories (1991)
A groundbreaking Black lesbian vampire novel following Gilda across two centuries as she navigates freedom, community, desire, and survival.
Forty-Three Septembers (1993)
A collection of autobiographical essays addressing family, identity, history, culture, and lived experience.
Oral Tradition: Selected Poems Old & New (1995)
A collection bringing together Gomez's poetry across themes of history, identity, sexuality, relationships, and community.
Don't Explain: Short Fiction (1998)
A short-fiction collection exploring relationships, race, class, sexuality, and lesbian life.
Still Water: Poems (2022)
A poetry collection exploring family heritage, multi-ethnic identity, sexuality, class, love, grief, friendship, and solidarity.
Learn More
Current institutional profile and programming documenting her literary and cultural work.
Personal site for her writing and professional work.
Publisher and author resource documenting her books, theatrical work, and social account.
Publisher record for Still Water and its themes of heritage, identity, sexuality, and community.