Thank you to all of the writers, academics, scholars, & historians who provided us with these great works for all of us to learn and enjoy !
If you have any books to recommend that we can add to our bookstore, please let us know.
Write us at info@dragkinghistory.com
FILMS
Venus Boyz
A film by Gabriel Baur
Venus Boyz
A film by Gabriel Baur
Club Casanova, home of the legendary Drag King Night in New York, is the point of departure for an odyssey to the transgender world. It’s a world where women become men – some for a night, others for a lifetime. The film stars renowned Drag Kings Mo B. Dick, DRED Gerestant, Storme Webber, Diane Torr, Del la Grace Volcano, and Bridge Markland, all women who dress, perform, and/or live as men, with appearances by legendary Drag Queens Mistress Formika and Queen Bee Luscious.
WINNER! Best Film: Semaine de la Critique at Locarno
BOOKS
Just One of the Boys
by Gillian M. Rodger
Just One of the Boys
by Gillian M. Rodger
Female-to-male crossdressing became all the rage in the variety shows of nineteenth-century America and began as the domain of mature actresses who desired to extend their careers. These women engaged in the kinds of raucous comedy acts usually reserved for men. Over time, as younger women entered the specialty, the comedy became less pointed and more centered on the celebration of male leisure and fashion
Girls Will Be Boys
by Laura Horak
Girls Will Be Boys
by Laura Horak
Marlene Dietrich, Greta Garbo, and Katharine Hepburn all made lasting impressions with the cinematic cross-dressing they performed onscreen. What few modern viewers realize, however, is that these seemingly daring performances of the 1930s actually came at the tail end of a long wave of gender-bending films that included more than 400 movies featuring women dressed as men.
Sex, Drag, and Male Roles
by Diane Torr & Stephen Bottoms
Sex, Drag, and Male Roles
by Diane Torr & Stephen Bottoms
This book documents the evolution of Torr’s work by blending first-person memoir and commentary from Torr with critical reflections and contextualization from leading performance critic Stephen J. Bottoms. The book includes a consideration of the long cultural history of female-to-male cross-dressing and concludes with Torr’s “Do-It-Yourself” guide to becoming a “Man for a Day.”
Under the Mink
2nd edition • by Lisa E Davis
Under the Mink
2nd edition
by Lisa E Davis
A novel about New York City in the good old days (1949) and entertainers who worked in drag, when that got you jail time instead of a TV show.
When Brooklyn Was Queer
by Hugh Ryan
When Brooklyn Was Queer
by Hugh Ryan
Hugh Ryan’s When Brooklyn Was Queer is a groundbreaking exploration of the LGBT history of Brooklyn, from the early days of Walt Whitman in the 1850s up through the queer women who worked at the Brooklyn Navy Yard during World War II, and beyond. No other book, movie, or exhibition has ever told this sweeping story. Not only has Brooklyn always lived in the shadow of queer Manhattan neighborhoods like Greenwich Village and Harlem, but there has also been a systematic erasure of its queer history—a great forgetting.
The Drag King Book
by Judith “Jack” Halberstam & Del LaGrace Volcano
The Drag King Book
by Judith “Jack” Halberstam & Del LaGrace Volcano
This book, the first to chart the explosive rise of drag kings, combines the photographs of (100 of drag kings from London, New York, and San Francisco) Del LaGrace Volcano with the text of Judith Halberstam.
The Drag King Anthology
by Donna Troka, Kathleen Lebesco, & Jean Noble
The Drag King Anthology
by Donna Troka, Kathleen Lebesco, Jean Noble
Dispelling the myth that drag kings are simply, “women doing drag”, the Drag King Anthology, presents enlightening essays that address gender, sexuality and feminism.Using prose, poetry and, photographs, an eclectic mix of scholars, performers and fans offer cultural and political, insights on the international growth and, development of drag king troupes and communities.
Drag: The Complete Story
by Simon Doonan
Drag: The Complete Story
by Simon Doonan
Drag is transformation, communication, and, above all, exaggeration, where gender non-conformity is the plat du jour. This fearless book observes this increasingly complex world by exploring drag’s journey – from the surprising, to the sophisticated, to the utterly bizarre – through the twentieth century and up to the present day.
With witty text, dazzling photography, and corralled into thematic chapters, this is the first flamboyant and poignant survey of drag culture. Drag is not just for fabulous queens and drag enthusiasts, but for anyone interested in gender fluidity and the culture surrounding it.
The Gay Revolution: The Story of the Struggle
by Lillian Faderman
The Gay Revolution: The Story of the Struggle
by Lillian Faderman
The sweeping story of the modern struggle for gay, lesbian, and trans rights from the 1950s to the present—based on amazing interviews with politicians, military figures, legal activists, and members of the entire LGBT community who face these challenges every day.
In the words of the eyewitnesses who were there through the most critical events, The Gay Revolution paints a nuanced portrait of the LGBT civil rights movement. A defining account, this is the most complete and authoritative book of its kind.
Gay L. A.: A History of Sexual Outlaws, Power Politics, and Lipstick Lesbians
by Lillian Faderman and Stuart Timmons
Gay L. A.: A History of Sexual Outlaws, Power Politics, and Lipstick Lesbians
by Lillian Faderman and Stuart Timmons
Award-winning historian Lillian Faderman teams with journalist Stuart Timmons to write the first history of gay life in America’s ultimate frontier town: Los Angeles
The exhortation to “Go West!” has always had a strong hold on the American imagination. But for the gays, lesbians, and transgendered people who have moved to L.A. over the past two centuries, the City of Angels has offered a special home–which, in turn, gave rise to one of the most influential gay cultures in the world.
Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers: A History of Lesbian Life in Twentieth-Century America
by Lillian Faderman
Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers: A History of Lesbian Life in Twentieth-Century America
by Lillian Faderman
Lillian Faderman tells the compelling story of lesbian life in the 20th century, from the early 1900s to today’s diverse lifestyles. Using journals, unpublished manuscripts, songs, news accounts, novels, medical literature, and numerous interviews, she relates an often surprising narrative of lesbian life. “A key work…the point of reference from which all subsequent studies of 20th-century lesbian life in the United States will begin.”—San Francisco Examiner.
Surpassing the Love of Men: Romantic Friendship and Love Between Women from the Renaissance to the Present
by Lillian Faderman
Surpassing the Love of Men: Romantic Friendship and Love Between Women from the Renaissance to the Present
by Lillian Faderman
A classic of its kind, this fascinating cultural history draws on everything from private correspondence to pornography to explore five hundred years of friendship and love between women. Surpassing the Love of Men throws a new light on shifting theories of female sexuality and the changing status of women over the centuries.
Mother Camp
by Esther Newton
Mother Camp
by Esther Newton
For two years Esther Newton did field research in the world of drag queens—homosexual men who make a living impersonating women. Newton spent time in the noisy bars, the chaotic dressing rooms, and the cheap apartments and hotels that make up the lives of drag queens, interviewing informants whose trust she had earned and compiling a lively, first-hand ethnographic account of the culture of female impersonators. Mother Camp explores the distinctions that drag queens make among themselves as performers, the various kinds of night clubs and acts they depend on for a living, and the social organization of their work. A major part of the book deals with the symbolic geography of male and female styles, as enacted in the homosexual concept of “drag” (sex role transformation) and “camp,” an important humor system cultivated by the drag queens themselves.
Gay New York: Gender, Urban Culture, and the Making of the Gay Male World, 1890-1940
by George Chauncey
Gay New York: Gender, Urban Culture, and the Making of the Gay Male World, 1890-1940
by George Chauncey
The award-winning, field-defining history of gay life in New York City in the early to mid-20th century. Gay New York brilliantly shatters the myth that before the 1960s gay life existed only in the closet, where gay men were isolated, invisible, and self-hating. Drawing on a rich trove of diaries, legal records, and other unpublished documents, George Chauncey constructs a fascinating portrait of a vibrant, cohesive gay world that is not supposed to have existed. Called “monumental” (Washington Post), “unassailable” (Boston Globe), “brilliant” (Nation), and “a first-rate book of history” (New York Times), Gay New York forever changed how we think about the history of gay life in New York City, and beyond.
Early Professional Women in Northern Europe, c. 1650-1850
Edited by Johanna Ilmakunnas, Marjatta Rahikainen and Kirsi Vainio-Korhonen
Early Professional Women in Northern Europe, c. 1650-1850
Edited by Johanna Ilmakunnas, Marjatta Rahikainen and Kirsi Vainio-Korhonen
This book focuses on early examples of women who may be said to have anticipated, in one way or another, modern professional and/or career-oriented women. The contributors to the book discuss women who may at least in some respect be seen as professionally ambitious, unlike the great majority of working women in the past. In order to improve their positions or to find better business opportunities, the women discussed in this book invested in developing their qualifications and professional skills, took economic or other kinds of risks, or moved to other countries. Socially, they range from elite women to women of middle-class and lower middle-class origin.
In terms of theory, the book brings fresh insights into issues that have been long discussed in the field of women’s history and are also debated today. However, despite its focus on women, the book is conceptually not so much focused on gender as it is on profession, business, career, qualifications, skills, and work. By applying such concepts to analyzing women’s endeavours, the book aims at challenging the conventional ideas about them.
100 of the Most Influential Gay Entertainers
by Jenettha J. Baine
100 of the Most Influential Gay Entertainers
by Jenettha J. Baines
Original couture fashion design. Flawless makeup. Perfectly executed performances. Attention-commanding stage presence. This is only the beginning of what makes an entertainer engaging and truly memorable. Welcome to a backstage pass into the intimate details of the lives of some of the world’s most influential gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, and inter-sexed entertainers. These are their stories. Discover their fears and motivations. Experience the joy, excitement and fascination of working in the entertainment business.
These entertainers are locally appreciated, nationally known, and world traveled. They have performed everywhere from small smoke-filled clubs to Las Vegas stages. Their impact on the GLBTQI (gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, inter-sexed) communities in the United States and around the world is immeasurable. Entertainers such as RuPaul’s Drag Race contestants Nina Flowers, Ongina, and Rebecca Glasscock; legendary performers Mr. Charlie Brown from the infamous Backstreets of Atlanta; Tommie Ross and Hawaiian Goddess Dina Jacobs; celebrity impersonators Hot Chocklate as Tina Turner, Coti Collins as Reba McIntyre, Leigh Shannon as Bette Miller, and Andy “6-Pak” Citino as Kid Rock; Queen of Hawaii Tiana Anderson, Queen of Bermuda Sybil Barrington; the many faces of Tasha Long; the mother of Atlanta Niesha Dupree; female-to-male illusionists Romance St. James and Gage Gatlyn; the multi-talented actress and star of “The Dred Love Experience”, MilDred “DRED” Gerestant; the beautiful and talented Raquell Lord, Erica Andrews and Stasha Sanchez; “at large” Kelexis Davenport, Chelsea Pearl and former Alvin Ally student and house music diva Ebonee Excell; New York actress and comedian Harmonica Sunbeam and her sidekick Sugga Pie Koko, and the greatest femme and stud promoters of all time, Miss Theresa from New Jersey, Regina Franklin from Atlanta, Madison from New York, and many, many more entertainers across the United States and beyond!
Intimate Investments in Drag King Cultures
by Kerryn Drysdale
Intimate Investments in Drag King Cultures
The Rise and Fall of a Lesbian Social Scene
by Kerryn Drysdale
This book takes the globally recognised phenomenon of drag king performances as an opportunity for critical inquiry into the rise and fall of an urban scene for lesbian and queer women in Sydney, Australia (circa 1999-2012). But what happens when scenes fade, as they invariably do? Intimate Investments in Drag King Cultures is unique in capturing the perspective of a scene at the moment of its decline, revealing the process by which the contemporary drag king movement becomes layered with historical significance.
For a FREE PDF Download of this book, please contact the author Kerryn Drysdale. She will happily send you a copy.
ZINES
Kingdom Magazine Vol. 1
by Ken Vegas & Carlos Las Vegas
Kingdom Magazine Vol. 1
by Ken Vegas & Carlos Las Vegas
“Kingdom Magazine” was dedicated to documenting drag king history, drag shows, our arts and photographs, from performers all over the World.
Inspired by the Drag King community at IDKE (The International Drag King Etravaganza), Ken Vegas and Carlos Las Vegas, teamed up with incredibly generous drag king contributors, photographers and artists to document what was happening at the time. There was a lot of activity in the scene of emerging drag artists, troupes and gender politics that Ken and Carlos knew that they had to create a space for these voices and efforts to be documented for future generations of drag kings, genderbenders and historians to reference.
We hope you enjoy taking a peek into the world of drag that was occurring in the early part of the 21st century.
We offer Kingdom Vol. 1 as a free printable download (PDF) with more editions to come as they are made available.