GLR May-June 2026

IN MEMORIAM

Don Weise, LGBT Publishing Dynamo R ICHARD C ANNING L OS ANGELES-BORN Don Weise (1967–2026) was a titan of LGBTQ + publishing for over three decades. Wry, learned, shrewd, yet also risk-taking, he not only

other devoted to Huey P. Newton). At the same time, he never lost the most important perspective—that of the lay reader. The often myopic, gossip-ridden, backstabbing bear pit of much American publishing held no interest. He simply wanted great books to find new audiences, challenge orthodoxies and, yes, change lives for the better.

propelled queer publishing into a richer, more substantial, diverse, and significant realm; he also steered the tiller of several publishing companies through their most challenging times, first at California-based Cleis Press and—following a long and highly successful period as editor of a “queer and more” list at Carroll & Graf— later at Boston-based Alyson Books. In re cent years, he ran two publishing houses, Magnus Books and Querelle Press, contin uing to promote new voices, ideas, and fields of study. Being edited by Don was a pleasure, as so many have recorded in paying tribute. His

Don’s impeccable manners and fairness stood out and made his influence that much wider. He persuaded gay male luminaries such as Gore Vidal, Edward Albee, James Purdy, Edmund White, and Dennis Cooper to publish with him, despite Carroll & Graf’s relatively modest commercial reach. Equally, he promoted women’s work, in cluding that of Ann Bannon, Susie Bright, Kate Clinton, Sarah Schulman, Annie Sprin kle, and Urvashi Vaid. The C&G list was heterodox in every way, embracing estab lished and unknown authors of every eth nicity, spirituality, region, age, and class.

Don was understandably proud of nurturing a return of the challenging but brilliant Brooklyn novelist James Purdy to the public eye, escorting him personally in 2005 to receive the Clifton Fadiman Medal at the Mercantile Library, Purdy’s novel Eustace Chisholm and the Works having been nomi nated by Jonathan Franzen. Weise had strong commercial instincts but sometimes took a proactive view on what he thought needed to be heard. At Carroll & Graf, he commissioned my own Vital Signs: Es sential AIDS Fiction (2007), though we both knew it was un likely to sell many copies. This desire also led to the revised edition of Andrew Holleran’s collection of journalism Ground Zero as Chronicle of a Plague, Revisited (2008), still among the most compelling accounts of the first decade of the Amer ican epidemic. Don spent most of his spare time volunteering for advo cates of LGBTQ + writing such as the Publishing Triangle. He also edited books on a freelance basis for most of the big houses. In the early evenings during the late ’90s and early 2000s, he would be found at Chelsea’s Barracuda Bar, taking advantage of two-for-one happy hour. He would be sur rounded by many whose nascent literary careers he aided, even when they found their way to other publishing houses— including Michael Carroll, David McConnell, Vestal McIn tyre, Patrick Ryan, and Bob Smith. His inside knowledge of queer publishing always made his conversational contribu tions memorable, though he was uniformly discreet and al ways protected friends and contacts. Nonetheless, he was memorably witty, warm, and wise. Weise is survived by his mother Linda and sisters Susan and Lori. The queer literary community in the U.S. and far be yond is much in his debt. Richard Canning is author or editor of ten books, including Brigid Brophy. Avant-Garde Writer, Critic, Activist (2020).

calm, reasoned questioning was polite, discreet, and, most im portantly, always informed by scholarship. (He was also a renowned scholar in African-American literature, editing an acclaimed volume of the writings of Bayard Rustin and an

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