Queer As Folklore - The Hidden Queer History of Myths and Monsters!

Join any Pride march and you are likely to see a glorious display of papier-mâché unicorn heads trailing sequins, drag queens wearing mermaid tails and more fairy wings than you can shake a trident at. But these are not just accessories: they are queer symbols with historic roots.

Queer as Folklore is an exhilarating journey across centuries and continents which reveals the unsung heroes and villains of storytelling, magic and fantasy. Featuring images from archives, galleries and museums around the world, each chapter investigates the queer history of different mythic and folkloric characters, both old and new.

Leaving no headstone unturned, Sacha Coward will take you on a wild ride through the night from ancient Greece to the main stage of RuPaul’s Drag Race, visiting cross-dressing pirates, radical fairies and the graves of the ‘queerly departed’ along the way. Queer communities have often sought refuge in the shadows, found kinship in the in-between and created safe spaces in underworlds; but these forgotten narratives tell stories of remarkable resilience that deserve to be heard.

To truly understand who queer people are today, we must confront the twisted tales of the past and Queer as Folklore is a celebration of queer history like you've never seen it before.

MEET OUR SPEAKER! Author Sacha Coward

Sacha Coward has worked in museums and heritage for over 10 years. For the past three years, he has been freelancing as an historian, public speaker, and researcher. He has run LGBTQ+ focused tours for museums, cemeteries, archives, and cities around the world.

Sacha has made several appearances on Virgin Radio, speaking on topics such as Turing’s Law and the history of the rainbow flag. He hosted the sell-out ‘Dragged Through History’ event featuring drag queens from UK’s Drag Race such as Sum Ting Wong, Tia Kofi and Divina De Campo. During Lockdown he worked on the #MuseumFromHome movement on twitter creating daily 60 second videos about history and collections, as featured in Forbes, The Metro and the BBC's Culture in Quarantine series.

He has written articles for a huge number of publications, including Metro, Gay Star News, National Theatre, Art UK, Queer Bible, Royal Museums Greenwich, and Dig It Scotland, with a focus on LGBTQ+ history, underrepresented audiences in heritage and mythology and folklore.

Queer as Folklore is Sacha's first book.

Our host for the evening is Scottish queen of twisted folktales, the glorious Kirsty Logan!