Velvet-Club Connecting Lesbians & Bi-women around the World

NON-FICTION TRIUMPHS AT POLARI AWARDS AS MOHSIN ZAIDI AND DIANA SOUHAMI NAMED 2021 WINNERS Criminal Barrister Mohsin Zaidi wins the Polari First Book Prize for his coming-of-age memoir A Dutiful Boy: A Memoir of a gay Muslims journey to acceptance Award-winning writer Diana Souhami wins the overall Polari Prize for her latest foray into biography, No Modernism Without Lesbians Mohsin Zaidi and Diana Souhami have tonight (Sat, Oct 30) been announced as the winners of the 2021 Polari Prizes, the UKs only awards celebrating literature that explores the LGBTQ+ experience. Mohsin Zaidi becomes the 11th winner of the Polari First Book Prize for his memoir A Dutiful Boy (Square Peg), which charts his journey growing up in a devout shia Muslim community within a poor pocket of east London. Diana Souhami scooped the overall Polari Prize for non-debut talent for her biography No Modernism without Lesbians (Head of Zeus) about a singular group of women who fostered the birth of the Modernist movement. The winners were announced in a ceremony held at the Southbank Centre at the London Literature Festival. A Guardian, New Statesman and GQ Book of the Year, Zaidis revelatory memoir is a moving and ultimately uplifting account of his experiences as a young boy in denial about his sexuality. Becoming the first person from his school to attend Oxford University, new experiences and encounters lead him on a path to self discovery, opening the door to live every part of his identity. Rachel Holmes, judge for the 2021 Polari First Book Prize, said of the book: In these days of deliberately-stoked culture wars Mohsin Zaidi deftly engages us with the harsh, hilarious and inherently human realities of multiple identity. With painful honesty, he shows how no community of class, race, faith or queerness is immune from suspicion and occasional hatred of otherness, nor mercifully from love, laughter and acceptance. No Modernism Without Lesbians by renowned biographer Diana Souhami, is a bold, fresh new look at the early twentieth century cultural canon through the lens of four lesbians: Sylvia Beach, Bryher, Natalie Barney, and Gertrude Stein. A trailblazing publisher, a patron of artists, a society hostess, and a groundbreaking writer, their lives and work became central to fostering the Modernist movement in interwar Paris. Praising the winner, judge and CEO of the National Centre for Writing, Chris Gribble described the book as richly researched, entertaining and hugely enjoyable offering insight into the lives, passions and legacies of a group of outstanding women who together helped change the course of their culture. Souhami is a brilliant guide and this book a celebration, corrective and fillip all in one.

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