The Poetry of Alta

This week on From The Vault we present our 1972 recording of Alta Gerry, simply known as Alta in the Poetry World. Alta is an Award winning poet, but maybe more importantly credited with opening one of the early Feminist press houses in 1969, that created space for Women’s voices at a critical point in the 2nd Wave of Feminism.

Alta opened the first women owned Feminist Press in California, Shameless Hussy Press in 1969 and began publishing the works of authors such as Susan Griffin, Pat Parker, Mitsuye Yamada and her own first collection of poetry, Freedom’s in sight. She also published the first edition of Ntozake Shange’s important work, For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide, When The Rainbow is Enuf.

Alta’s collection of poetry, The Shameless Hussy, won the American Book Award in 1981.


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