The Bookseller - Features - Virago looks forward after full five decades

Virago's ability to see what others missed was how the imprint first came to publish Maya Angelou in the UK: "Caged Bird was published in the US in 1969 and according to Angelou, every British publisher had passed-‘Who cares about the experiences of a young Black woman growing up in the South, for British readers?' That took until 1984 to be published [in the UK] and was a huge success for us. That still happens, but in 2017 it was the opposite, and that had its challenges in terms of being sane about advances and keeping our cool." Now that big auctions for books on feminism are quietening a little, Virago continues as it always did, she says. "Whether it feels boom or bust for feminism, because we have been going for 50 years, it doesn't bother us. We still feel Virago is necessary and that there are writers who have been marginalised or dismissed or silenced who deserve a bigger platform."