Emanuel Xavier


Emanuel Xavier, is an American poet, spoken word artist, novelist, editor, and activist born and raised in New York City, in the Bushwick area of Brooklyn. Of Puerto Rican and Ecuadorian ancestry, he emerged from the neo-Nuyorican spoken word movement to become a successful writer and advocate for gay youth programs and Latino gay literature. Once a street hustler and drug dealer, he has conducted spoken word poetry workshops and produced benefits and events for youth organizations around the United States.
Emanuel Xavier married Brian Berger on September 2, 2018.

Early years

Xavier's father abandoned his mother after learning she was pregnant. At the age of three, Xavier was the victim of child sexual abuse by a relative. At age 16, he came out to his mother and was thrown out of his house. Soon after, he became a hustler. He then attended St. John's University for several years, dropping out after receiving his associate's degree in communications. He worked for a local drug dealer and made a living by selling drugs at popular New York City gay nightclubs, including The Sound Factory and Roxy NYC. Later, after leaving the club scene, he became employed at the famous LGBTQ bookstore A Different Light where he discovered his passion for writing and turned his life around. He has said that he viewed poetry as an "outlet to unleash pain and anger."
Regarding his past, he stated, "I became all those things society expected me to become. I thought that was the only thing I could be."

Professional career

Xavier self-published his debut poetry chapbook, Pier Queen, in the fall of 1997 through his own independent publishing house, Pier Queen Productions. Fifteen years later, in 2012, it was officially published by Rebel Satori Press with photographs taken at the NYC West Side Highway piers by Richard Renaldi.
In 1998 he created the Glam Slam, an annual poetry slam competition featuring four open categories such as Best Erotic Poem in Sexy Underwear or Lingerie and Best Love Poem in Fire Engine Red. Winners of each category received a trophy and went on to compete for the Grand Prize title of Glam Slam Champion. The annual competition was first held in New York City and then London until 2010.
Painted Leaf Press, a small, independent publishing company which went out of business, published Xavier's novel, Christ Like, in 1999. Despite a limited press run, the novel was nominated for a Lambda Literary Award in the Small Press category. It was later reprinted in 2009 by Rebel Satori Press as a revised ten-year-anniversary edition and in 2019 for the twentieth anniversary.
In 2000, Xavier hosted the Lambda Literary Awards ceremony in New York.
Soon after 9/11, Xavier was one of the leading forces behind Words to Comfort, a poetry benefit held at the New School.
Xavier edited the 2005 anthology Bullets & Butterflies: Queer Spoken Word Poetry, earning him a second Lambda Literary Award nomination in the Anthologies category.
He was featured on television on Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry on HBO and In The Life on PBS. He also appeared in the Wolfgang Busch documentary How Do I Look. He also co-starred in the feature film The Ski Trip which aired on LOGO.
In 2009, Xavier headlined an event at El Museo del Barrio entitled, Spic Up! Speak Out! Due to public outcry, the event organizers changed the name to Speak Up! and issued a formal apology. Regarding his personal use of the word spic, Xavier told The New York Times, "For me, it's about empowerment. Look at everything we have done and accomplished. And it is a play on the word. We are speaking out our truths and identities in very perfect English.... spic is a word that we can re-appropriate, that was used to oppress us and box us in a negative way."
Regarding his career, he has been quoted to say, "I think at the beginning it was about me, about sharing my story. But as it evolved, it became more about the larger picture, hoping to inspire others not to follow that path, that it wasn't the only way to go if you were gay, a person of color, and thrown out because you were gay. That it wasn't the only option."
He works for Penguin Random House and helped create the Penguin Random House LGBT Network where he served as Chair of the group.
In 2014, he was invited to speak at The United Nations as part of The International Symposium on Cultural Diplomacy in the USA.
In 2015, he was selected as a featured speaker for TEDx Bushwick on March 21, 2015.
He also filmed for a documentary from Spain which included poets from around the world and helped organize the first ever After Sunset: Poetry Walk at The High Line with The Academy of American Poets.
In 2017, he read his signature poem "Americano" at the PEN America Writer's Resist rally on the steps of The New York Public Library in protest of the Trump administration. That same year, a week long exhibit was staged in NYC to celebrate the 20th anniversary of his poetry collection, "Pier Queen."
In 2018, he was invited again to speak at The United Nations as part of The Conference on Cultural Diplomacy. He read a new poem, "Thoughts and Prayers", and shared a speech about gun control in America.
He was part of the Saks Fifth Avenue Stonewall Inn Gives Back Initiative in 2019 who partnered to give back to the LGBTQ community in honor of the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Inn riots, the beginning of the LGBTQ rights movement. Other celebrities included Amanda Lepore, Dionne Warwick, Kate Bornstein, Lea DeLaria, Michael Musto, Michael Urie and Nico Tortorella.
During the COVID-19 era of 2020, he appeared virtually as guest speaker during the first ever Brooklyn College Lavender Graduation.

Assault and aftermath

In October 2005, Xavier was brutally attacked by a group of about twenty young men in the Bushwick area of Brooklyn. Despite various rumors about the attack—some suggested it stemmed from his granting the Latin Kings gang permission to publish one of his poems, "Waiting For God", which dealt with police brutality while others suggested it was simply another gay bashing—Xavier believed the crime was a random act of violence. He later captured his experience in the poem "Writer's Block".
After the attack, Xavier was diagnosed with an acoustic neuroma, a type of brain tumor, and had surgery; the tumor was benign, but resulted in a period of partial facial paralysis. He recovered from the paralysis; however, he became deaf in his right ear In Fall 2015, he announced on his personal website that the acoustic neuroma had returned. By year's end, he underwent successful radiosurgery.

Awards and honors

In 2010, The Equality Forum named him an LGBT History Month Icon.
The American Library Association selected Xavier's poetry collections If Jesus Were Gay & other poems and Nefarious for their Over The Rainbow Books lists for 2011 and 2015 respectively.