At The Brussels Review, we have a straightforward standard: the art comes first; the author second; everything else can go sit in the hallway and wait quietly. Let your art speak, and only then may you speak as well. Check our logo: we have a pissing boy on it; we are neither puritanical nor prudish; politely vulgar in the Belgian way.
Recently, I had a poet from the United States withdraw her accepted work because I declined to include in her author bio the fact that she was queer and disabled. She wanted these to appear as defining descriptors of her literary identity. I explained our position: TBR does not place personal intimate characteristics into professional bios. Not your sexuality; not your disability; not your internal labels; not your activist hashtags. Imagine me placing in my own title: Heterosexual Publishing Editor.
These traits are personal realities like eye color or blood type. The fact that you prefer your lovers arranged in a particular way has absolutely zero bearing on your ability to write a moving poem. If you want the world to know how you have sex, go on Tinder; here we display cultivated ideas, not intimate habits.
People often object. They think that if you don’t publicly signal your identity groups, you’re erasing them. I once had a young writer lobbying for her work by emphasizing that we did not yet have many black lesbians from Africa published. Nonsense! You’re not being erased; you’re simply being treated like everyone else. Equality means you do not get extra badges pinned to your name because the zeitgeist demands a diversity showcase. One goal of our mission is the de‑Americanisation of European publishing; your identity‑strategy manipulation can be left at the door. Let me give some examples of people I greatly appreciate who have operated in real arenas:
Don Lemon is gay. He is a journalist known for his interviews, commentary, and professional work. His bio does not read: “Don Lemon, gay news anchor.” His sexuality appears only in personal context, not as professional decoration.
So is Rachel Maddow, whose journalism has a secure place in my audio rotation and whose skill is the focus, not her sexual identity.
Stephen Hawking was disabled. He was Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge, succeeding Isaac Newton. That detail is relevant. His disability is mentioned where it matters: in terms of resilience, method of communication, and lived struggle against physical constraint while exploring cosmic order. It is not a marketing tagline.
So, we will continue to protect literary space from theatrical identity inventories. We are not interested in running an ideological petting zoo where authors are introduced by their demographic statistics before their words.
We publish:
- Excellent writing
- Deep thinking
- Real craft
- Authentic voice
- Work that stands on its own
We do not publish:
- Pronoun manifestos
- Identity checklists
- Sympathetic credentialing
- Performative vulnerability as résumé‑padding
The rule is simple: if something about you is relevant to the work, it goes in. If not, it doesn’t. If an author wants to speak about disability, sexuality, or anything else, they may put it in the poem, in the story, in the essay. That is where a writer speaks: through language, not labelling.
The Brussels Review is not an identity showcase; it is a literary platform. If someone insists that their pronouns, their queer‑status, or their footnoted personal suffering must be foregrounded, then we wish them well in finding a publication that plays that game. Many do. We won’t.
This is Europe. Here, for centuries, we have treated authors as creators first, citizens second, and private individuals always. The work stands; the work is judged; the work is remembered.
And to return to the withdrawn poems: I truly liked her verse and was genuinely saddened not to have them in the Winter issue; but the scent of flowers does not pair well with the smell of nonsense.
