Lets face it: drag as we know it is getting tedious. The names from TV are all starting to conglomerate, as each passing year gifts us with a new lot of queens to replace the last. And with each passing coronation ceremony we catapult a new crop of bitches into the drag industrial complex and move silently further from a time when queens weren’t guaranteed a check, and had just their goddess-given compulsion to transform into a glamorous diva to motivate them. The advent of ‘content’ has further smudged into obscurity the storytelling and community-building aspects of drag — which used to be tenets of the job description — and all but cast white noise over our history. @LegendsofDrag offers us more than a look backward, but rather a return to purity of the art form moving forward. In bringing these queens’ stories into the modern literary discourse, Hanson and Antheus have solidified into the zeitgeist the passion in drag and the gay deity of queens, one that existed in its concentrated form before it was paved over by the highway to catchphrase phase. I left the Jane Hotel wishing everyone could’ve seen it, that queens who suffer from drag ennui as I do could realize that they’re descendants of the most fabulous lineage there’s ever been, that being fierce knows no age, borders, or physical limits, that resilience and survival just make you fiercer, I swear I saw it myself! But they were all tucked under my arm in this crucial new addition to my gay library and yours. Legends of Drag is out now from @abramsbooks, and @skirtsuit and @antheus_ will be throwing kikis like they did at the Jane nationwide on tour this summer. Text by @Charleneincarnate To read the full story, go to #gayletter.com and follow the link on our site to purchase this issue and the book Legends of Drag... 1) Flotilla DeBarge in New York City. 2) Carla Gay in San Francisco. 3) Dolly Levi in Los Angeles. 4)Shawnna Brooks in Atlanta. 5)Tasha Kohl in Dallas. 6)Christina Chase in Milwaukee. 7) China in Fort Lauderdale.