LGBT literature in Spain, that is, literature that deals explicitly and primarily with characters and issues within the LGBT+ spectrum, is linked to the progressive social acceptance of sexual diversity in Spain. A great surge of authors, publications, awards, bookstores, and publishing houses—such as Egales , the "first openly homosexual publishing house in Spain"—burst into the scene in the 1990s.[1] In 1995, the Círculo de Bellas Artes itself in Madrid organized a series of 22 literary gatherings on this subject, which evidenced the flourishing of this type of literature.[2]