Elizabeth Alexander (poet)

Last updated

Elizabeth Alexander
Elizabeth Alexander 5037688.JPG
Born (1962-05-30) May 30, 1962 (age 62)
Harlem, New York City, U.S.
Education Yale University (BA)
Boston University (MA)
University of Pennsylvania (PhD)
Spouse Ficre Ghebreyesus (deceased 2012)
Children2 sons
Relatives Clifford Alexander Jr. (father)
Mark C. Alexander (brother)
Arthur C. Logan (grandfather)
Myra Adele Logan (greataunt)

Elizabeth Alexander (born May 30, 1962) [1] is an American poet, writer, and literary scholar who has served as the president of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation since 2018.

Contents

Previously, Alexander was a professor for 15 years at Yale University, where she taught poetry and chaired the African American studies department. In 2015, she was appointed director of creativity and free expression at the Ford Foundation. [2] She then joined the faculty of Columbia University in 2016, as the Wun Tsun Tam Mellon Professor in the Humanities in the Department of English and Comparative Literature. [3] [4] [5] In 2022, Time named Alexander one of 100 Most Influential People in World. [6]

Early life

Alexander was born in Harlem, New York City, and grew up in Washington, D.C. She is the daughter of former United States Secretary of the Army and Equal Employment Opportunity Commission Chairman Clifford Alexander, Jr. [7] and Adele Logan Alexander, a professor of African-American women's history at George Washington University and writer. [8] : 9–10  Her brother Mark C. Alexander was a senior adviser to the Barack Obama presidential campaign and a member of the president-elect's transition team. [7] After she was born, the family moved to Washington, D.C. She was just a toddler when her parents took her in August 1963 to the March on Washington site of Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous "I Have A Dream" speech. Alexander recalled that "Politics was in the drinking water at my house". She also took ballet as a child. [8] : 10 

She was educated at Sidwell Friends School, and graduated in 1980. From there she went to Yale University and graduated with a bachelor's degree in 1984. She studied poetry at Boston University under Derek Walcott and got her master's degree in 1987. Her mother said to her: "That poet you love, Derek Walcott, is teaching at Boston University. Why don't you apply?" Alexander originally entered studying fiction writing, but Walcott looked at her diary and saw the poetry potential. Alexander said, "He gave me a huge gift. He took a cluster of words and he lineated it. And I saw it." [8] : 10 

In 1992, she received her PhD in English from the University of Pennsylvania. While she was finishing her degree, she taught at nearby Haverford College from 1990 to 1991. At this time, she would publish her first work, The Venus Hottentot. The title comes from Sarah Baartman, a 19th-century South African woman of the Khoikhoi ethnic group. [8] : 10–11  [9] Alexander is an alumna of the Ragdale Foundation.

Academic career

While a graduate student, she was a reporter for The Washington Post from 1984 to 1985. [1] She soon realized that "it wasn't the life I wanted." [8] : 10  She began teaching at University of Chicago in 1991 as an assistant professor of English. Here she would first meet future president Barack Obama, who was a senior lecturer at the school's law school from 1992 until his election to the U.S. Senate in 2004. While in Chicago in 1992, she won a creative writing fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. [8] : 11 

In 1996, she published a volume of poetry, Body of Life, and a verse play, Diva Studies, which was staged at Yale University. She also became a founding faculty member of the Cave Canem workshop which helps develop African-American poets. In 1997, she received the University of Chicago's Quantrell Award for excellence in undergraduate teaching. Later in that year, she moved to Massachusetts to teach at Smith College. She became the Grace Hazard Conkling poet-in-residence and the first director of the college's Poetry Center. [8] : 12  In 2000, she returned to Yale University, where she would teach African American studies and English. She also released her third poetry collection, Antebellum Dream Book. [8] : 12  In 2005, she was selected in the first class of Alphonse Fletcher Foundation fellows and in 2007–08, she was an academic fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard. [10]

In 2007, Alexander became the first recipient of the Jackson Poetry Prize, an annual prize awarded by Poets & Writers that "honors an American poet of exceptional talent who deserves wider recognition." [11] Since 2008, Alexander has chaired the African American Studies department at Yale University. She currently teaches English language/literature, African-American literature and gender studies at Yale. In 2015, Alexander was elected a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. [12] In 2016, she became the Wun Tsun Tam Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Columbia University. [4] [13] She was awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters degree by Yale University in 2018. [14] She was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2019. [15] In 2020 she was elected to the American Philosophical Society. [16]

Works

Alexander's poems, short stories and critical writings have been widely published in such journals and periodicals such as: The Paris Review, American Poetry Review, The Kenyon Review, The Village Voice,Poetry magazine,The Women's Review of Books, and The Washington Post. Her play Diva Studies, which was performed at the Yale School of Drama, garnered her a National Endowment for the Arts creative writing fellowship as well as an Illinois Arts Council award. [17]

Her 2005 volume of poetry American Sublime was one of three finalists for the Pulitzer Prize of that year. [18] Alexander is also a scholar of African-American literature and culture and recently published a collection of essays entitled The Black Interior. [9] Alexander received the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award Lifetime Achievement Award in Poetry in 2010. [19]

2009 U.S. presidential inauguration

On January 20, 2009, at the presidential inauguration of Barack Obama, Alexander recited her poem "Praise Song for the Day", which she had composed for the occasion. [7] [9] She became only the fourth poet to read at an American presidential inauguration, after Robert Frost in 1961, Maya Angelou in 1993 and Miller Williams in 1997. [20]

The announcement of her selection was favorably received by her fellow poets Maya Angelou, Rita Dove, [20] Paul Muldoon, [7] and Jay Parini, who extolled her as "smart, deeply educated in the traditions of poetry, true to her roots, responsive to black culture." [18] The Poetry Foundation also hailed the choice: "Her selection affirms poetry's central place in the soul of our country." [20]

Though the selection of the widely unknown poet, who was a personal friend of Obama, was lauded, the actual poem and delivery were met with a poor reception. [21] the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times Book editor, and most critics found that "her poem was too much like prose," and that "her delivery [was] insufficiently dramatic." Adam Kirsch of The New Republic found the poem "dull, 'bureaucratic' and found it proved that 'the poet's place is not on the platform but in the crowd, that she should speak not for the people but to them.'" [22]

Alexander wrote of her experience of reading at the inauguration in The New Yorker in January 2017. Alexander brought her father, who had attended the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, to sit next to her at the inauguration. At the rehearsal for the inauguration, Alexander read Gwendolyn Brooks's poem "kitchenette building". [23]

Personal life

Alexander's mother is a member of the Logan family, a part of the old African-American upper class. Her grandfather was Dr. Arthur C. Logan and her greataunt was Dr. Myra Adele Logan. Alexander was married to Ficre Ghebreyesus until his death in April 2012. She lives with their two sons in New York City. [12] She is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated. [24] In 2010, Alexander participated in Henry Louis Gates, Jr.'s PBS series Faces of America , which explored her ancestry and analyzed her DNA. [25]

Bibliography

Poetry

Collections
List of poems
TitleYearFirst publishedReprinted/collected
Early cinema

Essays and introductions

Memoirs

Critical studies and reviews of Alexander's work

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fanny Howe</span> American poet, novelist, and short story writer

Fanny Howe is an American poet, novelist, and short story writer. Howe has written more than 20 books of poetry and prose. Her major works include poetry such as One Crossed Out, Gone, and Second Childhood, the novels Nod, The Deep North, and Indivisible, and collected essays The Wedding Dress: Meditations on Word and Life and The Winter Sun: Notes on a Vocation. She was awarded the 2009 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize by the Poetry Foundation. She is also the recipient of the Gold Medal for Poetry from the Commonwealth Club of California In addition, her Selected Poems received the 2001 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize for the Most Outstanding Book of Poetry Published in 2000 from the Academy of American Poets and she was a finalist for the 2015 International Booker Prize She has also received awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Poetry Foundation, the California Council for the Arts, and the Village Voice. She is professor emerita of Writing and Literature at the University of California, San Diego. She lives in Boston, Massachusetts.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rita Dove</span> American poet and author (born 1952)

Rita Frances Dove is an American poet and essayist. From 1993 to 1995, she served as Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress. She is the first African American to have been appointed since the position was created by an act of Congress in 1986 from the previous "consultant in poetry" position (1937–86). Dove also received an appointment as "special consultant in poetry" for the Library of Congress's bicentennial year from 1999 to 2000. Dove is the second African American to receive the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, in 1987, and she served as the Poet Laureate of Virginia from 2004 to 2006. Since 1989, she has been teaching at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, where she held the chair of Commonwealth Professor of English from 1993 to 2020; as of 2020, she holds the chair of Henry Hoyns Professor of Creative Writing.

Tess Gallagher is an American poet, essayist, and short story writer. Among her many honors were a fellowship from the Guggenheim Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts award, Maxine Cushing Gray Foundation Award.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cornelius Eady</span> American poet (born 1954)

Cornelius Eady is an American writer focusing largely on matters of race and society. His poetry often centers on jazz and blues, family life, violence, and societal problems stemming from questions of race and class. His poetry is often praised for its simple and approachable language.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Claudia Rankine</span> American poet, essayist, and playwright (born 1963)

Claudia Rankine is an American poet, essayist, playwright and the editor of several anthologies. She is the author of five volumes of poetry, two plays and various essays.

Linda Alouise Gregg was an American poet.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Susan Stewart (poet)</span> American poet and literary critic (born 1952)

Susan Stewart is an American poet and literary critic. She is the Avalon Foundation University Professor in the Humanities and Professor of English, emerita, at Princeton University. In 2023, she was elected to the American Philosophical Society.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Carl Phillips</span> American writer and poet (born 1959)

Carl Phillips is an American writer and poet. He is a Professor of English at Washington University in St. Louis. In 2023, he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for his Then the War: And Selected Poems, 2007-2020.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tracy K. Smith</span> American poet (born 1972)

Tracy K. Smith is an American poet and educator. She served as the 22nd Poet Laureate of the United States from 2017 to 2019. She has published five collections of poetry, winning the Pulitzer Prize for her 2011 volume Life on Mars. Her memoir, Ordinary Light, was published in 2015.

Kevin D. Prufer is an American poet, novelist, academic, editor, and essayist. He is Professor of English in the Creative Writing Program at the University of Houston.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Martha Collins (poet)</span> American poet

Martha Collins is a poet, translator, and editor. She has published eleven books of poetry, including Casualty Reports, Because What Else Could I Do, Night Unto Night, Admit One: An American Scrapbook, Day Unto Day, White Papers, and Blue Front, as well as two chapbooks and four books of co-translations from the Vietnamese. She has also co-edited, with Kevin Prufer and Martin Rock, a volume of poems by Catherine Breese Davis, accompanied by essays and an interview about the poet’s life and work.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Natasha Trethewey</span> American poet

Natasha Trethewey is an American poet who served as United States Poet Laureate from 2012 to 2014. She won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize in Poetry for her 2006 collection Native Guard, and is a former Poet Laureate of Mississippi.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jennifer Grotz</span> American poet and translator (born 1971)

Jennifer Grotz is an American poet and translator who teaches English, creative writing, and literary translation at the University of Rochester, where she is Professor of English. In 2017 she was named the seventh director of the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference.

Graywolf Press is an independent, non-profit publisher located in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Graywolf Press publishes fiction, non-fiction, and poetry.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stephanie Burt</span> American literary critic and academic

Stephanie Burt is a literary critic and poet who is Donald P. and Katherine B. Loker Professor of English at Harvard University. The New York Times has called her "one of the most influential poetry critics of [her] generation". Burt grew up around Washington, D.C. She has published various collections of poetry and a large amount of literary criticism and research. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker,The New York Times Book Review, The London Review of Books, and other publications.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mary Jo Bang</span> American poet

Mary Jo Bang is an American poet.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Monica Youn</span> American poet and lawyer

Monica Youngna Youn is an American poet and lawyer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Saskia Hamilton</span> American poet (1967–2023)

Maria Saskia Hamilton was an American poet, editor, and professor and university administrator at Barnard College. She published five collections of poetry, the final of which, All Souls, was posthumously published in September 2023. Her academic focus was largely on the American poet Robert Lowell; she edited several collections of the writings and personal correspondence of Lowell, Elizabeth Hardwick, and Elizabeth Bishop. Additionally, she served as the director of literary programs at the Lannan Foundation, as the Vice Provost for Academic Programs and Curriculum at Barnard College, and as an editor at The Paris Review and Literary Imagination.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Erika Sánchez</span> American poet and writer

Erika L. Sánchez is an American poet and writer. She is the author of poetry collection Lessons on Expulsion and a young adult novel I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter, a 2017 finalist for the National Book Award for Young People's Literature. She was a professor at DePaul University.

Donika Kelly is an American poet and academic, who is Assistant Professor of English at the University of Iowa, where she teaches creative writing. She is the author of the chapbook Aviarium, published with fivehundred places in 2017, and the full-length collections Bestiary and The Renunciations.

References

  1. 1 2 "Elizabeth Alexander". The Africana Research Center. PennState College of the Liberal Arts. Archived from the original on July 30, 2010. Retrieved January 15, 2009.
  2. ↑ "Ford appoints Elizabeth Alexander as director of Creativity and Free Expression". Ford Foundation. October 6, 2015. Retrieved June 15, 2022.
  3. ↑ "Elizabeth Alexander - Words That Shimmer". On Being with Krista Tippett. Retrieved September 3, 2015.
  4. 1 2 Milstein, Larry; Emma Platoff (September 18, 2015). "Elizabeth Alexander, poet and professor, to depart for Columbia". Yale Daily News . Retrieved February 9, 2017.
  5. ↑ "Elizabeth Alexander '84 named president of Mellon Foundation". Yale University News. February 7, 2018. Retrieved March 2, 2018.
  6. ↑ Nottage, Lynne (May 23, 2022). "Elizabeth Alexander: The 100 Most Influential People of 2022". Time. Retrieved September 6, 2023.
  7. 1 2 3 4 Seelye, Katharine Q. (December 21, 2008). "Poet Chosen for Inauguration Is Aiming for a Work That Transcends the Moment". The New York Times . Retrieved January 15, 2009.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Biography today : General Series, Volume 18, no. 2 : profiles of people of interest to young readers . Detroit, Michigan: Omnigraphics. 2010. ISBN   978-0-7808-1051-8. OCLC   320447330. OL   26490181M.
  9. 1 2 3 "Yale Professor Elizabeth Alexander Named Inaugural Poet". Yale Bulletin. Yale University. December 19, 2008. Archived from the original on July 9, 2010. Retrieved January 15, 2009.
  10. ↑ Ireland, Corydon (May 8, 2008). "Radcliffe Fellow, poet Elizabeth Alexander reads". Harvard University Gazette Online. Archived from the original on May 11, 2008. Retrieved January 15, 2009.
  11. ↑ "Jackson Poetry Prize". Poets & Writers. February 12, 2008. Retrieved December 10, 2018.
  12. 1 2 Alexander, Elizabeth (May 9, 2000). "Elizabeth Alexander - Poet - Academy of American Poets". Elizabeth Alexander. Retrieved December 10, 2018.
  13. ↑ "Renowned Poet and Scholar Elizabeth Alexander Joins Faculty". english.columbia.edu. September 11, 2015. Archived from the original on September 14, 2015.
  14. ↑ "Yale awards honorary degrees to 10 individuals for their achievements". YaleNews. May 20, 2018. Retrieved December 10, 2018.
  15. ↑ "New 2019 Academy Members Announced" (Press release). American Academy of Arts & Sciences. April 17, 2019.
  16. ↑ "The American Philosophical Society Welcomes New Members for 2020". American Philosophical Society. May 5, 2020.
  17. ↑ "Elizabeth Alexander: Biography and CV". Archived from the original on February 4, 2009. Retrieved January 15, 2009.
  18. 1 2 Parini, Jay (December 18, 2008). "Why Obama chose Elizabeth Alexander for his inauguration". The Guardian. London. Retrieved January 15, 2009.
  19. ↑ "Lifetime - Elizabeth Alexander". Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards. 2010. Retrieved December 10, 2018.
  20. 1 2 3 Ruane, Michael E. (December 17, 2008). "Selection Provides Civil Rights Symmetry". The Washington Post . Retrieved January 15, 2009.
  21. ↑ Schmich, Mary (January 25, 2009). "Big stage amplifies poet's critics". Chicago Tribune. Archived from the original on January 30, 2009. Retrieved January 27, 2009.
  22. ↑ Italie, Hillel (January 21, 2009). "Poet Elizabeth Alexander offers 'praise song' for Obama's Inauguration Day". Star Tribune . Archived from the original on January 23, 2009. Retrieved December 10, 2018.
  23. ↑ Alexander, Elizabeth (January 17, 2017). "A Poet's Tale from Obama's first inaugural". The New Yorker . Retrieved January 18, 2017.
  24. ↑ "Membership". Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated. 2011. Retrieved June 4, 2024.[ failed verification ]
  25. ↑ "Know Thyself". Faces of America. Season 1. Episode 4. March 3, 2010. PBS.
External videos
Nuvola apps kaboodle.svg "Praise Song for the Day", 2009 Presidential Inauguration, Elizabeth Alexander
Nuvola apps kaboodle.svg Keynote Address-Prof. Elizabeth Alexander, IRAAS 20th Anniversary, November 1, 2013
Nuvola apps kaboodle.svg Keynote- Elizabeth Alexander, Towards an Intellectual History of Black Women Conference, April 29, 2011
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.