Winter storm warnings continue in northern Minnesota 

MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all. 

Turn Up Your Support

The Library Of Congress has announced Arthur Sze as the 25th U.S. poet laureate. Sze has had a decades-long career as a poet, with his work often drawing inspiration from philosophy, science and nature. He's also an editor and translator of poetry. Sze will start on Oct. 9, taking over from Ada Limón.

The job of the poet laureate is to promote the reading of poetry, and different laureates choose different fields and avenues. In the announcement, Sze says he intends to focus on promoting translated poetry. "As laureate I feel a great responsibility to promote the ways poetry, especially poetry in translation, can impact our daily lives," he wrote in the announcement. "We live in such a fast-paced world: poetry helps us slow down, deepen our attention, connect and live more fully."

Sze, born in New York City, is a child of Chinese immigrants. He studied math and science at MIT in 1968. But in a 1998 interview with WHYY's 

, he said he found himself "totally bored" in a classroom, and found himself writing all the time instead. So he transferred to the University of California, Berkeley, to study poetry. Since then he's written 12 poetry collections, including 2025's 

In 2006 Sze became the poet laureate of Sante Fe, where he's lived for a long time. In 2015, he was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. And in 2019, he won the National Book Award for his collection 

In the announcement, Acting Librarian of Congress Robert R. Newlen praised Sze's poetry as "distinctly American" in how he portrayed the Southwest. "Like Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman, Sze forges something new from a range of traditions and influences – and the result is a poetry that moves freely throughout time and space."

Arts and Culture

The Thread® - Books and Literary News

Homepage

Andrew Limbong

Author

Sze is a poet with a lot of acclaim — he's won the National Book Award, was a Guggenheim fellow and was a finalist for the Pulitzer. He aims to promote interest in translated poetry in his new role.

Arthur Sze named 25th U.S. poet laureate

Go Deeper.

Like this?

News you can use in your inbox