national book award winner

Philip Levine reads widely from his early body of work, primarily from Not This Pig (1968) and They Feed They Lion (1972). He reads two poems that would be later published in his collection titled 1933 (1974).

W.S. Merwin reads from his early collections The Moving Target (1963) and The Lice (1967), as well as from The Carrier of Ladders (1970), which had not yet been completed at the time of this reading. Used with permission of the Wylie Agency LLC.

W.S. Merwin reads widely from his works. Used with permission of the Wylie Agency LLC.

Adrienne Rich reads poems appearing in The Will to Change (1971) and Diving into the Wreck (1973), as well as more recent poems that would be collected in Poems: Selected and New, 1950-1974 (1975).

Adrienne Rich reads poems from the collections Your Native Land, Your Life (1986) and Time's Power (1989).

Charles Wright reads from several of his books, along with three poems that would later be published, in slightly different versions, in his 1988 collection Zone Journals.

W.S. Merwin reads widely from his work. He also reads dreams transcribed and translated by anthropologist Robert M. Laughlin. Used with permission of the Wylie Agency LLC.

Philip Levine reads from five of his books, including the manuscript for 1933, which was published four years after this reading.

Charles Wright reads widely from his work.

W.S. Merwin reads from Travels (1993), The Rain in the Trees (1988), and The Shadow of Sirius (2008). Used with permission of the Wylie Agency LLC.

Jean Valentine reads poems appearing in Little Boat (2007) and Lucy (2009).

Wallace Stegner reads an excerpt from a manuscript that was in progress at the time of the reading; it would later be published as Recapitulation (1979).

W.S. Merwin reads poems from collections spanning four decades of work, including poems that would be collected three years later in Travels (1993). Used with permission of the Wylie Agency LLC.

W.S. Merwin reads from The Vixen (1996), Flower and Hand (1996), The River Sound (1999), and The Pupil (2001), as well as selections from his novel in verse The Folding Cliffs (1998). Used with permission of the Wylie Agency LLC.

John Ashbery reads poems that would later be collected in Hotel Lautréamont (1992), as well as an excerpt from Flow Chart (1991).

William Stafford reads poems from throughout his career, on themes such as aging, memory, nature, war, and human violence. He also reads what he claims is his "weakest" poem, "The Little Girl by the Fence at School."

Arthur Sze reads from his poetry collection Sight Lines (2019).