Charles Wright New US Poet Laureate

Shelf Awareness

Today, the Library of Congress will name as the next poet laureate Charles Wright, whose work, the New York Times said, fuses "the legacy of European modernism with mystical evocations of the landscape of the American South."

Wright is a retired professor at the University of Virginia and has won "just about every other honor in the poetry world, including the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, the Bollingen Prize and the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize."

Contacted by the Times, Wright said, "I'm very honored and flattered to be picked, but also somewhat confused.... I really don't know what I'm supposed to do. But as soon as I find out, I'll do it."

James Billington, the librarian of Congress, praised Wright for his "combination of literary elegance and genuine humility--it's just the rare alchemy of a great poet." Wright's work offers, he said, "an infinite array of beautiful words reflected with constant freshness."