Tracy K. Smith

Tracy K. Smith’s most recent book, To Free the Captives: A Plea for the American Soul, was published in November 2023 by Knopf. Tracy is a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet, memoirist, editor, translator, and opera librettist. She served as the 22nd Poet Laureate of the United States from 2017-19, during which time she spearheaded American Conversations: Celebrating Poems in Rural Communities with the Library of Congress, created the American Public Media podcast The Slowdown, and edited the anthology American Journal: Fifty Poems for Our Time. She is a professor of English and of African and African American Studies at Harvard University, and a Susan S. and Kenneth L. Wallach Professor at Harvard Radcliffe Institute.