Kevin Young
Young at the 2017Texas Book Festival
Born	Kevin Young (1970-11-08)November 8, 1970 (age 54) Lincoln, Nebraska, U.S.
Occupation	Poet professor editor literary critic
Language	English
Education	Harvard College (AB) Brown University (MFA)
Genre	Poetry,literary criticism
Subject	Blues
Notable awards	Guggenheim Fellowship; finalist,National Book Award
Spouse	Kate Tuttle
Website
kevinyoungpoetry.com

Kevin Young (born November 8, 1970)^[1][2] is an Americanpoet and the director of the Smithsonian InstitutionNational Museum of African American History and Culture since 2021. Author of 11 books and editor of eight others,^[3] Young previously served as Director of theSchomburg Center for Research in Black Culture at theNew York Public Library. A winner of aGuggenheim Fellowship as well as a finalist for theNational Book Award for his 2003 collectionJelly Roll: A Blues, Young was Atticus Haygood Professor of English and Creative Writing atEmory University and curator of Emory'sRaymond Danowski Poetry Library. In March 2017, Young was named poetry editor ofThe New Yorker.

Born inLincoln, Nebraska, Young was the only child of two working parents, his father, Dr. Paul E. Young, was anophthalmologist and his mother, Dr. Azzie Young, achemist.^[4][5] Due to the careers of both of his parents, his family moved frequently throughout his youth. Young lived in six different places before he reached the age of ten,^[4] but his family ultimately settled inTopeka, Kansas. He first began to pursue writing when he was thirteen years old, after he attended a summer writing class atWashburn University.^[6]

Young attendedHarvard College, where he studied withSeamus Heaney andLucie Brock-Broido^[4] and became friends with writerColson Whitehead.^[7] He graduated in 1992, then held aStegner Fellowship atStanford University (1992–94), where he worked withDenise Levertov. He received hisMaster of Fine Arts fromBrown University, whereMichael S. Harper served as a significant influence.^[8]

While in Boston and Providence, he was part of the African-American poetry group theDark Room Collective.^[4] He is heavily influenced by the poetsLangston Hughes,John Berryman, andEmily Dickinson and by the artistJean-Michel Basquiat.

Young wrote much of his debut collection,Most Way Home, while still an undergraduate.^[9] Published byWilliam Morrow in 1995,^[7]Most Way Home was selected byLucille Clifton for the National Poetry Series and wonPloughshares' John C. Zacharis First Book Award.^[8] Writing inPloughshares, Rob Arnold observes that in that first book Young "explores his own family's narratives, showing an uncanny awareness of voice and persona."^[9]

Young has described his next three books –To Repel Ghosts (named for aJean-Michel Basquiat painting),Jelly Roll (a collection of love poems named forJelly Roll Morton), andBlack Maria – as an "American trilogy", calling the seriesDevil's Music.^[9]

Young's collectionThe Book of Hours (Knopf, 2014)^[10] won the 2015Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize.

Young is also the author ofFor The Confederate Dead, Dear Darkness,Blues Laws: Selected and Uncollected Poems 1995–2015 (2016)^[11] and editor ofGiant Steps: The New Generation of African American Writers (2000), Blues Poems (2003), Jazz Poems (2006), andJohn Berryman's Selected Poems (2004).^[9]

His poem "Black Cat Blues," originally published inThe Virginia Quarterly Review, was included inThe Best American Poetry 2005. Young's poetry has also appeared inThe New Yorker,Poetry Magazine,The Paris Review,Ploughshares, and other literary magazines. In 2007, he served as guest editor for an issue ofPloughshares.^[9] He has written on art and artists for museums in Los Angeles and Minneapolis.

His 2003 book of poemsJelly Roll was a finalist for theNational Book Award. Young was named aGuggenheim Foundation Fellow in 2003, as well as anNEA Literature Fellow in Poetry.^[12]

After stints at theUniversity of Georgia andIndiana University, Young taught writing atEmory University, where he was the Atticus Haygood Professor of English and Creative Writing, as well as the curator of the Raymond Danowski Poetry Library, a large collection of first and rare editions of poetry in English.^[13][14]

In September 2016,^[3] Young became the Director of theSchomburg Center for Research in Black Culture at theNew York Public Library.^[15]

In March 2017, he was named poetry editor ofThe New Yorker,^[4] to begin in November 2017.^[3]

Young is working on two books: a non-fiction book calledBunk on the U.S. history of lies and hoaxes, and a poetry collection that he has described as being "about African American history and also personal history, growing up in Kansas, which has a long black history including Langston Hughes and others."^[3]

In September 2020, he was named director of theNational Museum of African-American History and Culture, to begin in January 2021.^[2] Elected to theAmerican Academy of Arts and Sciences, theAmerican Academy of Arts and Letters, and theSociety of American Historians, Young was also named a Chancellor of theAcademy of American Poets in 2020.^[16] As of March 14, 2025, he has been on personal leave and is not leading the museum.^[17]

Young lives in Washington, DC.

• 1992:Harvard University, Thomas T. Hoopes Prize forMost Way Home (Thesis/dissertation)
• 1993: National Poetry Series (selection) byLucille Clifton forMost Way Home
• 1993:Ploughshares, John C. Zacharis First Book Prize forMost Way Home
• 2003: Patterson Poetry Prize^[9]
• 2003:National Book Award (Poetry) (finalist) forJelly Roll
• 2003:Los Angeles Times, Book Prize (Poetry) (finalist) forJelly Roll
• 2003:Guggenheim Fellowship^[18]
• 2007: Patterson Poetry Prize for Sustained Literary Achievement
• 2007:Quill Awards (Poetry) forFor the Confederate Dead
• 2009:United States Artists, Fellow Award^[19]
• 2009: Pat Conroy Southern Book Prize (Poetry) forDear Darkness
• 2013:National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism (finalist) forThe Grey Album^[20]
• 2013:PEN Open Book Award forThe Grey Album^[21]
• 2014:Claremont Graduate University,Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award forBook of Hours
• 2015: Black Caucus of the American Library Association Literary Award (Poetry) forBook of Hours
• 2015:Academy of American Poets,Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize forBook of Hours^[10]
• 2016:American Academy of Arts and Sciences
• 2016:National Book Award, Autobiography/Biography (Hardcover) (longlisted) forBlue Laws
• 2017: Thomas Wolfe Prize^[22]
• 2017:Anisfield-Wolf Book Award in Nonfiction forBunk
• 2017:Georgia Writers Hall of Fame Inductee^[23]
• 2017:National Book Critics Circle Award (finalist) forBunk
• 2017: PEN/Jean Stein Book Award (finalist) forBunk
• 2021:T. S. Eliot Prize (shortlist) forStones^[24]
• 2024:Harvard Arts Medal^[25]

This list isincomplete; you can help byadding missing items.(December 2022)

Collections

• Young, Kevin (1995).Most Way Home. New York, NY: William Morrow.ISBN 978-0-6881-4032-8.OCLC 30544468.
• Young, Kevin (2001).To Repel Ghosts: Five Sides in B Minor. Cambridge, MA: Zoland Books.ISBN 978-1-5819-5033-5.OCLC 45466205.
• Young, Kevin (2003).Jelly Roll: A Blues. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.ISBN 978-0-3754-1460-2.OCLC 49737128.
• Young, Kevin (2005).To Repel Ghosts: Remixed from the Original Masters. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf.ISBN 978-0-3757-1023-0.OCLC 57722526.
• Young, Kevin (produced and directed by) (2005).Black Maria: Being the Adventures of Delilah Redbone & A.K.A. Jones: Poems. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf.ISBN 978-1-4000-4209-8.OCLC 55511276.
• Young, Kevin (2007).For the Confederate Dead: Poems. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf.ISBN 978-0-3072-6435-0.OCLC 69734632.
• Young, Kevin (2008).Dear Darkness: Poems. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf.ISBN 978-0-3072-6434-3.OCLC 196315701.
• Young, Kevin (2011).Ardency: A Chronicle of the Amistad Rebels. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf.ISBN 978-0-3072-6764-1.OCLC 635461180.
• Young, Kevin (2014).Book of Hours: Poems. Alfred A. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group.ISBN 978-0-3072-7224-9.OCLC 844789963.
• Young, Kevin (2016).Blue Laws: Selected & Uncollected Poems, 1995-2015. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf.ISBN 978-0-3853-5150-8.OCLC 908838408.
• Young, Kevin (2018).Brown: Poems. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf.ISBN 978-1-5247-3255-4.OCLC 992437731.
• Young, Kevin (2021).Stones. London: Jonathan Cape Ltd.ISBN 1-78733-375-2.OCLC 1246285491.

Anthologies (edited)

• Young, Kevin, ed. (2003).Blues Poems. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf (Everyman's Library Pocket Poets).ISBN 978-0-3754-1458-9.OCLC 52312415.
• Berryman, John (2004). Young, Kevin (ed.).John Berryman: Selected Poems. New York, NY: Library of America.ISBN 978-1-9310-8269-3.OCLC 493664682.
• Young, Kevin, ed. (2006).Jazz Poems. London: Alfred A. Knopf (Everyman's Library Pocket Poets).ISBN 978-1-8415-9754-6.OCLC 988704157.
• Young, Kevin, ed. (2010).The Art of Losing: Poems of Grief and Healing. New York, NY: Bloomsbury.ISBN 978-1-6204-0484-3.OCLC 852253772.
• Young, Kevin, ed. (2012).The Hungry Ear: Poems of Food & Drink. New York, NY: Bloomsbury.ISBN 978-1-6081-9551-0.OCLC 778422545.
• Clifton, Lucille; Morrison, Toni (foreword by) (2012). Young, Kevin; Glaser, Michael S. (eds.).The Collected Poems of Lucille Clifton 1965-2010.ISBN 978-1-9426-8300-1.OCLC 912319753.

List of poems

• Young, Kevin (2017).Bunk: The Rise of Hoaxes, Humbug, Plagiarists, Phonies, Post-Facts, and Fake News. Minneapolis, MN: Graywolf Press.ISBN 978-1-5559-7791-7.OCLC 965739583.^[26][27][28]

• Young, Kevin (1992).Most Way Home (Thesis/dissertation). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University.OCLC 26555488.

Wikimedia Commons has media related toKevin Young.

• Official website
• Appearances onC-SPAN
• Kevin Young reading at the Key West Literary Seminar, 2008
• Biography at poets.org
• Reading his poem "Elegy, Father's Day", on Slate.com
• Levi Rubeck reviews Kevin Young's bookArdencyArchived 17 April 2011 at theWayback Machine
• Kevin Young Interview,failbetter, October 6, 2009

• 1970 births
• Living people
• Poets from Nebraska
• Harvard College alumni
• University of Georgia faculty
• Indiana University faculty
• Emory University faculty
• Writers from Lincoln, Nebraska
• The New Yorker editors
• American literary critics
• Brown University alumni
• African-American poets
• New York Public Library people
• American Book Award winners
• 20th-century American poets
• 21st-century American poets
• 20th-century American male writers
• 21st-century American male writers
• Poets from Kansas
• Writers from Topeka, Kansas
• 20th-century African-American writers
• 21st-century African-American writers
• Members of the American Academy of Arts and Letters
• Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

• Webarchive template wayback links
• Articles with short description
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• Use dmy dates from November 2017
• Incomplete lists from December 2022
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