A poet and a staff writer at The Atlantic, Clint Smith was born in New Orleans, Louisiana. He received a BA from Davidson College and a PhD in education from Harvard University. His debut poetry collection, Counting Descent (Write Bloody Publishing, 2016), won the Literary Award for Best Poetry Book from the Black Caucus of the American Library Association. His nonfiction book How the Word Is Passed (Little, Brown, 2021) was a number-one New York Times bestseller. He has received a Pushcart Prize and fellowships from the Art for Justice Fund and the Emerson Collective.
