A living former United States Poet Laureate, Robert Pinsky served three consecutive terms from 1997 to 2000 and founded the Favorite Poem Project. Born in Long Branch, New Jersey, he received a BA from Rutgers University and an MA and PhD in philosophy from Stanford University, where he studied under Yvor Winters. His collections include Sadness and Happiness (Princeton University Press, 1975), History of My Heart (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1984), The Want Bone (Ecco Press, 1990), Gulf Music (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2007), and Proverbs of Limbo (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2024). His verse translation The Inferno of Dante received the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. He teaches at Boston University.
