Observable Readings: Carl Phillips & David Baker

Carl Phillips, professor of English, Washington University, is the author of 16 books of poetry, most recently Then the War: And Selected Poems 2007-2020 (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2022). His honors include the 2021 Jackson Prize, Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry, Kingsley Tufts Award, Lambda Literary Award, PEN/USA Award for Poetry, and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, Library of Congress, American Academy of Arts and Letters, and Academy of American Poets. Phillips has also written three prose books, most recently My Trade Is Mystery: Seven Meditations from a Life in Writing (Yale University Press, 2022); and he has translated the Philoctetes of Sophocles (Oxford University Press, 2004).

David Baker is author of 13 books of poetry, most recently Whale Fall, published in July by W. W. Norton, and Swift: New and Selected Poems, as well as six books of prose about poetry. Among his awards are prizes and grants from the Guggenheim Foundation, NEA, Mellon Foundation and Poetry Society of America. Baker’s poetry and essays have appeared in American Poetry Review, The Atlantic, The Nation, The New York Times, The New Yorker, Poetry and The Yale Review. He served for many years as poetry editor of The Kenyon Review, where he continues to curate the annual eco-poetry issue, “Nature’s Nature.” $5 suggested donation. See website for livestream.

Organized by St. Louis Poetry Center.