Ed Roberson Wins 2016 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize

Posted on May 23, 2016

Ed Roberson has been named the winner of the 2016 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. The annual prize honors a U.S. poet for outstanding lifetime achievement. It carries a $100,000 cash prize. It was established in 1986 by Ruth Lilly.

Roberson graduated from the University of Pittsburgh. His influences include his extensive travels, spirituals, the blues and visual art. Roberson has published ten books of poetry. His most recent collections include To See the Earth Before the End of the World (2010), The New Wing of the Labyrinth (2009) and City Eclogue (2006). Some of his other awards include the Lila Wallace Writers' Award, Shelley Memorial Award and the 2016 PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry.

Congratulations to Ed Roberson, winner of the 2016 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize! https://t.co/sqCT2SB7oa pic.twitter.com/yAATzhKz88

— Poetry Foundation (@PoetryFound) May 11, 2016

Poetry magazine editor Don Share says in the announcement, "In both language and in life (his studies have taken him to Alaska, South America, Africa and Bermuda), Ed Roberson is an explorer. Working at a healthy remove from the precincts of professional critics and tastemakers, but admired deeply by them, Roberson's ten books of poetry take readers, as they have taken the poet himself, to every corner of the vivid labyrinth of life."

Roberson's biography can be found here on the Poetry Foundation's website. Roberson has also taught at the at the University of Chicago and Northwestern University