Librarian of Congress appoints Natasha Trethewey Poet Laureate (USA)

Librarian of Congress James H. Billington has announced the appointment of Natasha Trethewey as the Library's Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry for 2012-2013. Trethewey, the 19th Poet Laureate, will take up her duties in the fall, opening the Library's annual literary season with a reading of her work on Thursday, September 13 in the Coolidge Auditorium. Her term will coincide with the 75th anniversary of the Library's Poetry and Literature Center and the 1937 establishment of the Consultant-in-Poetry position, which was changed by a federal law in 1986 to Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry